BME Seminar: Dr. Chien-Chi Lin - Photoclick Poly(ethylene glycol) Hydrogels for Pancreatic Tissue Engineering

Armour College of Engineering’s Biomedical Engineering Department will host a seminar featuring Chien-Chi Lin, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Purdue School of Engineering & Technology Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis on February 27, 2015. Lecture topic will be Photoclick Poly(ethylene glycol) Hydrogels for Pancreatic Tissue Engineering.

Abstract

Poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) hydrogels are widely used as scaffolds for cell and drug delivery to treat diseases and as platforms to study cell biology in three-dimension (3D). The research focus of our laboratory is on designing polymeric hydrogels with controllable biophysical (e.g., rigidity, stiffness, degradability, permeability, etc.) and biochemical properties (e.g., cell signaling ligands) for a variety of biomedical applications. In particular, we are interested in PEG hydrogels that can be prepared via modular ‘photo-click’ approaches as these gels are ideal for identifying individual factors and signals regulating cell fate processes. In this talk, I will highlight our recent efforts on the development of modular photo-click hydrogels for modeling pancreatic cancer cell growth, epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT), and drug responsiveness. This talk will also highlight our work on developing photoclick chemistry to prepare conformal hydrogel coating on pancreatic islets. This thin hydrogel coating can provide immuno-isolation against host immune rejection. This new technique has the potential to improve the design of hydrogel coating as a myriad of bioactive motifs can be easily immobilized within the coating to mitigate host immune rejection.