Alessia Longoni

Since my bachelor I have specialized in bone and cartilage tissue engineering. During my master I have further pursued my interest in developing strategies for the regeneration of musculoskeletal tissues by focusing on 3D scaffolds design, tailoring their physicochemical properties and architecture. In my PhD I developed an interest for translational aspects of tissue engineering, in particular for the challenges involved in the potential clinical implementation of cell-based cartilaginous constructs for endochondral bone regeneration. This gave me the opportunity of exploring the immunological challenges in tissue engineering, especially how the host immune response developed against the engineered cartilage impacted the final regenerative outcome. Finally, during my postdoc I focused on the role of vascularization in the context of osteonecrosis and on the design of growth factors delivery systems for the revascularization of the necrotic femoral head.