Grant: Emerging Team Grant: Regenerative Medicine and Nanomedicine - LOI

This proposal targets primarily cardiovascular diseases, a leading public health problem worldwide. Our pioneering research in regenerative medicine, a field using special cells (stem and progenitor cells) to repair damaged blood vessels and in nanotechnology (very small technological instruments) provided us with the clear indication that, in the near future, it will be possible to apply this knowledge to repair injured blood vessels and heart. The actual proposed strategy is to use nanotechnologies to optimize characteristics of those cells such as to enhance their ability to reach and attach to injured tissues in a way to improve vascular (endothelium) and cardiac (myocardium) healing in patients after a heart attack. This could reduce the risk of a second heart attack, a suddent death or the development of heart failure.Funding this new emerging team will lead to more effective ways to treat patients and reduce the occurrence of these complications and the cost for the Canadian health system.