{"295141":{"#nid":"295141","#data":{"type":"news","title":"2014 Robert M. Nerem International Travel Award Winner Announced","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EAshley Allen will travel to Jerusalem to learn new delivery technique of mesenchymal stem cells.\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EAshley Allen plans to take something special back with her to the Georgia Institute of Technology from her trip to Israel next fall, and it isn\u2019t souvenirs. \u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EAllen, winner of the 2014 Robert M. Nerem International Travel Award, will spend two weeks at Hebrew University in Jerusalem learning a new technique for delivering mesenchymal stem cells for the repair of large bone defects, and she intends to bring what she learns to the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u201cThis procedure could have a lot of potential advantages,\u201d says Allen, who is in her fifth year of the bioengineering Ph.D. program, and is a graduate research assistant in Robert E. Guldberg\u2019s Musculoskeletal Research Laboratory.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u201cOur lab focuses on a range of orthopaedic tissues, but not so much on cell delivery, mostly acellular strategies,\u201d Allen says. \u201cThe lab in Israel that I\u2019ll be working in is all about cell delivery for bone tissue engineering applications.\u201d\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EFriends and colleagues of Bob Nerem, founding director of the Petit Institute, thought it would be a good idea to honor his contributions to bioengineering and his commitment to the Petit Institute. So they established an annual award of up to $3,000 to support post-docs and graduate students traveling outside the U.S. for research.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003E\u0022A group of friends and colleagues, unbeknownst to me, talked to me about a travel award, which I though was a great idea, but I didn\u0027t want it to just send someone off to some conference,\u0022 Nerem says. \u0022It ended up being about research abroad, which I think is excellent, as our research is part of a global community, and I feel uniquely honored.\u0022\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAllen is the 10th recipient of the award. The program, which began in 2005, has received generous support from donors like Coe Bloomberg (ME, Class of 1966) and G.B. Espy (ME, Class of 1957) through the years, helping to increase the visibility of the Petit Institute around the world, sending trainees from Georgia Tech to some of the world\u2019s top research universities and institutions, including the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden; RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Japan; the National University of Singapore;\u0026nbsp; University of Twente, The Netherlands; Queensland University of Technology, Australia; Consorzio Interuniversitario Lombardo per L\u2019Elaborazione Automatica, Milan, Italy; \u0026nbsp;Imperial College, London; and Kings College, London.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EAllen will spend two weeks in the lab of Zulma Gazit, learning the technique developed there of incorporating perfluorotributylamine (PFTBA) into an alginate-based mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) delivery system. She has collaborated with Gazit twice before, in 2010 and 2011, for a week each time. \u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u201cI have come to know her as a hard-working and thoughtful researcher,\u201d Gazit says. \u201cHer attention to detail and ability to communicate complemented her work ethic, leading to a productive effort on which we have recently published.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u201cI think this is a beneficial new skill for her to have and I look forward to testing the technology within the segmental long bone defect model utilized at Georgia Tech.\u201d\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EBasically, Allen aims to test whether perfluorotributylamine (PFTBA) delivery will improve MSC survival.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u201cWhat we\u2019re seeking is better bone regeneration,\u201d Allen says.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003ERight now, she says, \u201cin our system, we see widespread cell death and minimal vascularization by three days in vivo, indicating limited nutrient availability.\u201d\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EShe believes there is a benefit in PFTBA utilization because it will help increase local oxygen levels, which theoretically will enhance survival of the MSCs, which means they have a better chance of forming better bone.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u201cSo my thesis is focused on taking different angles to get the cells to stick around and survive longer,\u201d says Allen, who isn\u2019t the first person to travel to the Holy Land for a better sense of perspective.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":[{"value":"Ashley Allen will travel to Jerusalem to learn new delivery technique of mesenchymal stem cells"}],"field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EAshley Allen will travel to Jerusalem to learn new delivery technique of mesenchymal stem cells\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Ashley Allen will travel to Jerusalem to learn new delivery technique of mesenchymal stem cells"}],"uid":"27195","created_gmt":"2014-05-05 12:48:20","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:16:22","author":"Colly Mitchell","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2014-05-05T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2014-05-05T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"295121":{"id":"295121","type":"image","title":"Ashley Allen - graduate student from the lab of Robert Guldberg, PhD","body":null,"created":"1449244514","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 15:55:14","changed":"1475894995","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:49:55","alt":"Ashley Allen - graduate student from the lab of Robert Guldberg, PhD","file":{"fid":"199374","name":"ashleyallen-neremtravelaward2014.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/ashleyallen-neremtravelaward2014_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/www.tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/ashleyallen-neremtravelaward2014_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":385114,"path_740":"http:\/\/www.tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/ashleyallen-neremtravelaward2014_0.jpg?itok=QrgUo_HJ"}}},"media_ids":["295121"],"related_links":[{"url":"http:\/\/guldberglab.gatech.edu\/","title":"Guldberg Musculoskeletal Research Lab"},{"url":"http:\/\/ibb.gatech.edu\/nerem-travel-award","title":"Nerem Interational Travel Award Information"}],"groups":[{"id":"1292","name":"Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience (IBB)"}],"categories":[{"id":"42941","name":"Art Research"},{"id":"134","name":"Student and Faculty"},{"id":"8862","name":"Student Research"}],"keywords":[],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39441","name":"Bioengineering and Bioscience"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EJerry Grillo\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003C\/a\u003ECommunications Officer II\u003Cbr \/\u003EParker H. Petit Institute\u003Cbr \/\u003Efor Bioengineering \u0026amp; Bioscience\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}