Professor Jude Curran BEng (Hons) PhD

The design and production of chemical nano-arrays utilisng PPL systems for the effective control of protein and stem cell responses on model surfaces in vitro.

Optimising surface modifications to control cell responses, designing cost effective and clinically relevant solutions.

Incorporation of novel techniques to detrmine the orientation/availability of a group of interest on a surafce. Derivation of data required to enhance the performance of materials in cell contacting applications.

Development of novel techniques for enhnaced surface modification of substrates to control cell interactions

This has been a continuous collaboration that has transgressed through numerous other internal/external projects. The main research ethos is to understand how material parameters can be used to dictate cellular responses, this has been investigated in an array of different bulk materials and forms i.e. bioglass scaffolds and gels. The success of this relationship has lead to numerous papers and conference abstracts and has been used to underpin a lot of our current research activities.

Prof Hunt was my PhD supervisor and we have worked together from this point to develop systems that can be used to evaluate specific cell material interactions, the role of inflammatory cells in determining the efficency of novel therapies and how these factors can be manipulated by presenting cells with the correct spatial cues both from a material and a stimulated medium. As the research has progressed the numbers of cell types, sources and are knowledge of the heterogenous nature of our starting populations has helped to refine our in vitro models and the development of a new generation of "smart" materials that cen be used both in vitro and in vivo.

Developing model surfaces that can be used to define the correct combination of parameters including surface energy, nanotopography and surface chemistry to produce homogenous cell responses. A parallel developmental aspect of the colllaboration is to use novel technologies to identify exactly where the cell is interacting with a modified (nano-patterned) surface and how the presence of a specified modification i.e. chemical group, peptide or DNA controls intergrin clustering, focal contat formation and subsequent cell signalling.

Within the REMEDI Grand Challenges in regenerative medicine programme I have been acting in a PI role on a project focused on enhancing the efficency of an injectable system for bone healing, combining expertise in material production, modification, cell isolation and infiltration into a three dimensional scaffold, cell culture and analysis. This project focused on introducing chemical groups to PLGA particles and quantifying how the introduction of these groups not only changed eth physical and mechanical properties on teh injectable system, but also cintrolled the cell response in vitro. the success of this project lead to additional funding for a PhD student to continue and develop the work.

Developing PLGA scaffolds that could be used in IVD. Optimising cell seeding and culture conditions for efficient population of the scaffolds with stem cells prior to introducing the scaffolds in vivo.

Evaluating how changes in bulk chemistry, more specificaly changing the TCP/HA content of bone contacting materials designed for impaction grafting affected human osteoblast/osteoclast and inflammatory cell responses. This involved identifying products produced in single culture systems to develop co-culture models that could be used to mimick in vivo environments and provide evidence regarding cell attachment, viability and function.