Upper and lower gaskets used to make a counter flow device. The danger is that the enclosing pdms can easily flex into the membranes on the flat side of the chip. A hard plastic cover can be used to prevent accidental contact between the PDMS and membrane.
Introduction Studies have shown that the shear-stimulation of endothelial cells results in the upregulation of the shear-sensitive transcription factor Kruppel-like factor 2 (KLF2). KLF2 plays a critical role in the regulation of endothelial activity such as the regulation of vascular tone, anti-inflammatory responses, and antithrombotic functions. KLF2 is also responsible for the upregulation of endothelial…
I’ve been trying to make the following device work for the past few years: The people who have been studying this have been trying to use the phenomena to mix solutions, or using arrays of mismatched electrodes to generate a sort of conveyor belt pumping mechanism: My idea is to use the electrokinetic phenomena of AC…
Last time I cultured fibroblasts on pnc-Si transwells, the cells got super-confluent over the membrane and made the analysis difficult. Basically, I wanted to see if fibroblasts formed vacuoles/2D structures over free-standing membranes. I thought the multi-layer cells could have choked off permeability and prevented the higher layers of cells from even sensing that they…
We are continuing to work with the Shestopalov lab on surface modifiation of hemodialysis filters to prevent adhesion and activation. Jim recently presented our status and strategy (PDF) to the Technical Development Fund and was awarded the balance of the award, so we may continue our work. Our goal is to develop hybrid hemodialysis devices to enable…
This is part of our work studying how cells adhere, spread and proliferate on varying pore size/porosity SiO2 membranes. This post will be a qualitative look at how HUVEC spread over membranes by staining for actin filaments. In a future post we will quantify the degree of spreading at 1hr, 4hrs and 24 hrs. Calculation…
For the last two weeks, we have observed that membranes have been wrinkling post-oxide strip. After some investigation, it was determined that the cause of wrinkling was from a cracked SiO2 target in the sputter system. I also saw a suppression of pore formation in the wrinkled films as compared to an unwrinkled membrane. The…