Immunobone
Background
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Treatment strategies of bone large defects, resulting from trauma, tumors or congenital malformations of the musculoskeletal systems encompass autologous or allogeneic bone grafts. Optimized allografts with a locally reduced inflammation and rejection response are assumed to overcome major clinical limitations of allogeneic bone transplantation. The immune modulatory capacities of mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) and regulatory T-cells (Treg) have launched a multitude of possible therapeutic applications, in transplantation medicine as well as in treatment of bone metastasizing tumors. Our focus is the investigation of the immune regulatory potential and regenerative capacity of MSC and Treg in allogeneic bone transplantation and bone metastasis. |
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Current Projects
- Interaction of MSC and Treg on single cell level, in 2- and 3-dimensional cultures (morphological, biochemical and biophysical)
- Bridging bone defects with MSC- and Treg-preseeded allogeneic scaffolds
- Characterize bone metastasis in human prostate cancer
- Evaluate antitumor and regenerative capacities of MSC and Treg
Group Leader
| Vera Pedersen, MD PhD, graduated in 1997 with a Diploma degree in Biology and finished her PhD in 2001, both in the Department of Neuropharmacology at the Eberhard-Karls-University, Tuebingen, Germany. During her PhD and following postdoc periods at the University and ETH Zurich, Switzerland and the Helmholtz Center, Munich, Germany, she focused on neurodegenerative and neuroregenerative mechanisms and potential therapeutic approaches in various conditions like schizophrenia, Parkinson syndrome and spinal cord injury. After accomplishment of medical school at the LMU in 2008 she started her clinical training in the Department of Surgery, at the LMU in Munich and joined the Experimed research group in 2009. Her main research focus lies on regenerative and immune modulatory mechanisms in preclinical models of bone transplantation and bone metastasis. Since 2010 she leads the group Immunobone. |  |
Contact: Vera.Pedersen@med.uni-muenchen.de
