ERC: Research Center for the Engineering of Living Tissues

9731643 NEREM该奖项由生物组织工程工程研究中心发起。牵头机构是佐治亚理工学院，埃默里大学医学院是核心伙伴机构。根据一项新的合作协议，该奖项为头五年的努力提供资金，潜在期限为十年。这个ERC将在适当的时候讨论一个对健康和医疗保健非常重要的领域。组织工程行业正处于初级阶段，该领域的许多发展都是基于经验主义或艺术。该中心将为组织工程领域带来对潜在生物学和工程学原理的更基本的理解，填补目前存在的学术理解和工业简化到实践之间的空白。同样，如果不是更重要的话，该中心将培养训练有素的工程师，他们在生物和医学科学方面具有深厚的背景，并与临床从业者和行业密切合作。该ERC专注于组织替代品的设计和开发，以取代、增强或维持自然组织功能。该中心的研究计划分为三个方面，代表了组织工程挑战的连续性：细胞技术、细胞构建技术(器官或组织原型结构)以及与生命系统的整合。ERC将结合医学理论和实践方面的专业知识，对组织细胞的潜在生物学和免疫反应进行研究，将基本工程设计概念应用于细胞结构或构造的生长和功能，并将这些构造融入生命系统。该中心承诺在对组织功能的基本理解和组织替换所需的技术方面取得突破。这两个机构将开发一个支持ERC的生物工程联合项目。ERC的外展将包括斯佩尔曼学院和莫尔豪斯学院，当地历史上的黑人机构，以及一个让当地高中教师和他们的学生参与的特别计划。工业界将通过一组公司积极参与，这些公司既代表新兴的初创公司，也代表成熟的公司。该奖项是根据ERC计划公告(NSF 97-5)参加1997-98财年工程研究中心竞赛的ERC预提案的结果。

9731643 NEREM This award initiates the Engineering Research Center for the Engineering of Living Tissues. The lead institution is the Georgia Institute of Technology and the Emory University School of Medicine is a core partner institution. The award funds the first five years of effort under a new cooperative agreement, with a potential duration of ten years. This ERC will address an area of great importance to health and health care at an opportune time. The tissue engineering industry is at a nascent stage, and many of the developments in the field are based on empiricism or art. This center will bring a more fundamental understanding of the underlying biological and engineering principles to the area of tissue engineering, filling the gap that currently exists between academic understanding and industrial reduction to practice. Equally, if not more importantly, this Center will produce well trained engineers with a strong background in the biological and medical sciences who have worked closely with clinical practitioners and industry. This ERC focuses on the design and development of tissue substitutes that replace, enhance or maintain natural tissue function. The Center's research program is organized into three thrusts that represent a continuum of the challenges of tissue engineering: cell technology, cell construct technology (prototype organ or tissues structures) and integration into living systems. Integrated with expertise in medical theory and practice, the ERC will carry out research on the underlying biology and immune response of tissue cells, the application of fundamental engineering design concepts to the growth and function of cell structures or constructs, and the incorporation of these constructs into living systems. This Center promises to produce breakthroughs in both the underlying understanding of tissue function and the technology required for tissue replacement. The two institutions will develop a joint program of bioengineering in support of th e ERC. ERC outreach will involve Spellman College and Morehouse College, local historically Black institutions, and a special program to involve local high school teachers and their students. Industry will be actively involved through a group of firms, representing both emerging start-up and well-established firms. This award is the outcome of the entry of this ERC's pre-proposal in the FY 1997-98 Engineering Research Centers Competition under the ERC Program Announcement, NSF 97-5.