Optimal Stem Cell Type for and Effect of Donor Demographics on Engineered Autologous Human Blood Vessels

Description of projects available to graduate students:
The goal of this project is to begin the process of clinical translation of our lab’s novel, autologous, stem cell-based tissue engineered vascular graft (TEVG). This will be achieved by first determining the most successful human mesenchymal stem cell (hMSC) type in terms of a TEVG implant, and then assess the effect of donor gender, age and diabetes, a common cardiovascular risk factor, on the effectiveness of the TEVG. We will evaluate muscle-derived pericytes (MDPs), muscle-derived slow-adhering cells (MDSACs), fresh isolated adiopose-derived stem cells (fADSCs) or culture expanded ADSCs (cADSCs) and assess which will perform in the TEVG model better than the others. All four cell types appear very promising based on pilot studies performed, but a rigorous study is needed to determine which one is most effective in a TEVG application. A careful, head-to-head comparison of TEVGs using all four cell types isolated from the same donor will allow this determination. We will also evaluate whether the seeded stem cells will behave variably in the TEVG model based on donor gender, age and the presence of the cardiovascular disease risk-factor diabetes. Gender, age and diabetes have all been shown to influence CVD development and treatment efficacy. It is important to understand whether a stem cell-based TEVG using cells from all patients will be feasible, or if certain factors (i.e., male or female gender, advanced age, with or without diabetes) preclude this therapy.

Techniques graduate student will learn:
Stem cell isolation from tissue; stem cell culture; cell sorting; cell seeding into TEVG scaffolds; rat surgery; histology; biological imaging; biomechanical testing.