Development and application of soft culturing microenvironment for novel drug discovery
-
Primary Supervisor
Professor Alastair Stewart+61 3 8344 5675
Project Details
The mechanical properties of microenvironment for cell culturing used in drug assays have major impacts on the testing outcome. Most assays are currently performed on monolayers of cells in rigid plastic dishes. There is growing interest in efforts to make the assay condition more tissue like in order to better predict the pharmacology of the drugs in tissues. We have referred to these new assay systems in an opinion article describing the interdisciplinary pursuit of “Mechano-pharmacology”. In this project, you will develop assays for drug action in 3- dimensional environments of defined physiological stiffness and compare the results to conventional 2D monolayer plastic culture environments. This interdisciplinary project will involve collaborations with Prof Peter Lee in the Department of Biomedical Engineering and Dr David Simpson and Prof Lloyd Hollenberg in the School of Physics. Methods will include immunoassay, real-time quantitative PCR, cell culture and high content screening using plate-based confocal microscopy (Operetta)
Research Opportunities
This research project is available to Honours students to join as part of their thesis.
Please contact the Research Group Leader to discuss your options.