Objective
Acute and chronic lung injury is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. During physiological repair of the damaged alveolar epithelium transdifferentiation of Alveolar Type II (ATII) cells occurs into Alveolar Type I (ATI) cells. Also, recently identified human multipotent lung stem cells (hLSCs) may participate in repair mechanisms of injured lung tissue by differentiating into multiple cell lineages in the lung. In pathological repair mechanisms, epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) occurs, epithelial cells acquire mesenchymal phenotype, a process that is believed to be associated with aberrant repair and scar formation after epithelial injury. EMT contributes to fibrosis in the lung in both acute and chronic alveolar diseases (e.g. Acute Lung Injury (ALI) and Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). The proposed project aims to investigate the role of Wnt11 in the differentiation of alveolar epithelial cells (AECs) and hLSCs. A tissue engineered 3D lung tissue model has been developed to mimic intercellular interactions in the lung which dramatically alters ligand responses in alveolar epithelium. Preliminary results suggest that in 3D co-culture and in human lung explant cultures Wnt11 promotes Alveolar Type II (ATII) like differentiation and prevents Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition (EMT) in human small airway epithelium. If our hypothesis is correct we will ascertain whether Wnt11 may have important role in lung tissue regeneration thus marking it as a potential therapeutic target to promote alveolar epithelial repair. The use of hLSC may allow novel 3D tissue engineering solutions to be developed to replace damaged alveolar epithelium.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- social sciences sociology demography mortality
- medical and health sciences medical biotechnology tissue engineering
- medical and health sciences medical biotechnology cells technologies stem cells
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
FP7-PEOPLE-2011-IEF
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Coordinator
B15 2TT Birmingham
United Kingdom
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.