Jerome Werkmeister
  1. Current research activities

    2. Our key area of research is in cell-based therapies suitable for autologous and stem cell targeted primarily towards orthopaedic applications including cartilage and bone, but largely applicable to a broad range of regenerative tissue-based scaffolds. Our previous track record has been based on designing and evaluating collagen-based materials for wound repair, cardiovascular applications and soft tissue augmentation. Our work involves articular and meniscal cartilage culture systems, development of synthetic and biological scaffolds, and evaluation of tissue growth in vitro and in small and large animals. Our group has experience in collagen-based biomaterials, including recombinant and peptide-based collagen-like proteins, for applications in wound healing, cardiovascular, tissue scaffolds, bioreactors and animal trials for development of cell-based tissue regeneration.

    In particular our current focus has been on developing technologies for rapid expansion and control of phenotype of cells for transplantation, using a number of synthetic and natural microspheres as well as materials for delivery systems that are non-disruptive to current surgical protocol. On a personal level, I have advised companies and acted as a consultant on various issues relating to biomaterials and biocompatibility, have received a number of grants from Industry and Government, and have acted as a spokesperson to the Industry Commission for the biomaterials scientific community on affairs related to new and advanced materials. I am a co-founder and Secretary of the Australian Society for Biomaterials and Past President for a number of years.

  2. Keywords

    3. Cell-based therapies, articular cartilage, meniscal regeneration, collagen, tissue constructs.

  3. End-user applications

    • Articular cartilage
    • Meniscal repair
    • Bone repair
    • Dermal scarring
    • Bioadhesives

  4. Key publications

    5. I. WERKMEISTER, J.A., Edwards, G.A., White, J.F., Casagranda, F., Hunt, J.A., Williams, D.F., and Ramshaw, J.A.M. In vivo evaluation of modified mandrel grown vascular prostheses. J. Biomed. Mater. Res. 47: 316-323, 1999.
    II. WERKMEISTER, J.A., Vaughan, P.R., Peng, Y., and Ramshaw, J.A.M. Recombinant protein scaffolds for tissue engineering. In “Biomaterials Handbook –Advanced Applications of Basic Sciences and Bioengineering”, Wise, D.L., Hasirci, V., Lewandrowski, K-U., Yaszemski, M.J., Altobelli, D.E., and Trantolo, D.J. (Eds), Cambridge Scientific Inc. pp 677-699, 2003.
    III. White, J.F., WERKMEISTER, J.A., Darby, I.A., Bisucci, T., Birk, D.E., and Ramshaw, J.A.M. Collagen fibril formation in a wound healing model. J.Structural Biology, 137: 23-30, 2002.
    IV. Ramshaw, J.A.M., Vaughan, P.R., and WERKMEISTER, J.A. Applications of collagen in medical devices. Biomed. Engineering 13: 14-26, 2001.
    V. WERKMEISTER, J.A., Tebb, T.T., White, J.F., and Ramshaw, J.A.M. Collagenous tissue formation in association with medical implants. Current Opinion in Solid State & Materials Science 5: 185-191, 2001.

  5. Outreach activities

    6. None as Yet.

  6. Key organisation membership

    7. Australian tissue engineering interest groups

  7. Early career researcher?

    8. No.

  8. Young investigator?

    9. No.

  9. Skills and expertise

    • Cell culture
    • Monoclonal antibody production
    • Tissue constructs and characterisation
    • Immunohistochemistry/histology
    • In vitro evaluation
    • Preclinical evaluation
    • Small animal evaluation
    • Collagen scaffolds
    • In vitro cytotoxicity/biocompatibility
    • Tissue-polymer biosynthetic materials
    • Explant analyses · Microscopy
  10. Specialist equipment and infrastructure

    • Microscopy – standard, confocal, fluorescent, SEM, TEM (shared)
    • Full cell culture facilities/bioreactors
    • Molecular biology facilities
    • Small animal house facilities (within Division)
    • Large scale collagen preparations
    • Biochemistry, gel chromatography
  11. Contact Details 

    Dr Jerome Werkmeister
    Address: Molecular Science CSIRO 343 Royal Parade, Parkville, Victoria, 3052
    Country: Australia
    Phone: +61 3 9662 7239
    Fax: +61 3 9662 7218
    Email: Jerome.Werkmeister@csiro.au

© 2004

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