CARMEN TERZIC: We are here joined by Dr. Fabrisia Ambrosio from the University of Pittsburgh, as part of the Fourth Annual Symposium on Regenerative Medicine. But I would like Dr. Ambrosio to talk about some new initiative that she is leading regarding Regenerative Medicine and the role that rehabilitation can play in that. Dr. Ambrosio--

FABRISIA AMBROSIO: Thank you, Carmen. Well we are thrilled to be here this year at the Mayo Clinic to hold our Fourth Annual Symposium.

The Symposium really started as an effort between Pittsburgh and Stanford and has expanded to include our partners UCSF and the Mayo Clinic. And we're particularly excited to have brought on some new partners this year, including Kyoto University, the University of Virginia, Emory University, and the University of Pisa.

So because we're starting to assemble many different partners in trying to map out a strategic vision for this field of regenerative rehab, we've decided to form an International Consortium for Regenerative Rehab. And again, here our goal is to really try and explore initiatives and programs that we can develop that can address this great potential to synergize the field of regenerative medicine with rehabilitation science. We know that the combination of the two fields really offers great promise for being able to maximize physical functioning in individuals after injury, disease or, for example, with aging.

CARMEN TERZIC: Dr. Ambrosio, can you tell us something-- what is the good news, or news, regarding the Alliance for Regenerative Rehabilitation?

FABRISIA AMBROSIO: Well we are so excited to have learned just recently that the National Institute of Health has decided to fund our Alliance for Regenerative Rehabilitation Research and Training. And this is a partnership, of course, between the University of Pittsburgh, Stanford, UCSF, and the Mayo Clinic. And so, these are the four institutions have come together.

And the goal is really to try and promote regenerative rehabilitation research and science, really through two main pillars. The first pillar being the establishment of various educational and didactic resources. So we have the intention of assembling a Massive Online Open Course, or a MOOC. We also will be developing a series of online webinars as well as an advanced training course, which will be a one-week course that will offer a series of lectures as well as hands-on laboratory experiences.

So the idea there with the educational and didactics component of our center is to really promote interactions and kind of exposure of individuals in the rehabilitation field to common techniques and tools typically employed in the field of regenerative medicine and, conversely, also to kind of expose individuals working in regenerative medicine to some of the methodologies that we commonly implement in the rehabilitation field.

As a second part of the center. We are really dedicated to promoting research in regenerative rehabilitation. As a part of this then, we plan to launch a series of pilot funding programs-- sabbatical experiences where, for example, a rehabilitation clinician or scientist can go and spend some time at one of the nation's leading laboratories in regenerative medicine research. And these laboratories come from the Mayo Clinic, UCSF, Pittsburgh, and Stanford.

And so they can spend some time learning critical methodologies in the laboratory. And hopefully this will really catalyze new collaborations between investigators in the field of regenerative medicine and rehabilitation.

So we're really excited about the potential for this new center to kind of stimulate regenerative rehabilitation efforts. And we're excited to seeing where it takes us.

CARMEN TERZIC: Thank you very much, Dr. Ambrosio. This is very exciting. And I think there is a great future of that and the role that the rehabilitation physician can play in the regenerative field. Thank you.