July 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 7| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Pittsburgh Craniofacial Sciences Training Program (PCSTP) With funding from the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Dental & Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), the University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine will establish a new Research Training Program aimed at preparing the next generation of Craniofacial/Dental focused scientists. Major research foci at Pitt Dental are Craniofacial/Dental Genetics and Craniofacial/Dental Tissue Regeneration as well as translational research. Trainees will be included at both the pre-doctoral and post-doctoral levels. The project principal investigator is McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine faculty member Charles Sfeir, DDS, PhD [...]

June 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 6| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Dr. Stephen Badylak Named Inaugural Winner of the Jensen Tissue Engineering Award McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine Deputy Director Stephen Badylak, DVM, PhD, MD, is the inaugural winner of the Jensen Tissue Engineering Award. This award—a gift from Ole Jensen, DDS, MS, a world-renowned oral surgeon and innovative businessman—was established “to recognize an individual (anywhere in the world) for sustained scientific contributions, translational impact towards clinical realization, and professional distinction in the field of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.” Dr. Badylak will receive his award during the upcoming TERMIS-AM Meeting in Toronto [...]

May 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 5| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Recruiting Patients - Clinical Trial – Volumetric Muscle Loss We previously reported the results of a study conducted by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine that showed significant improvement in strength and range of motion, as well as evidence for skeletal muscle regeneration, in 13 patients who were surgically implanted with bioscaffolds derived from pig tissue to treat muscle injuries. The patients had failed to respond to conventional treatment before use of the extracellular matrix (ECM). The findings were published online in [...]

April 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 4| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Drs. Kacey Marra and Eric Lagasse Recognized During Pitt’s Celebration of Innovation Drs. Kacey Marra (top) and Eric Lagasse The University of Pittsburgh Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship presented its 2022 Celebration of Innovation on April 21, 2022. This event recognized the achievements of Pitt faculty and student innovators who are seeking to improve people’s lives through the commercialization of their ideas and discoveries. In addition to recognizing all faculty and students who submitted an invention disclosure, were issued a U.S. patent, or had their innovation licensed, there were seven [...]

March 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 3| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Dr. David Kaczorowski on Xenotransplantation McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine affiliated faculty member David Kaczorowski, MD, Surgical Director of the Advanced Heart Failure Center of UPMC Heart and Vascular Institute and an Associate Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, University of Pittsburgh, was a member of the surgical team on the historic first successful transplant of a porcine heart into an adult human with end-stage heart disease. As a follow-up to this extraordinary accomplishment by the surgical team, Dr. Kaczorowski published an article entitled, “Organs from genetically engineered pigs may [...]

February 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 2| www.McGowan.pitt.edu New Peer-Reviewed Publication Expanding Liver Regeneration Technology McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine faculty member Eric Lagasse, PharmD, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology at the University of Pittsburgh and a co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of LyGenesis, a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing cell therapies for patients with end stage liver disease, Type 1 diabetes, end stage renal disease, single enzyme deficiencies, and aging. A decade ago, Dr. Lagasse, a world leader in ectopic transplantation research conducted at his McGowan Institute laboratory, began a series of experiments that would [...]

January 2022 | VOL. 21, NO. 1| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Dr. David Kaczorowski Member of Surgical Team on Historic First Successful Transplant of Porcine Heart into Adult Human with End-Stage Heart Disease In a first-of-its-kind surgery, a 57-year-old patient with terminal heart disease received a successful transplant of a genetically modified pig heart and is still doing well three days later. It was the only currently available option for the patient. The historic surgery was conducted by University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) faculty at the University of Maryland Medical Center (UMMC), together known as the University of Maryland Medicine. Bartley [...]

December 2021 | VOL. 20, NO. 12| www.McGowan.pitt.edu Study Identifies Factor in ‘Young Blood’ That Helps Rejuvenate Aged Mouse Muscle As we age, our muscles gradually become smaller, weaker, and less able to heal after injury. In a new study, University of Pittsburgh and UPMC researchers pinpoint an important mediator of youthfulness in mouse muscle, a discovery that could advance muscle regeneration therapies for older people. Published in Nature Aging, the study demonstrates that circulating shuttles called extracellular vesicles, or EVs, deliver genetic instructions for the longevity protein known as Klotho to muscle cells. Loss of muscle function and impaired [...]