2021 AMI Online Salon
Layers of the Calvarium
Project Details
- Entrant Name: Shawna Snyder
- Client: The Grayson Lab of Craniofacial & Orthopaedic Tissue Engineering
- Copyright: Shawna Snyder, 2021
- Medium/software used: Photoshop
- Final presentation format: Graphical Abstract in Online Journal
- Primary Audience: Tissue engineering professionals, specifically in Osteo Regenerative Medicine
Project Description
To regenerate cranial bone defects, tissue engineers need to understand the tissue they are trying to recreate. A long held belief is that more vasculature means better bone regeneration, but new research suggests that specific vessel subtypes drive progenitor cell differentiation and regeneration. This illustration peels back the layers of the calvarium to visualize the spatial relationships between vessel subtypes and progenitor cells. Vessel subtypes are classified by differences in endothelial cell expression, with the hi/lo designation for angiogenic potential. Two progenitor cell populations are found in the calvarium and their density varies on location. Progenitor cells preferentially associate with vessel subtype CD31(hi) Emcn(hi) at the transcortical canals, indicating that these vessel subtypes drive cranial bone regeneration. Visualized together, understanding the layers of the calvarium can enable a targeted approach to engineering vascularized bone.
