Speaker：Prof.Jons Hilborn,Uppsala Universit
Time: Tuesday,10:00 a.m.,29th March
Place：A718,SINANO
Abstract：Worldwide, patients continue to suffer from lack of bone. Gold standard treatment is the use of autologous bone graft obtained from the patient. This bone source has a limited quantity and the quality is dependent on the individual patient. Thus, bone repair by tissue engineering systems has attracted broad attention. Despite the continuing development of hormones and other bone-stimulating molecules, bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) remain the most potent inducers of bone formation. In particular, BMP-2 is widely recognized to be a powerful osteoinductive factor. Endogenous BMP-2 is also important for normal bone homeostasis and is upregulated immediately following bone trauma by recruitment, proliferation and differentiation of osteoprogenitor cells. In the clinical setting, BMP-2 absorbed into a bovine collagen type I sponge in the treatment of degenerative disc disease and fracture non-union but its usefulness has been questioned. BMP-2 efficacy in a clinical setting is remarkably low and milligram doses of the growth factor are needed to obtain therapeutic effects. As a result, other methods to stimulate bone growth are being explored.
One potentially much more powerful option that has been suggested since some time, is to affect target cells on the mRNA level instead of the protein level. However, despite the advances in designing and understanding the role of nucleic acid in several disease states, clinical translation of nucleic acid based therapy has met with limited success. This failure is attributed to our limited success in translocating these useful molecules through the cell membrane and out of the endosome using safe and nontoxic methods. In order to overcome this, we have developed a carrier-free concept that has the potential for therapeutic applications.
Bio：Jons Hilborn is since 2001 the head of the Polymer Chemistry program at the Department of Materials Chemistry, Uppsala University in Sweden. Currently he serves president of “Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society” (TERMIS) which he was a part of creating. He has extensive management experience from life science industry and coordination of European projects. His research interests are in the design, synthesis and preparation of polymers and specifically materials for tissue scaffolds and as delivery vehicles. Current focus is on injectable in-vivo gel forming matrices that acts on endogenous cells to regenerate bone. Chemistry, biology, engineering is combined with medicine to bring basic research findings from the lab bench to the clinic and commercial applications. Effort is also being placed on the reason for the formation of a fibrotic capsule around implants where recent findings suggest that biomechanics is one key promoter. He received his PhD from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm which was followed by seven years in industry before he joined the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Switzerland for eight years. He is a frequently invited speaker at international events and has published some 150 scientific papers, 26 patents and has started 4 companies.
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