Grant: Collaborative Health Research Projects

In normal individuals, most skin wounds close within a few days. However, in patients with*diabetes or vascular problems skin wounds can stay open leading to development of a*""chronic"" or non-healing wound. Such wounds commonly cause tremendous psychological*and physical suffering for the patient, and often result in limb amputation and even death.*Despite extensive research, reproducible treatments for non-healing dermal wounds remain*elusive. Skin is composed of many different protein types, which change when skin is injured.*Proteins such as collagen provide structural support, but another type known as matricellular*proteins are produced in the wound bed and form a scaffold that cells attach to and move on.*However, these proteins provide cells the instructions on how to repair the tissue. These*proteins are not normally present, but are upregulated after injury. However, our analysis of*chronic wounds has found that two of these matricellular proteins, periostin and connective*tissue growth factor (CCN2) are missing and no scaffold is formed in the wound, meaning it is*unable to repair. Periostin and CCN2 are very important in shutting down inflammation and*inducing the next phase of repair, where cells move into the wound and make new tissue. We*made scaffolds composed of fibres of periostin and CCN2 and demonstrated that they caused*cells to enter the wound and close it in diabetic mice. Furthermore, they helped attract blood*vessels into the wounds. We have now formed a multi-disciplinary collaborative research*team consisting of biologists, engineers, imaging specialists, a veterinarian, clinicians and*industrial collaborators Advanced BioMatrix, to optimize maufacturing protocols and move our*work into a large animal model that would be required prior to testing of the scaffolds in*humans. If successful, this proposal will lead to the development of new materials that could*be used to make chronic skin wounds close.