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.
Bioprinting Tissue Engineered Intramembranous Bone Constructs
Darren Smith MD
2011
University of Pittsburgh
Defects requiring craniofacial reconstruction, especially in children, are often complicated by a limited supply of bone. Tissue engineering is a potentially valuable strategy in repairing these deformities. Some of the most promising results have come in the form of BMP-2-generated endochondral bone. However, most calvarial bone is intramembranous in origin. BMP-2-based successes in cranial bone generation are therefore essentially creating ectopic bone at an orthotopic site, and it is not certain that this endochondral bone is ideally suited to respond to local environmental cues. The central hypothesis of this study is that by leveraging emerging bioprinting technologies to deposit precise doses and patterns of proteins known to play a key role in intramembranous ossification, we can enhance existing molecular osteoinductive pathways for calvarial defect repair. Specific Aim 1 is to compare the efficacy of different doses of TGF-B1 and TGF-B2 bio-printed on acellular dermal matrix (ADM) in generating intramembranous bone to repair calvarial defects. We will achieve Specific Aim 1 by testing the osteoinductive capacity of different doses of TGF-B1 and TGF-B2 bioprinted on ADM in a rabbit calvarial defect model. Specific Aim 2 is to evaluate the utility of printing FGF in combination with the ideal dose of whichever TGF-B isoform proves most osteoinductive in Specific Aim 1. We will achieve Specific Aim 2 by printing variable doses of FGF in combination with the ideal dose of the most osteoinductive TGFB isoform identified in Specific Aim 1 in an effort to produce an intramembranous osteoinductive synergy between the selected TGF-B isoform and FGF. The potential impact of this work is the development of a tissue engineering strategy that enhances local calvarial osteoinductive pathways to physiologically heal bone defects in the craniofacial skeleton. Calvarial reconstruction would no-longer be complicated by donor site morbidity and tissue shortages.