Given the prevalence of diabetes, it’s not surprising that we have to consider replacing damaged blood vessels.
Continue reading New hope for blood vessels?
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New hope for blood vessels?
Tag Archives: Blood vessel
Smart Bandage?
When I first heard about this development, I thought they were working on something similar to what Bob Langer, a fellow ChemE grad student from MIT, was working on years ago. Normally, all bandaging does is to contain a wound, preventing infection from setting in. That’s why Bob Langer developed his artificial skin to treat burn patients more effectively, because the “new skin” effectively replaced the burned skin and precluded infection in the patient. This new device was being touted as a “smart bandage”. But, that’s not really what Dr. H. Kong (Chemical and Biomolecular engineering, University of Illinois-Urbana), along with Drs. Jeong, Chan, Cha, Zorlutuna, Dyck, Hsia, and Bashir are developing.
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From hydrogel to blood vessel to… transplant preservation
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.
Continue reading From hydrogel to blood vessel to… transplant preservation
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