Mohamadmahdi Samandari
Old Dominion University, VA·Biomedical Engineering
Drugs taken by mouth or injection spread through the whole body, which can weaken their effect, damage organs such as the liver and kidneys, and encourage drug resistance. Applying drugs directly to a wound avoids some of these problems, but drugs often cannot get past biofilms.
- Fields
Biomedical Engineering
Engineering
Materials Science
- Topics
drug delivery
microneedles
microneedle arrays
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jun 2028
What they work on
- Characterize microneedle-like gelatin drug depots that are printed directly inside a defect, and measure how quickly they release drugs in laboratory experiments.
- Test whether sustained drug release from depots formed inside the wound can disrupt and treat bacterial biofilms, using an ex vivo pig skin wound biofilm model.
- Assess whether depots carrying antimicrobial and pro-healing drugs improve healing of biofilm-infected diabetic wounds in living animals, compared with drugs applied to the wound surface.
More about the research
Biofilms are protective, slimy layers that bacteria build on infected wounds. Microneedle arrays (MNAs), patches of tiny needles that pierce tissue barriers, can help. However, ready-made patches go into tissue poorly, do not fit large or irregular wounds, and have too few needles to break up a biofilm.
Why it matters
More than 5 million people in the United States have superficial infections, at an annual cost of about $11–28 billion. Antimicrobial resistance contributed to millions of deaths worldwide in 2019. Delivering antimicrobials and healing factors directly into infected tissue could help clear biofilm infections, reduce side effects, and speed or improve wound healing. Patients with chronic wounds, such as those with diabetes, may benefit.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Virginie Papadopoulou
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, NC·Biomedical Engineering
Optimize phase-change contrast agents, droplets that turn into bubbles under ultrasound, and therapeutic ultrasound settings to boost antibiotics against biofilms of Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterococcus faecalis in vitro.
Yong Wang
Pennsylvania State University, PA·Biomedical Engineering
Develop a one-step, three-dimensional method to select aptamers, short DNA or RNA strands that bind targets tightly, inside a non-fouling macroporous hydrogel that resists unwanted sticking.
Amay Bandodkar
North Carolina State University, NC·Biomedical Engineering·Early-career
Develop non-toxic sensor arrays based on biofuel cells, devices that convert a chemical reaction into an electrical signal, to detect molecular biomarkers of healing in wound exudate.
The school
Old Dominion University: 8 labs on PI Pages, $76M a year on research, 143 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
A start for your email. Fill in the brackets.