June – December, 2023
Project time from June 30 to December 31, 2023, were very intensive with a lot of work and activities done.
At the beginning of September, another student has been admitted to the project, who will develop her PhD thesis on a MATRI-X related subject. Several conferences with respective presentation titles were attended:
1) A.Dubnika and K.Egle presented posters at the 33rd Annual Conference of the European Society for Biomaterials (Davos, Switzerland, 4th-8th of September 2023)– “Challenges of the preparation and biocompatibility of the cannabidiol-containing liposomes” and „ Fucoidan/chitosan hydrogels for sustained delivery of platelet-rich fibrin containing growth factors”;
2) K.Egle attended the conference 64th International conference of Riga Technical University “Materials Science and Applied Chemistry, (MSAC) (Riga, Latvia, October 6th, 2023) with oral presentation “Exploring Platelet-Rich Fibrin Microstructure and Histology: with and without Hydrogel Carriers”;
3) E. Kelle attended the MSAC conference as well with a poster presentation “Extraction of marine sponges”.
In the middle of November, two MATRI-X project PhD students, L. Micko and L. Ievina attended Baltic Biomaterials Excellence Center (BBCE) Summer School on “Scientific Writing and presenting skills” organized by Prof. Aldo R. Boccaccini, Zoya Hadzhieva and Marcela Arango Ospina, Institute of Biomaterials, Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg (FAU). The focus of the writing school was the concept and design of academic posters, layout techniques, presentation skills, verbal and non-verbal communication.
Additionally, two conference abstracts “Platelet rich fibrin – from autologous bioactive molecule sustained delivery to antibacterial effect” (authored by A. Dubnika) and “Modulation of Bioactive Molecule Release from Platelet-Rich Fibrin and Fucoidan/Chitosan Delivery System” (authored by K. Egle) were submitted to 12th World Biomaterials Congress, WBC 2024 (EXCO, Daegu, Republic of Korea, 26th-31th of May 2024) and one abstract “Silk-Based Hydrogels: Versatile Matrices for Biomedical Applications” was submitted and confirmed to Scandinavian Society of Biomaterials 2024 17th annual meeting, ScSB2024 (Helsingør, Denmark, 23th – 26th of April 2024).
Project members also took part in “European Researchers’ Night 2023” which takes place at RTU, showing a small part of their daily work.
During this time period one article „ Fucoidan/Chitosan Hydrogels as Carrier for Sustained Delivery of Platelet-Rich Fibrin Containing Bioactive Molecules” was submitted within the framework of the MATRI-X project.
January – June, 2023
From January 1 to June 30, 2023, a lot of work has been done to implement the project.
Year started with the greatest news, MATRI-X project PhD student L. Micko published review article “Can Our Blood Help Ensure Antimicrobial and Anti-Inflammatory Properties in Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery?” (Int. J.Mol. Sci. 2023, 24(2), 1073).
From the end of February to the middle of March, the MATRI-X project PhD student K. Egle was on a short-term visit to the Goethe University Hospital, Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Frankfurt to gain new knowledge about the use of platelet-rich fibrin as a cell suspension in combination with biomaterials as a drug delivery.
The project results were also presented at conferences: L.Micko attended Rīga Stradiņš University Research Week 2023 conference (Riga, Latvia, March 27th -31th, 2023) with two oral presentations “Platelet-rich fibrin immunologocal testing methodology using Elisa assay” and “Platelet-rich fibrin antibacterial activity against Klebsiella pneumoniae”.
MATRI-X project coordinator A. Dubnika attended TERMIS-AM 2023 Annual Conference (11th – 14th April, Boston, MA, 2023) with poster “Development of drug delivery systems based on autologous 3D platelet-rich fibrin matrices”. K. Egle attended Scandinavian Society of Biomaterials 2023 16th annual meeting, ScSB2023 (Roros, Norway, 21th – 24th of March 2023) with poster presentation “Injectable platelet-rich fibrin as a drug carrier increases the antibacterial susceptibility of antibiotic-clindamycin phosphate”.
Additionally: one conference abstract „Fucoidan/chitosan hydrogels for sustained delivery of platelet-rich fibrin containing growth factors” (authored by K.Egle) was submitted and confirmed to 33rd Annual Conference of the European Society for Biomaterials (Davos, Switzerland, 4th-8th of September 2023).
In the middle of May, two FLPP projects were submitted, based on the research carried out in the MATRI-X project and which would be continuations of the existing project.
During this period, another one bachelor’s thesis „ Influence of technological process parameters on the properties of chitosan and fucoidan microparticles” and one school children scientific research “Histological analysis of autologous fibrin ” were conducted on a MATRI-X related subject.
June – December, 2022
Previous 6 months (from June 30 to December 31, 2022) were very intensive with a lot of work and activities. The greatest news is that we now have a symbol for the MATRIX project – a hedgehog. MATRI-X project symbol- heaghoug. No less important is the fact that in July we have submitted the mid-term report of the project, which was highly appreciated by the FLPP reviewers. At the beginning of August, another student has been admitted to the project, who will develop her bachelor’s thesis on a MATRI-X related subject. After a long period of virtual meetings, we had the first face-to-face meeting of the MATRI-X project partners at the beginning of September. During the meeting, we talked about further experiments to achieve the goal of the project. During this time period, one article „Injectable Platelet-Rich Fibrin as a Drug Carrier Increases the Antibacterial Susceptibility of Antibiotic—Clindamycin Phosphate” (Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2022, 23(13), 7407) was published within the framework of the MATRI-X project.
Several conferences with respective presentation titles were attended: 1) I.Salma and K.Egle presented posters at the 32nd Conference of the European Society for Biomaterials, ESB 2022 (Bordo, France, September 4-8, 2022) – “Development of protocol for obtaining autologous liquid PRF for local drug delivery systems” and „ Fucoidan/chitosan hydrogels as matrices for sustained delivery of platelet-rich fibrin containing bioactive molecules”;
2) L.Micko attended the congress 26th Congress of the European Association for Cranio-Maxillo-Facial Surgery, (EACMFS) (Madrid, Spain, 27-30 September, 2022) with an poster presentation “Antimicrobial activity of Platelet-Rich Fibrin”. Project members also took part in “European Researchers’ Night 2022” which takes place at RTU, showing a small part of their daily work. From the beginning of September to the end of December, two members of the MATRI-X project, L.Micko and K.Egle, were on a long-term visit to the AO Research Institute in Davos to gain new knowledge about growth factors and cell experiments, which are planned to be applied during the implementation of the project. Another review “Can Our Blood Help Ensure Antimicrobial and Anti-Inflammatory Properties in Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery?” was submitted at the beginning of November.
