Multiplex Cell Niche Engineering
Cells are living entities that sense and respond to many signals present in their microenvironment. We are developing the Multiphoton Microfabrication and Micropatterning (MMM) platform to engineer and precisely control each facet of the cell niche, including mechanical properties such as stiffness and elastic modulus, the 3D spatial position and concentration of extracellular matrix (ECM), growth factor and cell-cell interaction proteins, and high-resolution topographies. This enables us to pinpoint and research the effect of individual and combined factors in the microenvironment on cell behavior, for example, in the cell preference for ECM selection, phenotype maintenance, asymmetric cell division, and others.