Biomedical Engineering and Bioengineering Commons^™

Cardiac Regenerative Medicine: Insights From Healthy And Diseased Engineered Tissues, Pamela Grace Hitscherich

Dissertations

Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of mortality in the United States. Current tissue engineering approaches have fallen short of promoting fully functional cardiovascular cells and the post-myocardial infarction microenvironment is still not well understood. These gaps in knowledge are addressed in this dissertation through the development of in vitro engineered cardiac tissues using electroactive materials to enhance the differentiation of pluripotent stem cell derived cardiomyocytes and through the development of in vitro myocardial inflammation models dedicated to understanding cardiomyocytes and macrophages interactions.

Specifically, piezoelectric poly (vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) (PVDF-TrFE) supports the attachment and survival of mouse embryonic stem cell derived …

Temporal And Spatial Effects Of Shock Overpressure On Blood-Brain Barrier Permeability In Blast-Induced Traumatic Brain Injury, Matthew Joseph Kuriakose

Dissertations

Exposure to shock waves is the leading cause of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in military personnel and blast-induced TBI (bTBI) is considered the signature wound in recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many researchers attempt to replicate field-relevant shock waves in laboratory settings through the use of gas-driven shock tubes in order to investigate the generation and propagation of shock waves and also explore possible mechanisms of bTBI. Among several injury mechanisms of bTBI, damage to the blood-brain barrier (BBB) has been identified as a potential candidate and has been the focus of several clinical and experimental investigations aimed to …

A 3d Simulation Of Leukocyte Adhesion In Blood Flow, Tai-Hsien Wu

Dissertations

It has been widely acknowledged that further understanding about the dynamics between blood cells and blood flow can help us gain more knowledge about the causes of diseases and discover more effective treatments. Examples of such dynamics include red blood cell (RBC, or erythrocyte) aggregation, white blood cell (WBC, or leukocyte) margination, and WBC extravasation. WBC extravasation is an important multiple-step process in the inflammatory response and therefore has drawn considerable attention over the past two decades. In this multiple-step process, a WBC undergoes at least four steps, including capture, rolling, firm adhesion, and transmigration, and each step is influenced …

Prediction Of Forelimb Muscle Activities And Movement Phases Using Corticospinal Signals In The Rat, Sinan Gok

Dissertations

The targeted population for this project is primarily patients with high level spinal cord injury (SCI) and individuals with motor neuron diseases (MND). In both SCI and MND cases motor control is interrupted due to lack of communication between the brain and the musculature, although both sides are otherwise functional. The approach in this project is to use neural engineering techniques to restore the motor function that was lost because of an injury or disease.

Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) attempt to extract the volitional signals from the cortex when the brain's normal outputs to the musculoskeletal system are impaired. However, BCIs …

Submandibular Mechanical Stimulation Of Upper Airway Muscles To Treat Obstructive Sleep Apnea, Ferhat Erdogan

Dissertations

The extrinsic tongue muscles are activated in coordination with pharyngeal muscles to keep a patent airway during respiration in wakefulness and sleep. The activity of genioglossus, the primary tongue-protruding muscle playing an important role in this coordination, is known to be modulated by several reflex pathways mediated through the mechanoreceptors of the upper airways. The main objective is to investigate the effectiveness of activating these reflex pathways with mechanical stimulations, for the long-term goal of improving the upper airway patency during disordered breathing in sleep. The genioglossus response is examined during mandibular and sub-mandibular mechanical stimulations in healthy subjects during …

Fluorescent Probes And Functionalized Nanoparticles For Bioimaging: Synthesis, Photophysical Properties And Applications, Xinglei Liu

Dissertations

The development of new organic molecular probes with excellent photophysical properties and high fluorescence quantum yields is of considerable interest to many research areas including one- and two-photon fluorescence microscopy, fluorescence-based sensing methodologies, and cancer therapy. Series of organic linear-/non-linear optical molecules including squaraine derivatives, and fluorene derivatives as well as other bioconjugates are designed and synthesized during the doctoral study for the aim of ion detection (Chapter 5), photo dynamic therapy, and deep-tissue imaging (Chapter 4). These optical probes are capable of absorbing light in the near infrared (NIR) window and thus have deeper penetration and cause less photodamage …