Biomaterials for Tissue Sealing and Repair

Complications associated with ineffective tissue repair in slow or non-healing wounds, including in diabetic wounds, cost the US healthcare system ~$20 billion / year and amount to ~5% of the total cost of Medicare and Medicaid. In cases of surgical closure, lack of immediate tissue approximation, high potential for scarring, including in visible areas of the body, susceptibility to infection, and long procedure times necessitate new approaches for tissue repair especially for unmet needs where current approaches are suboptimal in performance. Light-activated tissue sealing is an emerging strategy that facilitates rapid, liquid-tight approximation of ruptured tissues, but the lack of effective biomaterials compromises efficacy. I will discuss our advances in the generation, characterization, evaluation, and of laser-activated sealants (LASE) for the rapid sealing and repair of incisional wounds. Use of bioactives (histamine) that modulate early tissue repair or combat infection further enhanced the efficacy of this approach. In addition to acute trauma, slow-healing and chronic wounds, including in diabetic and obese patients, are a significant cause for morbidity. Advanced biologics have shown some promise but have largely not succeeded in cases of intractable wound pathologies, and the last biologic approved for diabetic wounds was over 25 years ago. I will describe our new findings on the delivery of immunomodulating bioactive molecules e.g., histamine receptor agonists and silk- nanomaterials for kickstarting early stages of tissue repair, which are largely dysfunctional in diabetic wounds. We also describe an approach for temporal delivery in which, timing the delivery of growth factor nanoparticles to later stages of tissue repair led to early wound closure in healthy and diabetic obese mice. Taken together, our studies demonstrate that biomaterials, in concert with delivery of light and bioactive molecules, show strong promise for enhancing the efficacy and quality of tissue repair.

Dr. Kaushal Rege is Fulton Faculty Impact Professor in the School for Engineering of Matter, Transport, and Energy, Director, Center for Biomaterials Innovation and Translation, Biodesign Institute and Chair of the Biological Design Graduate Program at Arizona State University (ASU) in Tempe, Arizona. Research in Dr. Rege’s group focuses on molecular and nanoscale technologies for tissue repair. Dr. Rege has published over 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals in addition to book chapters. Dr. Rege serves as Associate Editor of the journals, Bioengineering and Translational Medicine (Wiley) and NanoLIFE, and has served as Guest Member of the Editorial Board for Annual Reviews in Biomedical Engineering. Dr. Rege was elected to the college of fellows of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers (AIMBE) in 2017. He was awarded a New Investigator Award from the American Society for Photobiology, a Young Investigator Award from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), and a Fulton Exemplar Faculty Award from ASU. Dr. Rege also serves as Chairperson of the Musculoskeletal Tissue Engineering (MTE) study section at NIH and will serve as co-chair of the ECI Conference on Nanotechnology in Medicine in 2024. Dr. Rege is an inventor on several patents and patent applications, and is co-founder of Synergyan, LLC and Endotat Biotechnologies, LLC. As chair of the Biological Design Graduate Program, Dr. Rege has recruited a strong diverse body of graduate students to ASU and significantly expanded the impact of the program. Dr. Rege has mentored over 70 research faculty, postdoctoral scholars and graduate students in addition to more than 60 undergraduate students. Dr. Rege’s mentees have gone on to pursue successful careers in academia and industry.