Dr. Christopher Moraes
Assistant Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering
Associate Member, Department of Medicine, Division of Experimental Medicine
Microscale tissue engineering presents us with unique opportunities to take a constructivist approach to biological systems. The Moraes lab develops microfabricated cell culture tools to simultaneously understand fundamental cell-microenvironment interactions, and construct highly realistic models of biological tissues “on-a-chip”. Recent research activities have used this approach to study the brain, placenta, lung, gut, and breast cancer.
1. Mechanobiological disease progression at the micro-scale: we have developed sensors to ‘map’ evolving tissue mechanical properties at the cellular length-scale, and are using these sensors to understand the mechanical basis for disease progression in multiple conditions.
2. Robust and increased-throughput tissue engineering: how do we translate tissue engineering from an artisanal enterprise towards the rigour, throughput, and robustness needed for drug screening applications?
3. Leveraging developmental mechanobiology for stem cell differentiation: by recreating the mechanical patterns of morphogenesis that accompany development, can we improve our capacity to bioengineer models of developmental tissues?