Gary L. Bowlin, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, presented last week's grand rounds lecture for faculty, residents and staff.

Dr. Bowlin's topic, "Engineering Extracellular Matrix Analogues," is summarized in the following abstract:.

While electrospinning had seen intermittent use in the textile industry since the early twentieth century, it took the explosion of the field of tissue engineering, and its pursuit of biomimetic extracellular matrix (ECM) structures, to create an electrospinning renaissance.  Over the past decade, a growing number of researchers in the tissue engineering community have embraced electrospinning as a polymer processing technique that effectively and routinely produces non-woven structures of nano-scale fibers (sizes of 80 nm to 1.5 microns).  These nano-fibers are of physiological significance as they closely resemble the structure and size scale of the native ECM (fiber diameters of 50 to 500 nm).  Attempts to replicate the many roles of the native ECM have led to the electrospinning of a wide array of polymers, both synthetic (poly(glycolic acid), poly(lactic acid), polydioxanone, polycaprolactone, etc.) and natural (collagen, fibrinogen, elastin, etc.) in origin, for a multitude of different tissue applications.  With various compositions, fiber dimensions, and fiber orientations, the biological, chemical, and mechanical properties of the electrospun materials can be tailored.  In this presentation, I will highlight the role of electrospinning in the engineering of different tissues and applications (cartilage, vascular tissue, etc.), as well as discuss its potential role in future work.

For more information, contact Dr. Bowlin.