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.
Inhibition of Skin Rejection in Composite Tissue Allotranplantation by Using migratory Inhibitors for Topical Immunosuppression
Stefan Schneeberger MD
2008
University of Pittsburgh
National Endowment
Technology Based
In the project described here, the effect of local immunosuppression in the skin as the component representing the primary target for rejection in composite tissue allotransplantation is addressed. In contrast to previous attempts, the investigators aim for inhibition of lymphocyte infiltration and not for inactivation of previously infiltrated lymphocytes while avoiding an immunosuppressive "overkill" and interference with the known tolerogeneic effect resulting from the continuous antigen presentation to the recipient of a composite tissue allograft. For this purpose, four inhibitors of lymphocyte migration (anti-CD11a-Ab, anti-ICAM-1-Ab, Efomycine M and Bb15-42) have been selected and will be studied for their efficacy in prevention of rejection in experimental rat models for vascularized skin and limb transplantation. All of these compounds act on lymphocyte adhesion, rolling or transmigration, Inhibition of lymphocyte migration into the skin shall ultimately allow for profound reduction or avoidance of systemically applied long term immunosuppression in composite tissue transplantation involving the skin. Inhibition of lymphocyte trafficking will be combined with a steroid free immunosuppressive protocol using a depletional polyclonal antibody (ALG) followed by very low dose monotherapy with Tacrolimus. This approach provides a clinically oriented protocol for immunosuppression with minimal toxicity in hand transplantation and any other type of CTA that includes the skin. In preliminary experiments, Bb15-42 was tested in a Brown-Norway to Lewis rat hind-limb allotransplant model. Untreated controls were compared with a group receiving Bb15-42 (5mg/kg) and sub-therapeutic doses of Tacrolimus (0.1 mg/kg). Treatment with Bb15-42 together and sub-therapeutic doses of Tacrolimus significantly prolonged limb allograft survival from 7 +/- 0 days to 17.25 +/-2.872 days (p=0.0056). Although hand transplantation is of major current interest for reconstruction of a variety of defects, there is an urgent need for minimizing toxicity of the required immunosuppressive treatment. The protocol described here shall ultimately allow for clinical application of hand transplantation thus avoiding the severe side effects associated with high dose long-term systemic immunosuppression. This would allow for the wide spread application of composite tissue allotransplantation as a therapeutic option for a great variety of disabling and disfiguring injuries.