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.
Sirtuin Regulation of Aging Human Adipose Tissue
Ivona Percec MD PhD
2012
The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania
National Endowment for Plastic Surgery Grant
General Reconstructive, Tissue Engineering
The goal of this project is to investigate the function of the sirtuin genes in aging human primary adipose tissue, to determine the epigenetic modifications leading to adipose senescence, and to identify specific epigenetic targets for stem-cell based regenerative medicine interventions. While adipose tissue plays a central role in metabolism, caloric restriction pathways, and is the largest known reservoir of adult stem cells, the epigenetic factors resulting in human adipose senescence are poorly understood. This work aims to broaden our understanding of normal tissue aging and advance the treatment and prevention of age-related pathologies. Specifically, the proposed work will: 1) validate a functional role for the sirtuin genes in human adipose aging; 2) establish critical sirtuin modifiers and target proteins that are specific to human adipose aging by sirtuin ChIP-seq analyses; 3) determine whether positive and negative sirtuin regulators can recapitulate youthful or aged phenotypes in human adipose-derived stem cells. Understanding the mechanisms of sirtuin gene activity in human aging through the study of primary human adipose tissue as proposed by this work will expand our understanding of human cellular and tissue aging, ultimately leading to advances in stem-cell based regenerative medicine and reconstructive surgery therapies.
Ivona Percec, MD, PhD is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Plastic Surgery at Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA. She completed her undergraduate work in molecular biology and medieval history at Princeton University and her medical degree and doctorate in genetics from the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. She completed her residency training at the Division of Plastic Surgery at the University of Pennsylvania. After she completed her training, Dr. Percec joined the Faculty of the Division of Plastic Surgery at the University of Pennsylvania, where she divides her time between her clinical practice focused on aesthetic and rejuvenative surgery and her basic science laboratory that studies epigenetic pathways responsible for human adipose tissue and stem cell aging. Dr. Percec is board certified in plastic surgery by the American Board of Plastic Surgery. She regularly presents her work at national and international meetings and has authored numerous publications in both the plastic surgery and basic science literature. Dr. Percec has received many awards for her work and is dedicated to the advancement of the translational science of aging through the study of primary human adipose tissue.