Kyle D. Allen and collaborators awarded $1.5M grant from the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases

Dr. Kyle Allen (PI) along with collaborators Dr. Jon Dobson, Dr. Carlos Rinaldi, and Dr. David Arnold received a new R01 from the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.  The 5-year $1.55 million dollar grant will allow the group to develop further their novel technology to collect and analyze osteoarthritis biomarkers using magnetic nanoparticles.  The group’s new magnetic nanoparticle-based technology can extract molecular biomarkers directly from small articular joints without the need to aspirate synovial fluid.  Using magnetic capture, the group has already demonstrated the ability to detect an osteoarthritis biomarker in a preclinical rat model of osteoarthritis with greater accuracy and sensitivity than current methods. 

Osteoarthritis is a painful, debilitating disease associated with a significant socioeconomic burden in the US. Many potential therapeutics for osteoarthritis would likely be more effective if they could be applied at early disease stages, and to facilitate this, development of diagnostics for early stage osteoarthritis is a critical need for the future of osteoarthritis therapy. Unfortunately, technologies to assess joint-level changes in small articular joints are underdeveloped, and these technological limits impede our ability to develop new diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for osteoarthritis effectively.  This new R01 proposal will help the group to advance magnetic capture as a method to assess multiple biomarkers in rodent osteoarthritis models, enabling the development of prognostic biomarkers and improving the preclinical assessment of emerging osteoarthritis therapeutics.  Long term, the group hopes to develop and apply magnetic capture to osteoarthritis biomarker analysis in small human joints, such as those of the human hand and lumbar spine.

Congratulations to Dr. Allen and his collaborators!