We are part of the The Innovate UK – Accelerated Knowledge Transfer (AKT) scheme in collaboration with 3D Bio-Tissues Limited, to share our tissue engineering skills, and in particular our expertise of collagen hydrogels and of compressive testing, to develop and validate new models for testing of ocular toxicity.

Grant funded: 2024 AKTP – 3D Bio-Tissues (lead PI: Dr K Pirog)

JGW Patterson foundation have kindly sponsored our study to further refine the modulation of an osteoarthritis susceptibility locus as potential therapy for OA and generate preclinical data leading to novel therapy for osteoarthritis.

Grant funded: 2024-2025 Potential therapy for osteoarthritis (lead PI: Dr K Pirog)

We are researching the molecular mechanisms triggered by the hemiepiphysiodesis, a corrective surgery approach used in guided growth, which is quite commonly applied in skeletal dysplasia patients. In this project, kindly funded by the Newcastle Hospitals Charity Trust, and driven by our Clinical PhD student and Paediatric Orthopaedic Surgical Trainee Anna Porter, we will use our tissue engineered model of cartilage and human primary cells collected during the corrective surgical procedures performed at Newcastle upon Tyne hospitals to study the effect of hemiepiphysiodesis on cartilage and the mechanism of the subsequent rebound growth. We will also establish a patient group to help us drive the project and inform on quality of life outcomes.

Grant funded: 2023-2026 Healthy and dysplastic chondrocyte (lead PI: Dr K Pirog, co-I Dr Kenneth Rankin)

We are part of the Horizon Europe MSCA project CHANGE (Cellular Homeostasis ANd AGing in Connective TissuE Disorders), uniting 10 universities and 5 companies across Europe to provide PhD training and knowledge transfer to increase our capacity to study molecular pathways and multimorbidities in rare and common musculoskeletal conditions.

Grant funded: 2022-2026 HORIZON-MSCA-2021-DN-01 CHANGE (101072766; Newcastle PIs – lead PI: Dr K Pirog also as work package lead (WP6), co-I: Prof M Briggs)

The NC3Rs have kindly funded our PhD project that combines the expertise of two supervisors (a cartilage biologist and a tissue engineer) to develop a zonally stratified mechanically responsive tissue engineered model of young and old human articular cartilage using human primary chondrocytes cultured in different hydrogels and/or bioprinting and use it to generate a transcriptomic profile of healthy cartilage ageing.

Grant funded: 2021-2024 Investigating biomechanical responses in healthy and diseased ageing cartilage – a tissue engineering approach (lead PI: Dr K Pirog, co-I: Dr Ana Ferreira Duarte)

Collaborations:

We are part of the collaborative MRC project grant awarded to the Newcastle and Liverpool Universities to investigate the impact of mechanical trauma on the progression of two age-related skeletal complications (osteoarthritis and osteochondritis dissecans) in genetically engineered mouse models of skeletal dysplasia.

Grant funded: 2023-2025 Defining the role of aggrecan and type IX collagen in osteoarthritis and osteochondritis dissecans through in vivo studies of genetic bone diseases (lead PI: Prof Michael Briggs, co-I: Dr K Pirog, Prof David Young, Dr Matthew German, Dr Blandine Poulet, named PDRA: Dr Ella Dennis)

Collaborative networks:

ECMage is a national research network funded in 2022 by the UKRI investigating healthy ageing of extracellular matrix. The ECMage network brings together expertise in key aspects of ageing, matrix biology, chronobiology, computational modelling and tissue engineering across UK to develop novel models to study ECM ageing. We are part of this exciting network which supports connective tissue aging research collaborations across the UK.

CHANGE is an international research and doctoral training network funded in 2023 by the Horizon Europe as part of the Marie Sklodowska Curie Actions(MSCA) training networks. It unites 10 European universities and 5 small to medium enterprises (SMEs) with the aim to uncover molecular mechanisms in connective tissue ageing and disease. Our group is one of the partners and PhD hosts in this project, and we will conduct research and training exchanges with the University of Padova, University of Pavia and LifeTec Group B.V. in Eindhoven.