Development of a novel wound dressing to mimic the extracellular matrix and promote healing.

Chronic wounds are a significant global problem, causing patient morbidity and a substantial financial burden on health services worldwide. The incidence of chronic wounds is currently rising because those populations most susceptible, the elderly and diabetic, are rapidly expanding1. In 2014, the annual NHS spend on wound care was estimated at £2 billion2, while in the U.S. an estimated US$25 billion is spent on their treatment3.

Approximately 40-60% of chronic wounds do not heal within 3 months with standard moist wound care and therefore more advanced wound therapies are often used4. The extracellular matrix (ECM) of chronic wounds is dysfunctional and thus a variety of topical therapies which supplement or mimic the ECM have been developed to promote healing. Collagen is the main component of the ECM, providing a scaffold for cell migration, binding and inactivating proteinases, and simulating cell signalling through integrin binding. Collagen dressings are becoming increasingly popular; however, in chronic wounds both the ECM and cells are dysfunctional, therefore the addition of an ECM component, such as collagen, does not always translate to clinical efficacy.

This studentship will investigate the effects of different ECM components on healing by utilising sophisticated methods (electrospinning and nanofiber technologies) of generating ECM matrices which more closely mimic native ECM and therefore are more likely to support cell migration. In addition, the student will determine whether incorporating a biologically active additive into a collagen/ECM dressing to stimulate dysfunctional wound cells has synergistic effects on healing by promoting cellular-EMC interactions.

There are numerous beneficiaries of this Advanced Biomedical Materials CDT. Firstly and of short term impact are the PhD students themselves. They will receive extensive research specific and professional/transferable skills training throughout the 4 years of the programme. They will have access to state of the art facilties and world leading academics, industry and clinicians. The training and potential placements are designed to maximise the impact of their research in terms of dissemination and movement of their research along the translation pathway.

Longer term benefits are that this distinct cohort will become the future UK Biomedical Materials leaders and be able to use their bespoke training and network within the cohort to collaborate on future worldwide funding opportunities and drive UK research in this area.

UK and international academics will benefit as they will gain the next generation of highly skilled postdoctoral researchers with knowledge and expertise not only in their specific research area but of industry, regulatory and clinical aspects.

UK and international industry will benefit - in the short term they will gain academic based research to further develop products and in the longer term have a pool of highly skilled graduates.

Clinicians will benefit from collaborative research and also the development of new and novel products to enhance the treatment of a variety of trauma and disease based needs from biomaterials.

The public will benefit as end users as patients that will have their quality of life improved from the products developed in the CDT and will be educated in novel technologies and materials to repair the human body. The UK economy will benefit from the reduced healthcare costs associated with the new and improved medical products developed in this CDT and subsequently from the trained graduates. The UK economy will also benefit from the increased revenue from medical sales products from the UK industrial partners we will be working with.

The impact of this CDT will be realised by direct academic, clinical and industrial engagement with the students allowing efficient and state of the at training and fast translation of developing products. Students will also be trained in knowledge exchange and will use these skills to disseminate their research to, and liaise with, the key stakeholders - the academic, industrial, clinical and public sectors. We will ensure widening participation routes are addressed in this CDT in order to include equality and diversity not only in our initial CDT student cohort but in future researcher generations to come.