Steven Nicoll
CUNY City College, NY·Biomedical Engineering
When a bone or other hard tissue is damaged, one repair strategy is to implant a scaffold: a porous structure that cells crawl into, rebuild tissue on, and that then dissolves away as the body replaces it. These resorbable scaffolds are vulnerable to a familiar enemy, though.
- Fields
Biomedical Engineering
Materials Science
Engineering
- Topics
tissue engineering
resorbable scaffolds
biomaterials
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Sep 2027
What they work on
- Build fiber-based resorbable scaffolds by 3D printing with controlled fiber size and spacing to mimic the extracellular matrix, incorporating signaling factors that direct stem-cell differentiation toward hard tissue.
- Make scaffolds self-defensive, releasing antimicrobials only when and where bacteria challenge them, using computational and experimental studies of polyelectrolyte complexation and directed self-assembly of charged polymers.
- Use lab-on-a-chip devices to measure the competition between mammalian cells and bacteria for the scaffold surface.
- Test the infection-resisting scaffolds in small-animal infection models that reproduce a complex physiological response in the project's second phase.
More about the research
Bacteria can colonize an implant and cause infection, and conventional scaffolds are designed for healing only. This collaborative project aims to change that, building a scaffold that grows hard tissue and resists bacterial colonization at the same time.
Why it matters
Implant-associated infection is a major failure mode for tissue repair devices. A resorbable scaffold that releases antimicrobials only when bacteria are present could support bone and other hard-tissue regeneration while limiting infection and unnecessary drug exposure, which matters for patients receiving reconstructive implants. The approach could also provide a flexible template for infection control in other tissue-engineering devices.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Thomas Schaer
University of Pennsylvania, PA·Biomedical Engineering
Use 3D printing to build fiber-based, resorbable polymer scaffolds with controlled fiber size and spacing that mimic the extracellular matrix, loaded with signaling factors that steer stem-cell differentiation.
Miqin Zhang
University of Washington, WA·Biomedical Engineering
Test how the composition and stiffness of chitosan–alginate (CA) scaffolds control human induced pluripotent stem cell self-renewal, and whether optimized scaffolds support long-term growth of tooth epithelial stem cells and neural crest cells.
Martha Grady
University of Kentucky, KY·Biomedical Engineering·Early-career
Identify the dominant parameters that promote strong biofilm adhesion using laser spallation, and establish an Adhesion Index comparing mammalian cell adhesion to biofilm adhesion on implant surfaces.
The school
CUNY City College: 9 labs on PI Pages, $72M a year on research, 31 research doctorates a year.
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