Novel stem cell technology developed at the Swinburne University of Technology will be used to grow the massive number of stem cells required for a new hand-held 3D printer that will enable surgeons to create patient-specific bone and cartilage.
The technology, called BioSphere, is being developed in collaboration with St. Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, to support the development of Biopen.
The Biopen is a hand-held 3D printer pen filled with stem cell ink that will allow surgeons to repair damaged bone and cartilage by “drawing” new cells directly onto bone during surgery and then filling in any damaged areas.
The BioSphere technology is part of Yashaswini Vegi’s Ph.D. project within the ARC Training Centre for Biodevices at Swinburne in partnership with St. Vincent’s.
“In the near future, advancements in stem cell technology will enable the use of a patient’s own stem cells to efficiently repair damaged cartilage and bone,” says Dr. Nicholas Reynolds. This breakthrough leverages stem cells’ unique capability to transform into diverse cells and tissues, facilitating bone and cartilage regeneration within the patient. Stem cells are extracted, cultivated in the lab, and converted into the required tissue type before being re-implanted into the injured body part via the Biopen.”
Reynolds says progress in this field has been slowed by a lack of means to generate the very large number of cells required for successful treatments and also a lack of methods to recover the cells from the ‘dishes’ they are grown on without damaging them.
The BioSphere technology will replace dishes with thousands of polymer beads less than a millimeter in diameter.
“This will vastly increase the available area for the cells to grow on enabling researchers to generate many more cells than is currently possible,” Reynolds says.
“The surface of the beads will utilize stem cell technology, coated with light-sensitive nanoparticles that do not affect the cells’ growth until the particles are activated with an infra-red beam. At this point, the activated nanoparticles cause the cells to gently detach from the beads, and can be easily recovered for re-implantation into the injured patient.”
The Biopen is one of 11 projects selected for the first round of the $35 million BioMedTech Horizons program investment recently announced by the Minister for Health, the Hon Greg Hunt MP.
“This funding provides valuable support for the ongoing BioSphere project undertaken between Swinburne and St. Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne and further strengthens Swinburne’s involvement in the Aikenhead Centre of Medical Discovery initiative,” says Vegi’s co-supervisor and Bioengineering Program Leader — Iverson Health Innovation Research Institute, Professor Simon Moulton.
The BioMedTech Horizons program aims to leverage stem cell technology to propel Australia move more cutting edge-ideas and breakthrough discoveries towards proof-of-concept and commercialization, and stimulate collaboration across disciplines between the research, industry, and technology sectors to maximize entrepreneurship and idea potential.
Source: http://www.swinburne.edu.au/news/latest-news/2018/04/swinburne-stem-cell-technology-aids-3d-printed-cartilage-repair.php
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