Neurointensive Care and Assessment Facility

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The overall goal of this G20 proposal is to create a shared Neurointensive Care and Assessment Facility (NCAF) to study acute and long-term responses in large animal models of disease and injury to enable the development and translation of new treatments and technologies that promote and preserve neurological function. This revised proposal responds specifically and substantively to each comment raised in the initial review. The NCAF will be a one-of-a-kind shared porcine facility for the study of neurological injury and recovery after stroke, cardiac arrest, cardiopulmonary bypass, and traumatic brain injury in pigs/piglets d 25kg. The facility will consist of 5 components: (1) a non-sterile procedure room for closed head injuries and terminal procedures, (2) an intensive care housing room, (3) a cognitive and behavioral assessment laboratory, (4) a survival surgical room, and (5) animal prep area. Facilities will be upgraded to allow survival surgery on USDA-regulated species and meet requirements of the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (ILAR, 1996; pre-publication, 2010), and provide a state-of-the art intensive care unit for monitoring and housing animals. Additional space will be renovated to serve as procedural space for cognitive and behavioral assessment using a battery of porcine-specific tests developed by the Facility Director. Finally, the NCAF facility will be upgraded to meet federal and other regulatory requirements that ensure safety, sanitization, security, vermin control and environmental control for surgery, experimental procedure, intensive care housing and behavioral study areas. The NCAF will be used for the study of more than 800 piglets/pigs per year, and will be shared by 25 investigators spanning the School of Medicine (SOM) and School of Engineering and Applied Science (SEAS) with over $42, million in current and pending funding. Moreover, this new facility will be a unique opportunity to create synergy between SOM faculty investigating cell and molecular approaches to therapeutic interventions that preserve neurofunction, with SEAS faculty who are innovators in device development, data integration, data processing, machine learning, biosensors and minimally invasive surgical technology. Thus, these renovations will enhance PHS-funded research, will advance the conduct of animal welfare in experimental research, and will positively impact the scope and pace of the preclinical research at Penn.