1st overall AND best poster awards to Wontae and Stephanie for the research they presented at the International Cell-Matrix Interactions meeting in Berlin yesterday! Congratulations to them, and to all our co-authors and collaborators who are making these projects so successful – we’re a fortunate research group.
Mad congratulations to Avital, who is no longer a master’s candidate, but our first MASTER now! Her thesis looked at quantifying cell mechanics in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, and she developed some easily accessible techniques to measure traction forces in 3D-like systems, showing that under certain culture conditions, cell contractile activity is enhanced in 3D. Good luck with your new job and further quests for science in Seattle!
EDIT: I guess this means that the lab is now Master Of One?
Big congratulations to Sarah Dubois, who received the Summer Undergraduate Research in Engineering poster award for her work on force measurement in complex contractile tissues formed in microfabricated templates – well done! Congratulations also to Nik Kalashnikov who presented his work at the SURE conference on measuring cellular mechanical properties in realistic hydrogel microenvironments, which also generated a lot of interest and discussion.
to explore cancer, immunology and engineered tumor microenvironments. Interested candidates must have a strong background in cell biology, with a previous focus on either cancer OR technology-driven approaches to biology. Interested applicants, please send Chris an email, along with a CV and statement of interest.
Congratulations to Wontae and Sanya, who received well-deserved NSERC PGS-D and CGS-M scholarships for their graduate research!
Congratulations to Avital, who’s presentation on dimensionally-dependent traction force microscopy in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis was awarded the Best Master’s-level contribution at the McGill / Polytechnique Chemical Engineering Research Day 2016!
Congratulations to Chris, who was just named a Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in Advanced Cellular Microenvironments! The 5-year term of this Research Chair allows us to continue developing innovative engineering techniques to bridge the gap between precisely controlled cell culture systems and the incredibly complex microenvironment present in the body. We’re extremely grateful to the CRC program for the recognition and the opportunity – the official announcement is available here.
Congratulations to Avital, Wontae and Katie who’s work on fibrosis, mechanosensors and smart materials have been accepted for presentation at the World Biomaterials Congress in Montreal this May. Especially big congratulations to Avital and Wontae, both of whom were awarded prestigious Travel Awards from the Canadian Biomaterials Society based on the quality of their work! We’re extremely grateful to CBS for their support of our work – click here for a complete list of award recipients.
Huge congratulations to Stephanie Mok and Wontae Lee, both of whom received prestigious and competitive McGill Engineering Doctoral Awards. These awards will support their doctoral research over the next few years, and we are extremely grateful to McGill’s Faculty of Engineering for the recognition and support.
What started out as a disastrous experiment to make hand-pulled cotton candy in Chris’ kitchen turned into a pretty sweet technique to microfabricate structures in really soft silicone materials (published in Lab on a Chip last week). Generating structures in materials that have the consistency of watered-down pudding is particularly challenging, as peeling away a mold tends to destroy the structures. While experimenting with candy-making, instead of creating delectable, delicate and light sugar structures, Chris ended up with a hard lump of sugar that tasted horrible – but seemed to hold the microscale features of his Ziploc plastic container rather well. He raced that lump down to the lab, and after some modifications, found that (a) designer hard candies can hold microscale features, (b) that PDMS can be cast and cured against the candy, and (c) the candy could be gently removed by dissolving away in warm water. We then used microengineered soft molded structures to measure contraction of engineered microtissues, as a simple demonstration of this fabrication technology. Seems quite promising for many applications in soft matter engineering, and as an added bonus, the lab smells *delicious*.
[UPDATE: lots of news coverage on this piece! Check out the publications page for links]
