Defence Online

Regenerative medicine at the front line: DASA launch new competition

Land November 27, 2017

The Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) has launched a new competition that will seek to exploit developments in regenerative medicine to offer practical approaches suitable for use early after injury.

Recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan saw step changes in trauma care that led to great improvements in survival following blast or ballistic trauma. This has meant, however, that people survive with increasingly life-changing injuries.

DASA envisage that the very early use of approaches in regenerative medicine has the potential to further revolutionise front line trauma care to save lives and to improve the quality of life for survivors.

This competition features two challenges:

• bioengineered blood and blood components
• the preservation and regeneration of soft tissue using biophysical approaches

The outputs from this work would be developed for use by the UK’s Defence Medical Services and other organisations who deliver trauma care in challenging environments.

These approaches should also reduce the burden on later care supplied by both MoD and the NHS.

Up to £500,000 is available for phase 1 of this competition, with at least another £500,000 to be made available for phase 2 of the competition. Only those projects funded through phase 1 will qualify for entry into the phase 2 of the competition.

The competition will close at midday on 11 April 2018 with Proposals to be submitted through the Accelerator submission service online.

image © Crown Copyright

If you would like to join our community and read more articles like this then please click here.

DASA Defence and Security Accelerator MOD NHS Regenerative medicine Trauma

Post written by: Matt Brown