Development of an Electrospun Antimicrobial Coated Tampon for Management of Bacterial Vaginosis Biofilm

女性阴道有自己的先天防御系统，涉及天然微生物群，阴道上皮和蛋白质，包括乳铁蛋白，有助于管理健康的微生物群。在这个项目中，我们关心的是当这种平衡出现问题时会发生什么。细菌性阴道病（BV）是一种常见的阴道感染，在英国，每3名绝经前妇女中就有1名在生命的某个阶段患有BV。阴道内治疗在月经期间可能会受到阻碍，如果没有得到有效治疗，BV通常会在几周内复发。该项目的目的是通过开发和测试新型生物材料来管理细菌性阴道病。学生将受益于材料加工（静电纺丝），材料物理化学表征和使用生物工程组织模型测量抗微生物功效领域的培训。该博士项目将跨学科进行监督，学生将接受3个部门的培训：生物医学工程（BME），皮肤科学中心（CSS）和布拉德福德大学（UoB）内的药物工程科学中心（CPES）。Virustatic Ltd也将作为该奖项的工业合作伙伴提供监督和培训。

The female vaginal tract has its own innate defence system that involves the natural microbiota, the vaginal epithelium and proteins including lactoferrin that help manage a healthy microbiome. In this project we are concerned with what happens when things go wrong with this balance. Bacterial vaginosis (BV) is a common vaginal infection with 1 in 3 pre-menopausal women in the UK suffering from BV at some point in their life. Intravaginal treatment can be impeded during menstruation and BV can often recur within a few weeks if not treated effectively. The aim of this project is to manage bacterial vaginosis through the development and testing of novel biomaterials. The student will benefit from training in the areas of materials processing (electrospinning), materials physicochemical characterisation and measuring anti-microbial efficacy using bioengineered tissue models. This PhD project will be supervised across disciplines and the student will receive training from 3 departments: Biomedical Engineering (BME), the Centre for Skin Sciences (CSS) and the Centre of Pharmaceutical Engineering Science (CPES) within the University of Bradford (UoB). Supervision and training will also be provided by Virustatic Ltd as industrial partner in the award.