BioMEMS

Research that includes:

  • Immunosensors
  • Single Cell Analysis
  • Cell Manipulation and Probing
  • SERS BioImaging
  • Micro Total Analysis Systems uTAS
  • DNA Transformations
  • Cell Cryropreservation
  • Optoelectronic Transport & Tweezers

BPN451: A Cyborg Beetle: Insect Flight Control by a Neural Stimulator

Hirotaka Sato
Travis L. Massey
2011

Despite major advances, performance of micro air vehicles (MAV's) is still limited in terms of size, payload capacity, endurance, and controllability. Various species of insects have as-yet unmatched flight capabilities and increasingly well understood muscular and nervous systems. Additionally, some of these insects undergo complete metamorphosis making them amenable to implantation and internal manipulation during metamorphosis. In light of this, we attempt to create implantable bio-interface to electrically stimulate nervous and muscular systems of alive insect to control its...

BPN545: Brain Machine Interfaces for Insect Flight Control

Amol Jadhav
2011

Insects with well developed flight muscles and sophisticated neuronal network signify nature's amazing flying machines which far surpass any human engineered initiative at this scale (e.g. micro air vehicles). The complicated mechanism of flight involving generation of flight response in the brain and delegation of control spikes to the flight muscles remains relatively unexplored and presents opportunity for advanced tools and techniques to further explore this area. In this project we intend to use advanced Brain Computer Interfaces (BCI) to perform neuronal ensemble measurements...

BPN643: Characterization of Growth and Osteogenic Differentiation of Human Bone Marrow Stromal Cells on Precisely Defined Surface Microtopographies

Eun Jung Kim
2012

A novel approach to enhance bone regeneration provided by transplantation of bone marrow derived cells involves rapid concentration and selection of the osteoblastic progenitor population in the graft using selective attachment to the matrix surface. MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) technology and related microfabrication techniques can be used to create precisely defined surface microscale topographies that can selectively stimulate cells on the surface of scaffolds to enhance osteoprogenitor cell growth and subsequent bone formation. The goal of this project is to investigate...

BPN403: Functional and Organized Cellular Substrates

Adrienne T. Higa
2012

While single cell studies have historically been the driving force for cell biology, collective, or group, behavior is actually the true working mechanism of numerous growth and pathological phenomenon in the body including morphogenesis, wound healing, and cancer metastases. Mechanical micro-environment cues have been demonstrated as important regulators of single cell behavior, and this project focuses on investigating mechanical regulation of collective cell behavior via microtopographic substrates.

Project end date: 08/15/12

BPN475: A CMOS Magnetic Sensor Chip for Biomedical Assay

Karl Skucha
2012

This project aims to develop a compact CMOS biosensor for robust detection of micron-sized paramagnetic beads which are used as labels for target analyte in biomedical applications.No external magnet, reference sensors or calibration is required. A 4.5-um bead is detected in 16 ms with probability of detection error < 0.1%. The ultimate goal of this project is to integrate the CMOS sensor chip with micro-fluidic system and demonstrate a lab-on-a-chip platform.

Project end date: 08/16/12

BPN484: Effects of Cell Contact in Differentiation of Adult Neural Progenitor Cells

Sisi Chen
2012

Cell-to-cell contact plays an important but poorly understood role in stem cell differentiation. Many proteins, such as notch, hedgehog, cadherins, and gap junctions rely on cell contact for signal transduction. The goal of this project is to probe the effects of cell contact in the differentiation of adult neural progenitor cells by high efficiency micropatterning techniques for monitoring dynamic activity or for downstream expression profiling. The adaptation of a microfluidic platform for the delivery of chemical gradients will also enable us to probe the ability of cells to...

BPN664: Blocks in Cells' Clothing: Mechanical Design of Tissues

Daniel J. Cohen
2012

One of the most enduring paradigms in tissue engineering (the growth of artificial organs, graft tissues, etc.) is that the materials we use should be made to look more like the environment that cells normally experience. By contrast, I am working on a new type of structure designed to appear, to a cell, to be another cell. By using microfabrication methods and kidney cells, I am producing a library of different shapes, all of which are identified as 'cell' by actual cells. While esoteric, the ability to appear as a cell would encourage a number of new approaches to tissue...

BPN612: High-Throughput CMOS Detector for Magnetic Immunoassays

Simone Gambini
2012

The goal of this project is to design an electronic system capable of detecting the presence of < 2.8um magnetic beads over a biologically relevant number of sensing sites in less than 10 seconds, giving an over 10X improvement in measurement time over prior art. We use a combination of signal processing and low-noise circuit design techniques to obtain this goal.

Project end date: 08/17/12

BPN538: Lipid Membrane Biosensors

Christopher E. Korman
Mischa Megens
2012

The lipid bilayer membrane is crucial to the proper functioning of biological processes. It not only secludes a cell's contents from the surrounding environment, but the membrane itself also serves as a dynamic scaffold for membrane proteins. The lipid membrane's thickness is of nanoscale dimension, thus making it an ideal structure for nano and micro bioengineering applications. Lipid membranes facilitate highly selective control and transport of molecules and ions entering and leaving a cell. As a result, they have great potential for use in applications such as drug screening and...

BPN680: Solar Optics-based Active Panels (SOAP) for Photocatalytic Greywater Treatment: Design and Kinetics

Vivek Rao
Benjamin Ross
2012

Water scarcity is projected to affect 1.8 billion people in the world by 2025. Due to the dramatic population growth of urban areas, the imminent water crisis demands efficient greywater treatment in new housing solutions. To address this need, we are developing a prototype of Solar Optics-based Active Panels (SOAP), which allows us to test the photocatalytic treatment of greywater using sunlight and immobilized titanium dioxide nanoparticles. The expected outcome of this research will be a prototype SOAP reactor that demonstrates fast inactivation of representative contaminants of...