Mcgowan Institute For Regenerative Medicine

Our last podcast featured the bioengineer responsible for much of today’s artificial heart technology. Now meet Dr. Robert Kormos, a clinician who has used those artificial hearts to help people survive until donor hearts were available. Some patients even recovered enough heart function to eliminate the need for transplantation. Dr. Kormos is the [...]

Twenty years ago, a pioneering team of clinicians and engineers had a vision to use a mechanical heart-assist device as an aid to a patient with a failing heart, and to ascertain if such a heart assist device could serve as a “bridge” for an ailing heart until a transplantable organ became available. [...]

Fifty years ago, Uncas Whitaker – the founder of the Harrisburg, PA-based electrical connector company AMP -- foresaw what engineers could do for medicine and human health. In 1975, he established a nonprofit foundation to help advance medical science and heal the sick and injured. Until its planned closing in summer 2006, the [...]

In podcast #16, learn about two technologies that help keep tissues oxygenated in dire times. Dr. William Federspiel is developing devices that do some of the lungs’ critical work of adding oxygen to blood and removing carbon dioxide. These aren’t ventilators, which mechanically inflate the lungs with air, but small devices that can [...]

In podcast #15, we’ll meet two researchers with very different approaches to tissue regeneration. We met both at the 2006 Regenerate World Congress in April. First we’ll hear from Dr. Kevin Shakesheff  of the University of Nottingham. He is developing new scaffolds from a familiar material: polylactic acid, the same stuff that makes [...]

In podcast #14 we’ll meet two more researchers who visited Pittsburgh for the 2006 Regenerate World Congress. Dr. Malla Padidam of the biotech company RheoGene (now merged with Intrexon Corporation) describes their gene switch, a molecule that can turn a gene on or off at a particular time to precisely guide the growth of [...]

Bone Tissue Engineering In podcast #13, we talk with Professor Jöns Hilborn and Dr. Ivan Martin, two experts in bone tissue engineering who attended the 2006 Regenerate World Congress in April. Professor Hilborn of the Department of Materials Chemistry at Sweden’s Uppsala University is engineering cells to produce customized extracellular matrices, which his [...]

Science Outside the Laboratory In podcast #12, we talk with two more experts who attended the 2006 Regenerate World Congress in April: policy advisor Dr. David Williams and Ms. Mary Ann Liebert, a publisher. Dr. Williams is an internationally recognized scientist and a leader in the development of policy and regulations related to regenerative [...]

The First Laboratory-Grown Organ Dr. Anthony Atala made headlines in April 2006 when he announced that his team had successfully grown new bladders for seven patients with spina bifida, a condition in which the spinal column fails to completely close during fetal development. While healthy bladders maintain a reasonably low pressure as they [...]

When the spinal cord is injured, commands and sensations can’t travel between the limbs and the brain, so arms and legs are can’t respond to the will to move. Until recently, physicians have not been able to offer spinal cord injury patients much hope for regaining function. But if the brain’s intention could [...]

Each year, approximately 200,000 persons in the United States suffer tears of their anterior cruciate ligament (ACL).  Approximately 2/3 of those tears require surgical reconstruction (1/3 at the time of injury and 1/3 at a later time). While orthopaedic surgeons are on the front line to repair tears of the ACL, Dr. Savio [...]

You can’t make a working synthetic tissue or joint until you fully understand how a natural one functions. That’s the mantra of Dr. Van Mow, who has led the field of  tissue engineering decades, and a co-creator of the generalized theory of classical mechanics, which makes it possible to calculate the mechanical loads [...]

This podcast is required listening for anyone who looks at an academic medical center and sees only a large hospital. According to Carolyn Green, Director of the Office of Enterprise Development, Health Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, publicly-funded research institutions like medical centers are important natural resources that stimulate knowledge and economies. In this [...]

Modern knee and hip replacement procedures rely on a number of advanced materials, as well as the effectiveness of the bond between the joint appliance and the patient’s bone that the artificial joint must bond with. In podcast #6, we'll hear from Dr. Andrés García. Dr. Garcia's research centers on cellular and tissue [...]

A impaired heart can doom a person to a shortened life span of limited mobility, each movement a tremendous effort. More than 13 million Americans suffer from heart disease. Each year, 500,000 Americans are diagnosed with heart failure, the most severe form of heart disease. Heart disease can be treated with medications and [...]

Our heart pumps about 2,000 gallons of blood each day. Our heart valves ensure all that blood moves in the right direction. When a heart valve fails, the heart must work harder to keep organs properly nourished. If the heart works too hard, it can begin to weaken and fail. Malfunctioning heart valves [...]

Regenerative Medicine Today welcomes Stephen Badylak, DVM, PhD, MD; Dr. Badylak is a Professor in the Department of Surgery, a deputy director of the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, and Director of the Center for Pre-Clinical Tissue Engineering within the Institute. Dr. Badylak discusses his research with extra cellular matrix, or ECM. For [...]

Regenerative Medicine Today welcomes Dr. Alyssa Panitch, who is an Assistant Professor in the Harrington Department of Bioengineering at Arizona State University. In this podcast she discusses her research into methods to improve regeneration of the central nervous system. Hosts: John Murphy and Leah Kauffman For more information about the McGowan Institute for [...]

Regenerative Medicine Today welcomes Dr. Alan Russell. Dr. Russell is the Founding Director of the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine. In this inaugural podcast, he discusses the current state of regenerative medicine and where it is headed in the future. Hosts John Murphy and Leah Kauffman For more information about the McGowan Institute [...]