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A Microfluidic Platform To Quantify Spatio-Temporal Diffusion Of Chemo-Gradients Within 3d Scaffolds: Applications In Axonal Biology, Michael A. Sawonik

ETD Archive

Axonal outgrowth and guidance play an important role in wiring the developing and regenerating nervous system. The critical role of biomolecular gradients in facilitating this axonal sensitivity and directionality along specific trajectories needs to be elucidated for designing effective therapeutic treatments under injury or disease conditions. However, previous in vitro approaches based on micropipette assay or gel-turning assay proved to be unsuitable or inefficient for precise generation and quantification of diffusive gradients. In this study, we utilized a microfluidic device to generate and quantify physiologically-relevant biomolecular gradients in a simple and reliable manner. Using a combination of computational and experimental …