Disease Programs

Tissue Engineering

Cecilia Giachelli (Bioengineering)

The Giachelli lab is interested in biomaterial control of stem cell differentiation for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine application. Current work focuses on directed epithelial stem cell differentiation using surface modification to engage notch signaling pathways. Other areas of interest include scaffold control of vascular endothelial, smooth muscle and valve progenitor cell differentiation.

Stephen Kim (Surgery)

The Kim lab is investigating the fabrication of new functional gastrointestinal tissue using isolated stem cells combined with three dimensional biodegradable polymer matrices. The ultimate goal is to generate implantable tissue that can be used in the treatment of patients with intestinal failure. Working closely with collaborators in the Bioengineering department, this lab is currently exploring ways to optimize various extracellular matrices to sup-port stem cell engraftment, proliferation, and function; optimize long-term in vitro culture systems to condition the engineered constructs prior to implantation; and investigate the role of trophic factors on stem cell proliferation, differentiation, and new tissue development in vivo. My lab is located at the Children's Hospital South Lake Union campus.

Buddy Ratner (Bioengineering)

Stem cells proliferate and differentiate in response to micromechanical cues, surface biological signals, orientational directives and chemical gradients. To control stem cell proliferation and differentiation, the Ratner lab brings 30 years experience in surface control of biology, polymer scaffold fabrication and controlled release of bioactive agents to address the challenges of directing stem cell differentiation and subsequent tissue formation.

Mehmet Sarikaya (Genetically Engineered Materials Science and Engineering Center, Materials Science and Engineering)

Our research focuses on Molecular Biomimetics in which we use combinatorial mutagenesis to select peptides with specific affinity to desired materials, use bioinformatics-based pathways to in-silico design peptides, tailor their structure and function using genetic engineering protocols, couple them with synthetic self-assembled molecular hybrids, and use them as molecular tools in practical medicine and materials technologies. Our focus at the biology/materials interface incorporates molecular biology and nanotechnology, computational biology and bioinformatics, molecular assemblers, bio-enabled nanophotonics (quantum-dot and surface-enhanced probes), and peptide-based matrices for neural, dental and soft tissue regeneration.

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