Tag Archives: bioengineering

Bioengineering with Carbon Capture and Sequestration

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Back when I was just out of grad school, high tech engineering firms would undertake big projects. As time went by, more and more of these firms would hook up together to jointly finish their engineering projects.

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A real artificial kidney?

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A real artificial kidney… Come on, you know that sounds funny.   But, oh, so critical.  Because transplantation needs kidney donors that are compatible- and we- not just America, but the world- find kidneys in short supply, and compatibility an even tougher hurdle.

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From hydrogel to blood vessel to… transplant preservation

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Growing cellular tissue may be done in 2 dimensional space (or a 3-D space that involves only a very short 3rd dimension, just short of a millimeter), but more complex items require the use of all three dimensions.  Joseph Hoffman (PhD candidate) and Dr. Jennifer West [Rice, Bioengineering chairperson] described improvements enabling the use of a polyethylene glycol (PEG) hydrogel, which is engineered to mimic the human’s extracellular matrix.  (The extracellular matrix provides support to the body, comprised of proteins and polysaccharides, forming the basis for connective tissue.)  Their development of  a “two-photon lithography” process was described in the November issue of SoftScience.  This afforded them the ability to exert control and create intricate 3D patternsi a heterogeneous environment, to insure cells grow and move where the scientist desires. Their process afforded them the ability to define patterns within the hydrogel that ranged in size from 1 µm to nearly 1 mm.

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Bioartificial Kidney Proof of Concept Completed

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We first proposed a method of using dialysis virtually continuously in the late 1970s.  Our approach was to employ a small dialyzer and a bioreactor to keep the dialysate clean. It was based upon our development of strains of microbes that degraded urea and creatinine (among other nitrogenous compounds) rapidly.  As biochemical engineering evolved, we began examining the use of stem cells.  We understood the technology could replace dialysis within a decade or so; we did not understand that politics would preclude that development for some 30 years or more.)

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