Description du projet
Ingénierie tissulaire avancée pour la réparation d’organes
La pénurie d’organes ou de greffons tissulaires provenant de donneurs limite considérablement les issues cliniques de nombreuses maladies et traumatismes. Les efforts d’ingénierie tissulaire ont fait des progrès considérables ces dernières années, mais ils ne peuvent pas encore récapituler l’architecture et la fonction complètes des tissus natifs, à l’exception des tissus avasculaires tels que le cartilage et la peau. Financé par le Conseil européen de l’innovation, le projet THOR entend développer une nouvelle technologie d’ingénierie tissulaire capable de produire n’importe quel type de tissu humain à des fins de réparation ou de remplacement d’organes. La technologie utilisera des molécules auto-assemblées, des fibres polymères et la fonctionnalisation pour fabriquer des tissus adaptés aux patients dans des unités de production entièrement automatisées. Les tissus/organes générés seront parfaitement vascularisés et entièrement fonctionnels, ce qui révolutionnera le domaine de la transplantation.
Objectif
Tenths of millions of people with organ failures or suffering from degenerative diseases are waiting for a novel cellular therapy or for a transplant of a donor compatible organ and the immense majority of these patients will die before receiving the tissue or organ they need. Despite the significant advances in tissue engineering, not a single artificial tissue has been used to replace a part of an organ, with the exception of simple or avascular tissues like skin or cartilage. THOR proposes the development of a revolutionary tissue engineering technology, capable to produce any type of human tissue for organ repair or replacement in case of illness, trauma or degenerative diseases. Patient-tailored tissues will be fabricated by pools of bioinspired mini-robots in fully automated production plants, using the breakthrough incremental technologies of the THOR project: self-assembling molecules inspired to the extracellular matrix; self-assembling solid and hollow polymeric fibers; materials functionalization using photoactivable crosslinkers; cutting-edge mini robots to wave 3D self-assembling structures with factors and cells with micrometric precision. THOR tissue arises from high-resolution 3D spatial positioning of self-assembling structures, angiogenic factors and relevant cell lineages, reprogrammed and expanded in a dedicated bioreactor under controlled conditions. Our long-term vision encompasses (1) the establishment of a Tissue Engineering industry for personalized organ repair, producing any type of well vascularized and fully functioning tissues and (2) the maintenance of such tissues alive for long periods of time, for an easy transportation to hospitals and clinics, even far from the big cities. THOR will foster the rise of a new industry and of a new biomedical field, while cadaveric donors' transplants will not be necessary.
Champ scientifique
Programme(s)
- HORIZON.3.1 - The European Innovation Council (EIC) Main Programme
Régime de financement
EIC - EICCoordinateur
28040 Madrid
Espagne