Research interests
The approach to develop bone repair biomaterials (e.g. dental implants or synthetic bone grafts) has been redefined in the last decades. The trend has been to move from an engineering design that would simply restore the mechanical properties of bone, to biomaterials that are able to replicate to a higher extent the physico-chemical and biological characteristics of bone, enhancing bone regeneration. Despite the immense biomaterial developments over the years, a small portion of them have become a clinical product. This can indirectly be attributed to the lack of correlation between the consecutive methods used to assess the biological properties of biomaterials, namely cell cultures (in vitro), animal testing (in vivo) and clinical trials (with volunteer patients). This leads to an iterative, long and often prohibitively expensive process.
The goal of my research group is to develop a new research tool to bridge the gap between in vitro and in vivostudies, which will potentially increase the biomaterials’ success rate in clinical trials. To achieve this, I integrate bone repair biomaterials in microfluidic platforms, where I recreate the biological and physical stimuli upon implantation. This test method will lead to reliable and time- and cost-effective studies, hence stimulating the translation of biomaterials to the market.
Our projects are funded by grants from the Swedish research councils (Vetenskapsrådet and Formas), Göran Gustafsson’s Foundation, STINT and VINNOVA.
Group members
- Gemma Mestres, PI
- Sarah-Sophia Carter, PhD student
- Abdul Raouf Atif, PhD student
- Maryam Shojaee, guest PhD student
- Hanlu Deng, MSc student
Contact
E-mail: Gemma.Mestres@angstrom.uu.se
Telephone: 018-471 3235