Posted 31 October 2024
Dr Kate Firipis has been awarded a $75,000 Jack Brockhoff Early Career Medical Research Grant for a novel tissue engineering and regenerative medicine project.
Kate works with Associate Professor Geraldine Mitchell in SVI’s Vascular Biology Lab. The lab’s aim is to find new treatments for serious wounds in humans arising from trauma, cancer resection and chronic diabetic skin wounds.
They investigate improved methods of blood vessel and nerve growth and integration for engineering human tissues and organs in the laboratory, and for wound-healing in models.
“I’m thrilled and grateful to receive this support from the Brockhoff Foundation.
“With no alternate treatment for skin flap replacement currently available, lab-grown human skin can provide coverage and wound healing for severe wounds requiring surgery – arising from trauma, burns, chronic wounds and cancer – reducing the need to take healthy skin from elsewhere on the patient.
“We seek to provide skin that can feel and interact with the world, while delivering a significant economic benefit and reducing strain on the busy healthcare system, resulting in shorter surgeries and better patient outcomes,” said Kate.
Vascular Biology