Research Projects

Biomimetic Materials for Cancer Tissue Engineering

3D biomimetic extra-cellular matrix (ECM) to understand tumor metastasis.
Investigation of matrix stiffness and its role in the movement and regrowth of cancer cells.
To understand cell-matrix interactions at a single-cell resolution.

Interplay between a tunable crystalline architecture and cellular activity of a bio-polymer crystallized on carbon nanotubes as nanohybrid shish kebab.
To investigate the hypothesis ‘the crystalline architecture is critical to generate cell recognition sites and impart nanoscale surface roughness, which directly impacts communication with cells and cellular activity’.
To study the fundamental relation between crystalline architecture, cell response, and the mechanism that govern polymer crystal-cell interactions.

Investigate nanoscale level interactions between graphene nanoscrolls (GNS) and poly(lactic acid).
To gain a fundamental understanding of factors that influence the nanoscale level reinforcement by GNS.
To characterize the interfacial adhesion strength of PLA-GNS nanohybrid.
Optimization of the experimental conditions in order to obtain polymer nanohybrids with tailored mechanical properties.