Rowan University

Blending is an efficient approach to generate biomaterials with a broad range of properties and combined features. By predicting the molecular interactions between different natural silk proteins, new silk-silk protein alloy platforms with tunable mechanical resiliency, electrical response, optical transparency, chemical processability, biodegradability, or thermal stability can be designed.

Mammalian skin contains a diverse array of structures - such as hair follicles and nerve endings - that exhibit distinctive patterns of spatial organization. Analyzing skin as a flat mount takes advantage of the 2-dimensional geometry of this tissue to produce full-thickness high-resolution images of skin structures.

An injectable tissue engineering scaffold composed of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide)-graft-chondroitin sulfate (PNIPAAm-g-CS)-containing alginate microparticles was prepared. The adhesive strength, swelling properties and in vitro biocompatibility are analyzed in this study. The characterization techniques developed here may be applicable to other thermogelling systems.

A low-cost, easy-to-use and powerful system is established to evaluate potential treatments that could ameliorate blood retinal barrier breach induced by histamine. Blood vessel leakage, Müller cell activation and the continuity of neuronal processes are utilized to assess the damage response and its reversal with a potential drug, lipoxin A4.

Here, we present a protocol using RNA-seq to monitor mRNA levels over time during the hypoxic response of S. cerevisiae cells. This method can be adapted to analyze gene expression during any cellular response.

Hair type commonly seen in historically underrepresented minorities appears to interfere with transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). Here we describe a hair braiding method (The Sol Braiding Technique) that improves TMS.