Bioinspired nanotechnologies for spatiotemporal tissue engineering

3D printing offers exciting possibilities for the fields of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, enabling the ability to spatially pattern cells and materials in three dimensions. However, it currently lacks the ability to actively direct collections of various cell types to dynamically populate the engineered scaffolds in specific arrangements.

We will create an engineered mimic of the TGF-b large latent complex that will activate and release bound cytokines, peptides and small molecules upon direct application of integrin-mediated cell traction forces.
The overall goal of this proposal is to develop a bioinspired technology that will allow tissue scaffolds to harness spatiotemporal biological information as a means to direct cells to form hierarchical tissue structures.

After initial development, this new system will be used to dynamically coordinate the patterning of both neurons and vasculature in 3D printed tissue scaffolds.