Tag: Biomaterials

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Penn Bioengineering Alumna Cynthia Reinhart-King is President Elect of BMES

Dr. Cynthia Reinhart-King, Engineering, BME, Photo by Joe Howell

Penn Bioengineering alumna Cynthia Reinhart-King, Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Engineering and Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt University, was elected the next President of the Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES), the largest professional society for biomedical engineers. Her term as president-elect started at the annual BMES meeting in October 2021.

Reinhart-King graduated with her Ph.D. from Penn Bioengineering in 2006. She studied in the lab of Daniel Hammer, Alfred G. and Meta A. Ennis Professor in Bioengineering and Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering as a Whitaker Fellow and went on to complete postdoctoral training as an Individual NIH NRSA postdoctoral fellow at the University of Rochester. Prior to joining Vanderbilt, she was on the faculty of Cornell University and received tenure in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. The Reinhart-King lab at Vanderbilt “uses tissue engineering, microfabrication, novel biomaterials, model organisms, and tools from cell and molecular biology to study the effects of mechanical and chemical changes in tissues during disease progression.”

Reinhart-King gave the 2019 Grace Hopper Distinguished Lecture, sponsored by the Department of Bioengineering. This lecture series recognizes successful women in engineering and seeks to inspire students to achieve at the highest level. She is a recipient of numerous prestigious awards, including the Rita Schaffer Young Investigator Award in 2010, an NSF CAREER Award, and the Mid-Career Award in 2018 from BMES.

In a Q&A on the BMES Blog, Reinhart-King said that:

“BMES is facing many challenges, like many societies, as we deal with the hurdles associated with COVID-19 and inequities across society. We must continue to address those challenges. However, we are also in a terrific window of having robust membership, many members who are eager to get involved with the society’s activities, and a national lens on science and scientists. One of my goals will be to identify and create opportunities for our members to help build the reach of the society and its member.”

Read “Cynthia Reinhart-King is president-elect of the Biomedical Engineering Society” in Vanderbilt News.

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Penn Establishes the Center for Precision Engineering for Health with $100 Million Commitment

by Evan Lerner

The Center for Precision Engineering for Health will bring together researchers spanning multiple scientific fields to develop novel therapeutic biomaterials, such as a drug-delivering nanoparticles that can be designed to adhere to only to the tissues they target. (Image: Courtesy of the Mitchell Lab)

The University of Pennsylvania announced today that it has made a $100 million commitment in its School of Engineering and Applied Science to establish the Center for Precision Engineering for Health.

The Center will conduct interdisciplinary, fundamental, and translational research in the synthesis of novel biomolecules and new polymers to develop innovative approaches to design complex three dimensional structures from these new materials to sense, understand, and direct biological function.

“Biomaterials represent the ‘stealth technology’ which will create breakthroughs in improving health care and saving lives,” says Penn President Amy Gutmann. “Innovation that combines precision engineering and design with a fundamental understanding of cell behavior has the potential to have an extraordinary impact in medicine and on society. Penn is already well established as an international leader in innovative health care and engineering, and this new Center will generate even more progress to benefit people worldwide.”

Penn Engineering will hire five new President’s Penn Compact Distinguished Professors, as well as five additional junior faculty with fully funded faculty positions that are central to the Center’s mission. New state-of-the-art labs will provide the infrastructure for the research. The Center will seed grants for early-stage projects to foster advances in interdisciplinary research across engineering and medicine that can then be parlayed into competitive grant proposals.

“Engineering solutions to problems within human health is one of the grand challenges of the discipline,” says Vijay Kumar, Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering. “Our faculty are already leading the charge against these challenges, and the Center will take them to new heights.”

This investment represents a turning point in Penn’s ability to bring creative, bio-inspired approaches to engineer novel behaviors at the molecular, cellular, and tissue levels, using biotic and abiotic matter to improve the understanding of the human body and to develop new therapeutics and clinical breakthroughs. It will catalyze integrated approaches to the modeling and computational design of building blocks of peptides, proteins, and polymers; the synthesis, processing, and fabrication of novel materials; and the experimental characterizations that are needed to refine approaches to design, processing, and synthesis.

“This exciting new initiative,” says Interim Provost Beth Winkelstein, “brings together the essential work of Penn Engineering with fields across our campus, especially in the Perelman School of Medicine. It positions Penn for global leadership at the convergence of materials science and biomedical engineering with innovative new techniques of simulation, synthesis, assembly, and experimentation.”

Examples of the types of work being done in this field include new nanoparticle technologies to improve storage and distribution of vaccines, such as the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines; the development of protocells, which are synthetic cells that can be engineered to do a variety of tasks, including adhering to surfaces or releasing drugs; and vesicle based liquid biopsy for diagnosing cancer.

N.B.: This story originally appeared in Penn Engineering Today.

Beth Winkelstein is the Eduardo D. Glandt President’s Distinguished Professor in Bioengineering.

The featured illustration comes from a recent study led by Michael Mitchell, Skirkanich Assistant Professor of Innovation in Bioengineering, and Margaret Billingsley, a graduate student in his lab.

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BE Seminar: “Regenerative Engineering: Enabling Regenerative Medicine” (Guillermo Ameer)

Guillermo Ameer, D.Sc.

Speaker: Guillermo Ameer, D.Sc.
Daniel Hale Williams Professor of Biomedical Engineering & Surgery
McCormick School of Engineering
Northwestern University

Date: Thursday, September 16, 2021
Time: 3:30-4:30 PM EDT
Zoom – check email for link or contact ksas@seas.upenn.edu
Location: Moore Room 216, 200 S. 33rd Street

Abstract: Regenerative engineering is the convergence of advances in materials science, physical sciences, stem cell and developmental biology, and translational medicine to develop tools that enable the regeneration and reconstruction of tissue and organ function. I will describe how materials can be engineered to play a critical role in treating tissue and organ defects and dysfunction by promoting cellular processes that are conducive to regeneration. Applications of these materials to address the complications of diabetes and orthopaedic injuries will be discussed.

Guillermo Ameer Bio: Dr. Ameer is the Daniel Hale Williams professor of Biomedical Engineering and Surgery in the Biomedical Engineering Department at the McCormick School of Engineering and the Department of Surgery at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University. He is the founding director of the Center for Advanced Regenerative Engineering (CARE) and the Director of the NIH-funded Regenerative Engineering Training Program (RE-Training). He received his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from The University of Texas at Austin and his doctoral degree in chemical and biomedical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His research interests include regenerative engineering, biomaterials, additive manufacturing for biomedical devices, controlled drug delivery and bio/nanotechnology for therapeutics and diagnostics.

Dr. Ameer’s laboratory pioneered the development and tissue regeneration applications of citrate-based biomaterials (CBB), the core technology behind the innovative bioresorbable orthopaedic tissue fixation devices CITREFIXTM, CITRESPLINETM, and CITRELOCKTM, which were recently cleared by the F.D.A for clinical use and marketed worldwide. CBBs are the first thermoset synthetic polymers used for implantable biodegradable medical devices. The co-founder of several companies, Dr. Ameer has approximately 300 publications and conference abstracts and over 55 patents issued and pending in 9 countries.

His awards include the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, the American Heart Association’s Established Investigator Award, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Eminent Chemical Engineer Award, the Key to the City of Panama, induction into the Academy of Distinguished Chemical Engineers (U. Texas Mcketta Dept. of Chemical Engineering), and the Society for Biomaterials Clemson Award for Contributions to the Literature. Dr. Ameer is a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), Fellow of the Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES), a Fellow of the AIChE, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), Fellow of the Materials Research Society, and a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors. Dr. Ameer is an Associate Editor for the AAAS journal Science Advances and the Regenerative Engineering and Translational Medicine journal; a member of the board of directors of the Regenerative Engineering Society; past board member of BMES and AIMBE; Chair of the AIMBE Awards Committee; Chair-elect of the College of Fellows of AIMBE; and a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Acuitive Technologies, Inc.- a company that is bringing his biomaterial technologies to the musculoskeletal surgery market.

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Bioengineering Graduate Students Take the Annual BETA Day Online

By GABE Outreach Chairs and Ph.D. students David Gonzalez-Martinez and David Mai

BETA Day Biomaterials workshop

Every spring, the Graduate Association of Bioengineers (GABE) at Penn partners up with iPraxis, an educational non-profit organization based in Philadelphia, to organize BETA Day, an event that brings together Bioengineering graduate students and local Philadelphia grade school students to introduce them to the field of bioengineering, the life of graduate students, and hands-on scientific demonstrations. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, we adapted the traditional in-person BETA Day into a virtual event on Zoom. This year, we assembled kits containing the necessary materials for our chosen demonstrations and worked with iPraxis to coordinate their delivery to partner schools and their students. This enabled students to perform their demonstrations in a hands-on manner from their own homes; over 40 students were able to participate in extracting their own DNA and making biomaterials with safe household materials.

Michelle Johnson presents on her work in robotics

The day began with a fantastic lecture by Michelle Johnson, Associate Professor in Bioengineering and Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, who introduced students to the field of rehabilitation robotics and shared her experience as a scientist. Students then learned about DNA and biomaterials through lectures mediated by the graduate students Dayo Adetu and Puneeth Guruprasad. After each lecture, students broke into breakout rooms with graduate student facilitators where they were able to get some hands-on scientific experience as they extracted DNA from their cheek cells and fabricated alginate hydrogels. Michael Sobrepera, a graduate student in Dr. Johnson’s lab, concluded the event by giving a lecture on the process of robotics development and discussed where the field is heading and some important considerations for the field.

Dayo Adetu, Bioengineering Master’s student and GABE President, teaches the students about Genetic Engineering

While yet another online event may seem unexciting, throughout the lectures students remained exceptionally engaged and raised fantastic questions ranging from the accessibility of low income communities to novel robotic therapeutic technologies to the bioethical questions robotic engineers will face as technologies advance. The impact of BETA day was evident as the high school students began to discuss the possible majors they would like to pursue for their bachelor’s degrees. Events like BETA Day give a glimpse into possible STEM fields and careers students can pursue.

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Claudia Loebel Appointed Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan

by Mahelet Asrat

Claudia Loebel, MD, PhD (Photo/Mel Evans)

The Department of Bioengineering is proud to congratulate Claudia Loebel, M.D., Ph.D. on her appointment as Assistant Professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan. Loebel is part of the University of Michigan’s Biological Sciences Scholar program, which recruits junior instructional faculty in major areas of biomedical investigation. Loebel’s appointment will begin in Fall 2021.

Loebel got her M.D. in 2011 from Martin-Luther University in Halle-Wittenberg, Germany and her Ph.D. in Health Sciences and Technology from ETH Zurich, Switzerland in 2016. There she worked under her advisors Professors Marcy Zenobi-Wong from ETH Zurich and David Eglin from AO Research Institute Davos. At Penn, she conducted postdoctoral research in the Polymeric Biomaterials Laboratory of Jason Burdick, Robert D. Bent Professor in Bioengineering, and as a Visiting Research Scholar in the Mauck Laboratory of the McKay Orthopaedic Research Laboratory in the Perelman School of Medicine.

Loebel was awarded a K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award through the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which supports her remaining time as a postdoc as well as her time as an independent investigator at the University of Michigan. Loebel is excited about training the next generation of scientists and engineers and being part of their journey in becoming independent and diverse thinkers.

Loebel’s research area is inspired by the interface between material science and regenerative engineering and how it can address specific problems related to tissue development, repair, and regeneration. By developing mechanically and strucatally dynamic biomaterials, microfabrication, and matrix manipulation techniques her works aim to recreate complex cell-matrix interactions and model tissue morphogenesis and disease. The ultimate goal of her research is to use these engineered systems to develop and translate more effective therapeutic treatments for diseases such as fibrotic, inflammatory, and congenital disorders. Her lab’s work will initially focus on developing engineering lung alveolar organoids, aiming to build models of acute and chronic pulmonary diseases and for personalized medicine.

Loebel says, “I am grateful to all my Ph.D. and postdoc mentors for their continuous support and especially Jason who, over the last few years, has trained me in becoming an independent scientist and mentor. This transition would not have been possible without such a great mentor team behind me.”

Congratulations Dr. Loebel from everyone at Penn Bioengineering!

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Manuela Raimondi Appointed Visiting Professor in Bioengineering

Manuela Raimondi, PhD

Manuela Teresa Raimondi was appointed Visiting Professor in Bioengineering in the Associated Faculty of the School of Engineering and Applied Science for the 2020-2021 academic year. Raimondi received her Ph.D. in Bioengineering in 2000 from Politecnico di Milano, Italy. She is currently a Full Professor of Bioengineering at Politecnico di Milano in the Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering “G. Natta”, where she teaches the course “Technologies for Regenerative Medicine” in the Biomedical Engineering graduate program.

Raimondi is the founder and Director of the Mechanobiology Lab and of the Interdepartmental Live Cell Imaging lab. She has pioneered the development of cutting edge tools for cell modelling, ranging from micro-engineered stem cell niches, to miniaturized windows for in vivo intravital imaging, to microfluidic culture systems to engineer tissue-equivalents and organoids for cell modelling and drug discovery. Her platforms are currently commercialized by her start-up, MOAB srl. Her research is funded by the European Research Council (ERC), by The National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs), by the European Commission, and by the European Space Agency.

“Getting to Penn was quite the challenge with the various travel restrictions and the pandemic, but I am used to overcoming adverse odds and I am really excited to be here now,” says Dr. Raimondi. “In this challenging time, when many new barriers are coming up, I think building bridges and new scientific collaborations is even more important. I very much look forward to being part of the Penn research community.”

Dr. Raimondi with host Riccardo Gottardi, PhD on Smith Walk

During her sabbatical at Penn, Raimondi is investigating her hypothesis that stem cells pluripotency reprogramming can be guided by mechanical cues. Over the past five years, she has cultured many different stem cell types in the “Nichoids,” the synthetic stem cell niche she developed, and gathered robust evidence on how physical constraints at the microscale level upregulate pluripotency. Raimondi is hosted in the Bioengineering and Biomaterials Lab of Riccardo Gottardi, Assistant Professor in Bioengineering and in Pediatrics at the Perelman School of Medicine, where she is helping to refine human stem cell sources that could be minimally manipulated for translational tissue engineering for a safe and effective use in regenerative therapies, as a key issue for clinical translation is the maintenance or enhancement of multipotency during cell expansion without exogenous agents or genetic modification.

“Dr. Raimondi is a trailblazer in Italy in regenerative medicine who has introduced many new concepts in a sometimes musty academic environment and has shattered a number of glass ceilings,” says Dr. Gottardi. “I think her sabbatical at Penn is a great opportunity for her and for the Penn community to build new and exciting trans-Atlantic collaborations.”

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BE Seminar: “Engineering Synthetic Biomaterials for Islet Transplantation” (María M. Coronel)

Speaker: María M. Coronel, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow, the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology

Date: Thursday, February 18, 2021
Time: 3:00-4:00 PM EST
Zoom – check email for link or contact ksas@seas.upenn.edu

Title: “Engineering Synthetic Biomaterials for Islet Transplantation”

Abstract:

Two major challenges to the translation of cellular-based tissue-engineered therapies are the lack of adequate oxygen support post-implantation and the need for systemic immunosuppression to halt the strong inflammatory and immunological response of the host. As such, strategies that aim at addressing oxygen demand, and local immunological responses can be highly beneficial in the translation of these therapies. In this seminar, I will focus on two biomaterial strategies to create a more favorable transplant niche for pancreatic islet transplantation. The first half will describe an in-situ oxygen-releasing biomaterial fabricated through the incorporation of solid peroxides in a silicone polymer. The implementation of this localized, controlled and sustained oxygen-generator mitigates the activation of detrimental hypoxia-induced pathways in islets and enhances the potency of extrahepatic 3D islet-loaded devices in a diabetic animal model. In the second part, I will focus on engineering synthetic biomaterials for the delivery of immunomodulatory signals for transplant acceptance. Biomaterial carriers fabricated with polyethylene glycol microgels are used to deliver immunomodulatory signals to regulate the local microenvironment and prevent allograft rejection in a clinically relevant pre-clinical transplant model. The use of synthetic materials as an off-the-shelf platform, without the need for manipulating the biological cell product, improves the clinical translatability of this engineered approach. Designing safer, responsive biomaterials to boost the delivery of targeted therapeutics will significantly reinvigorate interventional cell-based tissue-engineered therapies.

Bio:

Dr. María M. Coronel is currently a Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation postdoctoral fellow at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Dr. Coronel completed her BS degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Miami, and her Ph.D. degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Florida as a National Institute of Health predoctoral fellow. Her doctoral work focused on engineering oxygen-generating materials for addressing the universal challenge of hypoxia within three-dimensional tissue-engineered implants. As a postdoctoral fellow, her research interest focus on engineering tools and principles to understand, stimulate, and modulate the immune system to develop controlled targeted interventional therapies. In addition to research, Dr. Coronel aims to be an advocate for diversity and inclusion in STEM as the co-president of the postdoctoral group and a founding member of the diversity, equity, and inclusion committee in bioengineering at Georgia Tech. Outside of the lab María enjoys cooking, baking, and traveling.

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Penn Bioengineering Postdoc Brittany Taylor Appointed Assistant Professor at University of Florida

 

Brittany Taylor, PhD

The Department of Bioengineering is proud to congratulate Postdoctoral Researcher Brittany Taylor, PhD on her appointment as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the J. Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering of the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering at the University of Florida. Taylor’s appointment will begin in January 2021 after four years as a postdoc in Penn Medicine’s McKay Orthopaedic Research Laboratory where she worked under the supervision of Louis Soslowsky, Fairhill Professor in Orthopaedic Surgery and Professor in Bioengineering.

Taylor got her BS in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Virginia where she conducted research under Drs. Cato Laurencin and Edward Botchwey (the latter got his PhD in Penn Bioengineering in 2002). She went on to complete her PhD in Biomedical Engineering in 2016, studying with Dr. Joseph Freeman, in the Musculoskeletal Tissue Regeneration Laboratory at Rutgers University. During her time at Penn, she served as the Co-President of the Biomedical Postdoctoral Council, worked with the Perelman School of Medicine’s PennVIEW program on postdoctoral diversity recruitment, and spearheaded the mentoring circles program, which brings together postdoctoral researchers, graduate students, and undergraduates in informal groups that allow mentorship and learning to flow freely.

The foundation for Taylor’s research interests is a combination of her training in bone tissue engineering, bioactive biomaterials, and tendon injury and repair. Her graduate research focused on a three-dimensional biomimetic pre-vascularized scaffold that simultaneously promoted osteogenic and angiogenic differentiation of human mesenchymal stem cells in vitro and cellular infiltration and neovascularization in vivo without the addition of growth factors of cells. As a postdoctoral fellow, in addition to investigating the role of collagen type V on tendon inflammation and remodeling in a mouse patellar tendon injury model, she also elucidated the biological and mechanical implications of an implantable bilayer delivery system (BiLDS) for controlled and localized release of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) to modulate tendon inflammation in a rat rotator cuff injury and repair model. This collection of work exploits the ability of these transformative technologies to provide physical and chemical regenerative cues without the use of exogenous cells; hence avoiding possible complications associated with autologous and allogeneic cell sources and simplifying the regulatory pathway towards clinical application. Taylor’s future research program at the University of Florida will focus on tailored cell-free combinatorial strategies, such as decellularized matrices, tunable delivery systems, and modified extracellular vesicles, to complement and improve the native musculoskeletal tissue regenerative and reparative process.

“Brittany has been an amazing postdoctoral fellow,” says her mentor Louis Soslowsky. “She has learned a lot and contributed to various projects in an exemplary manner. She has been a leader in many arenas here at Penn and I am so proud of what she has done so far. I look forward to following her continued accomplishments at the University of Florida! I know she’ll do great!”

In the course of her pre-faculty career, Taylor achieved an impressive list of accomplishments. She received a Postdoctoral Fellowship for Academic Diversity from the Office of the Vice Provost for Research; a Postdoctoral Enrichment Program (PDEP) award from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund; and a UNCF Bristol-Myers Squibb E.E. Just Postgraduate Fellowship. Additionally, she was named a Rising Star in Cell Mentor’s list of “100 inspiring Black scientists in America” in February 2020 and was given a Rising Star in Biomedical Science Award from MIT in 2019.

“I am grateful for the opportunity to complete my postdoctoral training at Penn,” Taylor says:

“[P]articularly in a lab that is affiliated with the Penn Bioengineering program and the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, where I had the unique experience of addressing basic science questions using translational animal models, while utilizing my engineering background and having a direct interaction with clinicians. Additionally, I connected with some amazing people here at Penn who had a significant impact on my time at Penn, and will be lifelong friends, colleagues, and mentors.”

Congratulations Dr. Taylor from everyone at Penn Bioengineering!

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Penn Bioengineering Postdoc Rachel Riley Named Assistant Professor at Rowan University

Rachel Riley, Ph.D.

The Department of Bioengineering is proud to congratulate Postdoctoral Fellow Rachel Riley on her appointment as an Assistant Professor in Biomedical Engineering at Rowan University starting September 2020.

Originally from Matawan, NJ, Riley has been an NIH Postdoctoral Fellow in the Mitchell Lab since 2018. Her move to a faculty position at Rowan marks a return, as she received her B.S. in Civil and Environmental Engineering there in 2012. Riley went on to receive her Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering in 2018 at the University of Delaware with Emily Day, Ph.D. before joining the lab of Michael J. Mitchell, Ph.D., Skirkanich Assistant Professor of Innovation, later that year. The Mitchell Lab’s research lies at the interface of biomaterials science, drug delivery, and cellular and molecular bioengineering to fundamentally understand and therapeutically target biological barriers.

“Rachel has had a prolific academic career at the University of Delaware and at Penn, launching several exciting research projects and mentoring the next generation of STEM researchers,” Mitchell says. “I’m very hopeful that her new position as an Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Rowan University will permit her to engineer new drug delivery technologies for women’s health applications.”

Research in the Riley Lab at Rowan will explore how nanoparticle drug delivery technologies can be engineered specifically for applications in women’s health. They will use nanoparticles as tools to study and treat gynecological cancers, fetal diseases, and pregnancy complications. Riley’s ultimate goal is to gain a fundamental understanding of how nanoparticle structure influences delivery to gynecological tissues to enable them to take an engineering approach to tackle new applications in women’s health.

Riley says that she is committed to supporting women and minorities in STEM disciplines and she looks forward to continuing collaborations with Penn and starting new collaborations with researchers at Cooper Medical School at Rowan University (CMSRU). Congratulations, Dr. Riley!

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BE Seminar Series: February 6th with Kara Spiller, Ph.D.

We hope you’ll join us for our next Penn Bioengineering seminar!

Kara L. Spiller, Ph.D.

Speaker: Kara Spiller, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of the School of Biomedical Engineering, Science, and Health Systems
Drexel University

Date: Thursday, February 6, 2020
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Room 337, Towne Building

 

 

Title: “Immunomodulatory Biomaterials for Limb Salvage”

Abstract:

Diabetes and peripheral arterial disease affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Patients with these conditions frequently develop chronic wounds on the lower limbs that lead to amputation, with a 5-year mortality rate as high as 77%. Macrophages, the primary cell of the innate immune system, are critical regulators of angiogenesis and wound healing. Their dysfunction is strongly implicated in arterial dysfunction, limb ischemia, and poorly healing chronic wounds. The goal of the Biomaterials and Regenerative Medicine Laboratory at Drexel University is to understand the mechanisms by which macrophages orchestrate successful angiogenesis and tissue regeneration and to develop novel biomaterial strategies that apply these principles to pathological situations, in order to ultimately prevent limb amputation. This talk will focus on the effects of temporal changes in macrophage phenotype on angiogenesis, the design of biomaterials and drug delivery systems to modulate macrophage phenotype for enhanced angiogenesis, and the development of macrophage phenotype-related biomarkers to assist in clinical decision making for a personalized medicine approach to wound care.

Bio:

Dr. Kara Spiller is an Associate Professor in Drexel University’s School of Biomedical Engineering, Science, and Health Systems. Her research interests include the role of immune cells in tissue regeneration, the design of immunomodulatory biomaterials, and international engineering education. Her research is funded by the NIH, the NSF, and private foundations. Her awards include a Fulbright fellowship, the NSF CAREER award, and the United States nomination for the ASPIRE prize.