Scientific conference devoted to the 40th Anniversary
40th Anniversary of the Institute for Problems of Cryobiology and Cryomedicine
The Institute for Problems of Cryobiology and Cryomedicine of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine was organised in 1972 on the base of two laboratories of the Institute of Low Temperature Physics and Engineering of the National Academy of Sciences of USSR and R&D laboratory for Low Temperature Preservation of Bone Marrow and Blood at Kharkov Institute for Physicians Advanced Training. The Institute has always been a unique establishment of such a scientific profile within Ukraine and ex-USSR. The driving forces of the Institute's creation were Academician B.I. Verkin and Prof. N.S. Pushkar. The latter became the first Director of the Institute.
Since 1983 the Institute was headed by Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine Valentin I. Grischenko. He was the first in Ukraine who started the applying for infertility treatment the artificial reproductive technologies, method of artificial insemination with husband's and donor's sperm, IVF etc. Due to the studies under Valentin I. Grischenko's leadership for the first time in Ukraine in 1991 the girl conceived in vitro was born. Introduction into practice of these methods enables the improvement of demographic situation in the country. The cryopreserved placental preparations, now successfully used in clinical practice were designed and certified under the leadership of Valentin I. Grischenko. When applying these tissue and cell biological preparations a patient receives the biologically active balanced compounds of natural origin, affecting the metabolism of an organism in a whole. The cells administered into organism are capable of performing the substitutive functions. The example of practical cold application in medicine is the activity of the Bank of Autological Cord Blood, which is stored for newborn baby in a frozen state and can be used for his/her treatment if needed. Of special attention is the designing of the brand new preparations derived and cultured from the cells of an adult patient. These preparations may be used for this particular patient in orthopaedic practice, when treating complicated wounds, burns, neurological pathology and in cosmetic medicine.
The present director of the Institute is the Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine is Anatoliy N. Goltsev. He was the first who proved the possible directed verification of allogeneic bone marrow immune reactivity after certain cryopreservation regimens with minimizing an immune conflict as the graft versus host disease. Recently under his leadership as the competitive research topics there have been performed the works on theoretical substantiation and practical use of current nanotechnologies as well as cryogenic ones in biology and medicine according to joint STCU and the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine Targeted Initiative Program, as well as complex program of National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine titled as "Development of novel medical and biological as well as bioengineered technologies for human health and national economy". Academician Anatoliy N. Goltsev has studied the effect of cryopreservation factors on the cell genome state, in particular the gene expression of self-maintenance, proliferation and differentiation of hemopoietic stem and stromal elements of immune competent cells of different origin, cancer stem cells.
The major research interests of scientists of the Institute are:
Studying the method of cryoinjury, cryoprotection, natural integrity of biological objects to cold and their reparation after a cold effect.
Creation of effective methods for artificial cryoprotection of biological systems of various organization levels and developing the cryopreservation techniques for biological objects and technical devices for their realization.
Use of hypothermia, cryotherapy and cryopreserved biological objects to treat different types of diseases.
Cell and tissue therapy.
Basing on the fundamental investigations performed at the Institute, a lot of scientific projects were of great significance for medicine and economics and introduced into practice, among those there are the unique ones with no analogues in the world.
Human organ, tissue and cell cryopreservation, their long-term storage at low temperature banks enables the use of these biological objects in the therapy of adults and children with such diseases as hematopoiesis aplasia, different types of leukosis, malignant tumors, diabetes, infertility etc. At the Institute there have been created highly efficient methods for artificial cooling of a human being, with the possibility of regulating the level of functional activity at various organism system and, in such a way to promote effectively the recovery from alcohol addictions, poisonings, vegeto-vascular dysfunctions and other diseases.
To introduce the Institute's scientific achievements into the practice in the field of low temperature preservation of biological objects, hypothermia, cryotherapy and cryosurgery in 1974 there was established the independent unit, namely, the Experimental Production Unit, which was in 1980 re-organized into Special Designing and Technical Bureau with Experimental Unit of the Institute for Problems of Cryobiology and Cryomedicine of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Now this subdivision deals with the designing, production and introduction into practice of the equipment, providing long-term storage, processing and production of biological preparations.
Program of the conference (pdf 749 K).