X. Lucas Lu
University of Delaware, DE·Biomedical Engineering
A torn ligament or other traumatic joint injury can set off cartilage breakdown years later. This condition is called post-traumatic osteoarthritis (PTOA).
- Fields
Biomedical Engineering
Medicine & Clinical Research
Pharmacology
- Topics
post-traumatic osteoarthritis
cartilage
chondrocytes
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2027
What they work on
- Determine whether statin use is linked to lower rates of osteoarthritis in the Delaware population, using a retrospective cohort study of existing health records.
- Identify how statins protect cartilage, including their effects on the mechanics of chondrocytes (cartilage cells), using in vitro cell and tissue culture models.
- Test whether statin treatment prevents post-traumatic osteoarthritis after joint injury in animal models, building the case for clinical trials in patients with joint injuries.
More about the research
Today there are few ways to stop the cartilage from degrading after an injury. The lab has found that statins can protect cartilage from a range of factors that trigger osteoarthritis. Statins are cholesterol-lowering drugs taken by about 40 million people in the US. The team found that statins act directly on chondrocytes, the cells that build and maintain cartilage, and keep them from breaking down the cartilage matrix around them.
Why it matters
Few drugs can prevent osteoarthritis after a joint injury. If statins prove effective, people with joint injuries could gain a widely available, low-cost preventive option. The work could provide one of the first effective drug-based approaches to osteoarthritis prevention. It may also encourage the 40 million current statin users, especially those with past joint injuries, to keep taking their prescriptions.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Alexander Knights
Washington University in St Louis, MO·Medicine & Clinical Research·Early-career
Determine how Rspo2-driven Wnt/β-catenin signaling controls the appearance and behavior of scar-promoting synovial cells in PTOA, using transgenic reporter mice, multi-omic analyses and in vitro differentiation assays.
Chia-Lung Wu
University of Rochester, NY·Biomedical Engineering
Determine how mechanical loading switches on WNT16 in chondrocytes through the force-sensing calcium channel TRPV4, by loading human stem cell-derived and hip chondrocytes in agarose gels and sequencing their genetic and epigenetic controls.
Sanja Novak
University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, AR·Physiology
Evaluate how blood vessels in the synovium and subchondral bone change during OA development. Test whether early microvascular damage or later synovial angiogenesis drives cartilage damage, including after mechanical-stress knee injury.
The school
University of Delaware: 22 labs on PI Pages, $466M a year on research, 298 research doctorates a year.
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