The role of absorbable nano-fibre scaffolds in treating chronic tendinopathy

Project Leader: Dr Adrian Kendal, Academic Clinical Fellow

As a member of Prof. Andrew Carr’s group Adrian has been involved in improving the way we treat patients with chronic tendon and ligament degenerative disease. The development of new bioabsorbable scaffolds made of electrospun nano-fibrous polydiaxanone (PDO) offers surgeons a way of influencing the microenvironment to improve soft tissue repair and regeneration. The work focuses on the behaviour of human tendon fibroblasts on electrospun nanofibres with the aim of identifying parameters of desirable biological activity. It investigates how primary human tendon cells from degenerative tissue differ from those found in healthy tissue and whether these differences can be overcome by mechanical stimulation with nanofibres.