University of Virginia assistant engineering professor Liheng Cai has earned the Maximizing Investigator's Research Award from the National Institutes of Health.
University of Virginia School of Engineering and Applied ScienceAug 5 2024 University of Virginia assistant engineering professor Liheng Cai has earned the Maximizing Investigator's Research Award from the National Institutes of Health. His work holds significant implications for the future of personalized biomedicine, including the possibility of repairing living tissue, perhaps even replacing whole organs.
"One of the major components of the award is to develop biomaterials that can be constructed from tiny, basic modules," said Cai, who joined the UVA Engineering faculty in 2018. "The mechanical properties of the modules will mimic the mechanical properties of human tissue. This approach is built on a class of polymers -; bottlebrush polymers -; my lab has been pioneering."
"The popular video game uses individual 3D cubes as 'voxels' to create a virtual world," he said. "We developed voxelated bioprinting technologies in the real world. Our technology assembles cell-encapsulated droplets into a specially designed printer. During the printing process, we create 3D cell assemblies with the exact architecture and functions that we programmed.
"We are investigating the interactions between mucus and three indispensable components of the microenvironment: cilia, cells and bacteria," he said. "The idea is to exploit this biologically similar device to study human lung defense, without having to cause harm to living beings." Cai also noted the striking similarity between the material and human vocal cords, which currently can't be replaced if they are too severely damaged.
In a related research project, Cai and colleagues recently discovered through experiments that such stickiness is controlled by the density of the bonding structures, upending more than three decades of theory. "This new discovery is critical to the development of biomaterials that match how biological tissues respond to stress over time," Cai added.
Biomedicine Bioprinting Cell Medicine Polymers Technology Vocal Cords
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