Title: Bioactive Bacterial Cellulose for Corneal Translational Medicine (CORNEAL-TRANSMED)
Reference: FYP2021 CORNEAL-TRANSMED
PI: Anna Roig, Ralph Michael (Barraquer Ophthalmology Centre)
NN research team: Thomas Meslier, Anna Roig
Barraquer Ophthalmology Centre: Justin D’Antin, Ralph Michael
Starting date: 16th June 2021
Ending date: 31st December 2023
Funding Agency: Frontier Interdisciplinary Projects (FIP) within the ICMAB-FUNFUTURE Severo Ochoa Programme Short description: Corneal damage – infections, burns, ulcerations, autoimmune diseases or physical trauma – can lead to impaired vision and even blindness. Yearly, 1.5 million new cases of corneal trauma are reported worldwide; those numbers steadily growing due to the population aging. Amniotic membrane (AM) grafts, donor-dependent and with stringent storing conditions, is the commmon clinical treatment for corneal injuries not requiring transplantacion. Tissue engineering could bypass many complications of corneal transplantation or the use of AM providing that biomechanical stability, biointegration and bioactivity of the corneal engineered tissues can be addressed. Based on the positive outcomes of previous projects, CORNEAL-TransMed aims at validating the translational medical potential of bioactive bacterial cellulose (BC) for cornea treatment.
Title:Thermoelectric and Magnetic nanomaterials for novel wireless charging technologies
Reference: FYP2021 ChargThem
PI: Pablo Guardia
NN research team: Roger Morales, Xuesong Zhang
Starting date: 16th June 2021
Finishing date: 31th December 2023
Funding: Frontier Interdisciplinary Projects (FIP) within the ICMAB-FUNFUTURE Severo Ochoa Programme Short description: Batteries and capacitors are key for developing long lifetime off-grid devices. When the latter are hermetically encapsulated, plug-in solutions are not available and after battery or capacitor depletion the device has to be disposed or charged by a wireless power charging solutions. Electromagnetic (EM) wireless power transfer (WPT), and in particular inductive coupling, have been widely exploited for contactless charging. However, its deployment relies on high-frequency EM waves, bulky coils, and bulky energy-storage systems. This avoids the implementation of EM WPT to applications in which micron size devices or low frequency EM fields are required. A clear example are implantable medical devices (IMDs) were EM WPT are key for avoiding device replacement. Despite the efforts devoted for developing novel WPT technologies, EM WPT are still the most exploited ones and hence the miniaturization of IMDs as well as its location inside the body are limited. Charge-TheM proposed a ground-breaking idea exploiting magnetic induced hyperthermia (MH) and thermoelectricity for novel WPT technologies. On one hand, MH is able to transform low-frequency EM waves into thermal energy. On the other hand, thermoelectric materials are able to convert temperature gradients (ΔT) into electric power. The combination of MH and TE materials for EM WPT is able to overcome the current limitations while boosting its deployment in several applications.
Title: Resynchronization of Cardiac beating using polypyrrole composites and the in vivo C. elegans platform (FIP BEAT)
Reference: FYP2020 BEAT
PI: Anna Laromaine
NN research team: Sumithra Srinivasan, Amanda Muñoz
Starting date: 1st September 2020
Finishing date: 31st December 2023
Funding: Severo Ochoa Program-ICMAB
Collaborators: IDIBELL, Univ Valladolid, IBEC and Zecardio Short description: Cardiac arrhythmia (CA) is a disorder characterized by an irregular heartbeat, caused by improper propagation of cellular impulses, and it affects 40% of people with heart problems. Under normal conditions, the heart muscles have an inherent electrical conductivity that allows a synchronized heart rhythm.BEAT will develop cardiac biomaterials to be used as adjunctive therapy to bypass cardiac arrhythmia and resynchronize the cardiac pulse.A combination of biopolymers will be used, polypyrrole (conductive biopolymer) and bacterial cellulose (biocompatible and flexible polymer), to build conductive and flexible three-dimensional composites, and the porous network will allow the absorption and release of current drugs. With this biomaterial, the electrical conduction of the myocardial tissue will be stimulated, and CA drugs will be released to help to recover from cardiac arrhythmia. Evaluation of those novel strategies will be performed in vitro in cells and in vivo in C. elegans.
Title:A novel wireless charging technology based in Thermoelectric and Magnetic nanomaterials (ChargeTheM)
PI: Pablo Guardia
NN research team: Xuesogn Zhang, Allan Lancezeux
Starting date: 1st December 2021
Finishing date: 31st July 2023
Funding: Generalitat de Catalunya. Departament de Recerca i Universitats Short description: ChargeTheM project aims to explore a novel Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) technology beyond the state-of-the-art combining magnetic and Thermo Electric (TE) materials. In particular, ChargeTheM ground-breaking idea is to transform the energy of EM field radiations into voltage by combining magnetic induced hyperthermia (MH) with the TE effect. On one hand, the basic principle of MH is the conversion by magnetic materials of EM waves’ energy into heat. On the other hand, TE inorganic materials are able to produce open voltage circuits between 0.6 and 1.2 V for temperature gradients between 10 to 30 ºC. To that extent, ChargeTheM proposes exploiting the local heating provided by MH with the capability of TE materials to produce a voltage. The latter to be used to recharge batteries in encapsulated devices. This will be carried out by developing a magneto-thermoelectric nanocomposite multilayer. Compare to the WPT’s current state-of-the-art, ChargeTheM technology will provide power transfer through small reviving systems and under low-frequency EM fields. This clearly overcomes the current limitations for EM WPT allowing the development of novel micron size encapsulated Implantable Medical Devices.
Title: Millimeter-wave assisted magnetization switching in high anisotropy epitaxial ferrite films (mmWAMS)
Reference: 2021 LLAV 00095
PI: Martí Gich
NN research team: Ana Vila, Nico Dix, Martí Gich
Starting date: 12th October 2022
Finishing date: 11th July 2023
Funding: Generalitat de Catalunya. Departament de Recerca i Universitats Short description: Improving the energy efficiency of computing is mandatory for making sustainable the exponential rise of data processing and storage. A critical step to confront this challenge is developing novel, fast, low-dissipative and ultrahigh density magnetic recording media for future data centers. Magnetic materials with large coercive fields still remain the main pillar in the development of new memories, but its high anisotropy which is good for increasing the information storage capacity also make it difficult to write the information. To solve this problem one can take advantage of a well-known phenomenon: when magnetic resonances are excited in a material the external field required to reverse its magnetization decreases significantly. The aim of the project is exploring the use of this strategy in ferrimagnetic oxides with magnetic resonances in the range of millimetre waves.
Title: New neurovascular remodelling strategies for neurorepair after stroke
PI: Anna Rosell Vall d’Hebron Research Institute coordinator, Anna Roig PI ICMAB
Starting date: 1st January 2020
Ending date: 1st December 2020
Funding Agency: Call for Expression of Interest (EoI) for Collaborative Projects on Regenerative Medicine 2019
Title: AGAUR-PROJECTE Llavor (Cornea-BC)
PI: Anna Roig
Starting date: 1st September 2020
Ending date: 1st May 2021
Funding Agency: Generalitat de Catalunya
Title: AMPLIANDO EL ALCANCE DE APLICACIONES DE COMPUESTOS DE CELULOSA BACTERIANA (RISE-BC)
PI: Anna Laromaine
Starting date: 1st January 2019
Ending date: 30th September 2022
Funding Agency: Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades
Title: Synthetic nanoparticles as an innovative treatment for sepsis (SPRINT-4-SEPSIS)
PI: Anna Roig
Starting date: 1st January 2019
Ending date: 1st December 2021
Funding Agency: XIX Concurso Nacional Ayudas Fundación Ramon Areces
