Coronary artery disease is the number one cause of death in the world. One of the main reasons for this is that it often goes unnoticed until there is significant damage to cardiac tissue in the heart. Thus, most severe cases of coronary artery disease are untreatable because of the inability to heal a severely degenerated heart. That is where tissue engineering comes in. Having taken a course in tissue engineering this past summer, I am astounded by the many applications this nascent, yet fascinating field may have in the medical field, especially in healing cardiac tissue damage. For example, tissue engineers are currently working on in vitro engineered scaffolds for cardiac regeneration. These scaffolds will be placed on the damaged area and will act as a prosthetic for the heart to function normally. However, unlike prosthetics, the scaffold will aid in healing the damaged cardiac tissue and degenerate over time such that when it has fully degenerated, the cardiac tissue should be completely healed. .
The problem with in vitro cardiac scaffolds is the lack of thickness they can currently maintain. The lack of nutrients and cell proliferation will not allow for most cardiac scaffolds to be more than half a millimeter. Thus, for severe cases of heart degeneration, there is often much more than half a millimeter of damage to cardiac tissues. My engineering idea is to use low intensity ultrasound stimulation (LIUS) on these scaffolds with the hope that LIUS will promote the growth of these cardiac scaffolds. LIUS has already been shown to increase both cell metabolism and cell proliferation in C2C12 muscle cells and in vitro engineered bone cells. Thus, I believe that I can take advantage of the research opportunities in Molecular, Cellular, and Tissue Engineering at Cornell University to explore LIUS on in vitro engineered cardiac scaffolds. If LIUS were to sustain the growth of these cardiac scaffolds, more extreme cases of coronary artery disease will be much easier to treat due to the ability to regenerate damaged cardiac tissues.
