Monday, March 6, 2017 at 12:10pm in CUE 419
The Gene and Linda Voiland School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering is hosting a seminar presented by Nathan S. Swami, Associate Professor, Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Virginia.
Nathan Swami is an Associate Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of Virginia (UVA), Charlottesville. His group is focused on label-free microfluidics, based on the deformability and impedance characteristics of cellular aggregates, cells, microbials, and nanoscale biomarkers for the enabling their selective enrichment. Some of the chief enablers in his group include soft lithography for 3D patterning of biodegradable scaffolds towards controlling cellular interactions, as well as label-free electrokinetic and deformability-based sorting and cytometry of biosystems. Prior to University of Virginia, he served on the scientific staff of the MEMS group at Motorola Labs and at Clinical Microsensors, Inc., a Caltech start-up interfacing microelectronics to bio-analysis. He seeks to impact emerging biomanufacturing approaches, as well as detection systems within point-of-care and resource-poor settings for personalizing medical decisions. http://people.virginia.edu/~ns5h/
Label-free microfluidic enrichment and cytometry of biosystems using AC electrokinetics
Abstract: Characterizing the emergence of heterogeneity among isogenic cellular populations is of fundamental importance to biosystems, as apparent from its role in driving stem cell differentiation, antibiotic resistance, cancer metastasis and the division of labor among neighboring neurons. Microfluidic tools, with their ability for single-cell manipulation, are emerging as a platform for tracking cellular heterogeneity, by quantifying biomarker expression profiles and through monitoring the subcellular phenotypes. This presentation is focused on the use of AC electrokinetics within microfluidic and nano-confined devices for enabling label-free and frequency-selective enrichment of biomolecules, exosomes, microbials and tumor cells. Following elucidation of the underlying principles and device platforms for AC electrokinetics, some of the application testbeds will be presented to illustrate the strengths, challenges and opportunities. These include: (1) quantifying alterations in intracellular mitochondrial morphology after pharmacological screens to develop therapeutics for reducing tumor volume; (2) optimizing microbiota interactions for controlling clostrodial infections1; (3) enrichment of molecular cancer biomarkers versus interfering circulating antibodies2-4; and (4) stratifying exosomal biomarkers to probe cancer metastasis.
[1] ACS Infectious Diseases (2016), 2 (8), 544-551.
[2] Biosens. Bioelectron. (2016), 78, pp. 244-252; DOI: 10.1016/j.bios.2015.11.044.
[3] Lab Chip (2015), 15, 4563 – 4570. DOI: 10.1039/C5LC00840A
[4] Anal Chem (2014), 86, 10855–10863; DOI: 10.1021/ac5029837
