Orthopedics This Week | December 5, 2017 | Page 15
ORTHOPEDICS THIS WEEK
VOLUME 13, ISSUE 38 | DECEMBER 5, 2017
award from the New Jersey Research
and Development Council for their
invention of piezoelectric material,
which produces an electrical charge
in response to a mechanical force. The
group’s repair strategy is to build a
piezoelectric scaffold with neural cells
to try to regenerate nerve tissue in spi-
nal cord injuries.
“Axons—the nerve fibers that trans-
mit messages—can potentially travel
long distances if given the right cues
to regrow. We knew that an electri-
cal charge could direct this growth,”
Arinzeh said, adding, “Some tissues in
the body are naturally piezoelectric.
What we did was to create a fibrous
material that is similar, but with a high-
er charge to stimulate growth.”
The Department of Defense, which
seeks research into remedies for trau-
matic battle injuries, learned of the scaf-
folds. Arinzeh understood and shared
the department’s concern. “There is
15
no effective treatment for severe spinal
cord injuries, and soldiers can remain
completely paralyzed for the rest of
their lives,” she noted. job will be to restore existing cells by
stimulating them to extend their axons.
With funding from the agency, the tech-
nology is being tested at several loca-
tions. One is the University of Miami
Miller School of Medicine, where
Arinzeh is working with Mary Bunge,
Ph.D., a neuroscientist, and her former
student. The Miami Project is currently in phase I
clinical trials with humans as well. They
are testing the use of Schwann cells for
spinal cord repair. By combining those
cells with piezoelectric scaffolds, “we
hope to improve the cells’ survival and
their effectiveness when implanted into
the spinal cord,” Arinzeh says.
They are injecting Schwann cells from
the peripheral nervous system, which
produces the myelin sheath around
nerve axons, in combination with the
piezoelectric scaffold.
Other testing is examining the efficacy
of injecting Schwann cells from the
peripheral nervous system, which pro-
duce the myelin sheath around nerve
axons, in combination with the piezo-
electric scaffold, for spinal cord repair.
Their hope is that the Schwann cells’
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“The nice thing about Schwann cells is
that they’re readily accessible from low-
risk sites like limbs. I think of them as
‘facilitator cells’ because they provide
the signals that prompt axons to grow
and reach their targets which are other
neurons,” she adds.
In the pre-clinical studies, Arinzeh
found that implanted scaffolds with
Schwann cells would extend themselves
over a 5mm gap in the spinal cord. “The
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