Grants We Funded
Grant applicants for the 2023 cycle requested a total of nearly $4 million dollars. The PSF Study Section Subcommittees of Basic & Translational Research and Clinical Research evaluated nearly 140 grant applications on the following topics:
The PSF awarded research grants totaling over $1 million dollars to support nearly 30 plastic surgery research proposals.
ASPS/PSF leadership is committed to continuing to provide high levels of investigator-initiated research support to ensure that plastic surgeons have the needed research resources to be pioneers and innovators in advancing the practice of medicine.
Research Abstracts
Search The PSF database to have easy access to full-text grant abstracts from past PSF-funded research projects 2003 to present. All abstracts are the work of the Principal Investigators and were retrieved from their PSF grant applications. Several different filters may be applied to locate abstracts specific to a particular focus area or PSF funding mechanism.
Decellularized Nerve Allografts and Motor Nerve Regeneration
Michael Nicoson MD
2009
Washington University in St. Louis
Pilot Research Grant
Hand or Upper Extremity, Microsurgery
Nerve injuries are a complex and challenging surgical problem. Though a variety of causative factors lead to such peripheral nerve injuries including trauma and obstetric complications, the ongoing military operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan have and will continue to lead to numerous nerve injuries. The treatment of nerve injuries can be approached via several therapeutic measures. The success of nerve autografts is known, but also the limitations. For instance, the nerve harvest locations may be inaccessible by concomitant injuries, such as thermal disruption due to blast injuries. Nerve allografts are of unlimited supply but have the requirement and risk of systemic immunosuppression. Recently, decellularized nerve allografts have become an alternative to the two prior techniques, as they are easily available and the decellularization process reduces the immunogenicity of the grafts. Our group performed a comparative study of a decellularized allograft in a rat sciatic nerve model and found that the endoneurial conduits remained intact, and laminin was present in the decellularized grafts. While axonal regeneration was not equivalent to an isograft, the rat decellularized allograft performed better than the most commonly used commercially available nerve conduit at both 14 mm and 28 mm gap lengths (Neuragen, Integra, Inc.). We hypothesize that the addition of a motor specific neurotrophic factor, GDNF, to the decellularized allograft will enhance axonal regeneration and improve end organ function to the level of an isograft. It has been shown that GDNF has a significant long-term survival effect on motoneurons in the setting of nerve injury and models of motoneuron disease. As the need for an "off the shelf'" alternative to autografting becomes more apparent, especially in the light of our war victims, the findings of this study could certainly translate to improved clinical treatment of peripheral nerve injuries.
Dr. Nicoson is a graduate of the University of Louisville School of Medicine, and currently a resident in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at Washington University in St. Louis. His current research interests include peripheral nerve regeneration after traumatic injury, nerve-allotransplantation, and the interface of neurotrophic factors in the nerve regeneration process. Dr. Nicoson recently received grant funding from a 2009 PSEF Pilot Research Grant for his project titled Decellularized Nerve Allografts and Motor Nerve Regeneration.