Medical Biotechnology Commons^™

Engineering Advanced Micro And Nanofiber Materials For Biomedical Applications, Alec D. Mccarthy

Theses & Dissertations

At the functional crossroads of engineering and biomedical sciences lies the interdisciplinary field of biomedical engineering. Principles of biomedical engineering are vast, and the rigorous application of engineering towards clinically-relevant medicine has the ability to take novel concepts from bench to bedside. Arguably one of the most promising and productive sub-fields within the biomedical engineering discipline is biomaterial engineering. Here, novel biomaterials, synthesized from natural, synthetic, or hybrid materials, can be used in tissue repair and regeneration, hemostasis, as anatomical support and drug delivery vessels, or as diagnostic devices.

Of particular interest are applications of nanofiber and microfiber objects, which …

Biodegradable Nano-Hybrid Polymer Composite Networks For Regulating Cellular Behavior, Charles Henley Sprague

Masters Theses

Photo-crosslinkable polymeric biomaterials have emerged in the field of biomedical research to promote tissue regeneration. For example, scaffolds that can be crosslinked and hardened in situ have been known to make suitable implant alternatives. Since injectable and photo-crosslinkable biomaterials offer the advantage of being minimally invasive, they have emerged to compete with autografts, a current highly invasive method to repair diseased tissue. A series of novel photo-crosslinkable, injectable, and biodegradable nano-hybrid polymers consisting of poly(ε-caprolactone fumarate) (PCLF) and polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS) has been synthesized in our laboratory via polycondensation. To engineer the material properties of the nano-hybrid networks, varied …

Design And Development Of Two Component Hydrogel Ejector For Three-Dimensional Cell Growth, Thomas Dunkle, Jessica Deschamps, Connie Dam

Honors Scholar Theses

Hydrogels are useful in wound healing, drug delivery, and tissue engineering applications, but the available methods of injecting them quickly and noninvasively are limited. The medical industry does not yet have access to an all-purpose device that can quickly synthesize hydrogels of different shapes and sizes. Many synthesis procedures that have been developed result in the formation of amorphous hydrogels. While generally useful, amorphous hydrogels exhibit limited capability in tissue engineering applications, especially due to their viscous properties. This endeavor aims to modulate the appropriate gelation parameters, optimize the injection process, and create a prototype that allows for the extrusion …

Label-Free Enrichment Of Functional Cardiomyocytes Using Microfluidic Deterministic Lateral Flow Displacemen, Boyang Zhang, James V. Green, Shashi K. Murthy, Milica Radisic

Shashi K. Murthy

Progress in cardiac cell replacement therapies and tissue engineering critically depends on our ability to isolate functional cardiomyocytes (CMs) from heterogeneous cell mixtures. Label-free enrichment of cardiomyocytes is desirable for future clinical application of cell based products. Taking advantage of the physical properties of CMs, a microfluidic system was designed to separate CMs from neonatal rat heart tissue digest based on size using the principles of deterministic lateral displacement (DLD). For the first time, we demonstrate enrichment of functional CMs up to 91±2.4% directly from the digested heart tissue without any pre-treatment or labeling. Enriched cardiomyocytes remained viable after sorting …

Trabecular Calcium Phosphate Scaffolds For Bone Regeneration, Mark Ryan Appleford

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Bone tissue engineering represents a strategy for the repair or regeneration of damaged bone in the body. The science underlying this clinical therapy bridges the traditional fields of cell biology, materials science and mechanical engineering with the aim to identify how cells behave on physiologically relevant materials with natural mechanical stimuli. The objectives of this research were to develop and characterize calcium phosphate ceramic scaffolds matched to the local architecture of natural trabecular bone and to apply tissue engineering strategies for the study of cell behavior in both in vitro and in vivo models.The specific role of environment on cell …