Hansjoerg Wyss Research Grant Awards

The Hansjoerg Wyss Research Awards were established in 2009 through a generous grant to the AOSpine Research Commission (AOSRC) by the HJW Foundation.

The purpose of the grants is to provide funding for researchers for projects that explore innovative hypotheses or approaches to clinical and experimental research covering all areas of spine research.

The award winners for 2009 are:

Focus Grant

Jeremy Fairbank, Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre, University of Oxford, UK—Does fusion lead to increased adjacent segment disc degeneration (ASDD) in patients with chronic low back pain?

Start-up Grants

Jaro Karppinen, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, University of Oulu, Finland—Molecular mechanisms in low back pain with modic changes

Guang-Qian Zhou, Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, The University of Hong Kong, PRC – HK SAR—MRI and genetic labeling-based molecular imaging for tracking differentiation fates and functionality of mesenchymal stem cells transplanted into the intervertebral disc of a rhesus monkey model

Michael Guy Vitale, Pediatric Spine and Scoliosis Service, Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital of New York, USA—Psychosocial effects of repetitive surgery on children and their caregivers in the setting of early onset scoliosis

Joshua Auerbach, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, USA—Disc degeneration below arthrodesis in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis at a minimum 10 year follow-up

Wesley Hsu, John Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, USA— Using human chordoma cell lines to understand the pathophysiology and role of stem cells in a primary osseous tumor