Engineering peripheral nerve devices with patterned magnets

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The clinical treatment of nerve injury usually needs surgical intervention to repair tissue that has been severed. Problems arise when the resulting nerve ends cannot be sewn back together because the injury 'removes' a section of nerve, forming a gap. Nerve has the ability to re-grow and in such instances an entubulation conduit can be used to guide new nerve growth across a gap injury site. This approach is limited but can be made more effective by implanting nerve support cells (Schwann cells) inside the conduit. However, the implanted support cells have no spatial organisation to guide regenerating nerve filaments. We therefore plan a pilot study to build a device that can control the position of Schwann cells with micrometer accuracy using nanobeads and parallel magnetic field elements. If successful, we will scale up our approach to developing a magnetic conduit for non-invasively controlling the position of Schwann cells with accurate alignment inside a conduit for improving nerve repair strategies.