Seminar

ABSTRACT:  Regenerative medicine offers great hope in curing many currently untreatable diseases. Tissue engineering and stem cell therapy are the two main components of regenerative medicine. In this talk, I will discuss how engineering can make contributions to this highly interdisciplinary field, including biomaterials as 3D scaffolds, bioreactor design, and stem cell bioprocessing.

Bio-Sketch:  Professor Hua (Cathy) Ye, University of Oxford

ABSTRACT:   The Regenerative Medicine and Skeleton laboratory (INSERM U1229, Nantes, France) has developed an injectable and self-hardening silated-HydroxyPropylMethyl Cellulose (Si-HPMC) hydrogel. In this talk, we will go through our recent approaches using Si-HPMC hydrogels as a drug and/or cell carrier in the context of degenerative diseases. Intervertebral disc (IVD) disease is a major cause of low back pain and a low-invasive approach for intradiscal delivery of therapeutics is of particular interest.

ABSTRACT:   Polyolefins are ubiquitous in polymer technology, yet conductive nanocomposites based on these materials are very difficult to manufacture, because of the inability to efficiently disperse conductive nanoparticles, and the poor interfacial adhesion between polymers and fillers. During the last decade we have done extensive research to develop melt compounded electroconductive polyolefin composites, containing well dispersed conducting fillers, such as carbon black, multi walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT), graphite and graphene.

ABSTRACT:  A reflection on over three decades of Li-ion and EDLC development from my personal involvement. I would recount my experiences and try to connect them with either the significance in advancement in energy storage or to the significance of personal development. I would try to be inspirational in expressing the excitement of the challenges that exist for those who pursue them. I would also talk about our latest patented EDLC chemistry.

ABSTRACT:  In total Duane has almost 20 years of experience in fluid flow, heat and mass transfer analysis, nuclear thermal-hydraulics, energy system analysis and design. Duane is a mechanical engineer with Masters’degrees in Mechanical Engineering and Chemical Engineering, both from University of Waterloo. After graduation Duane started his career in CFD modeling in Waterloo working for CFX, which later was later acquired by Ansys, supporting CFX users, giving training courses, and doing multi-phase, turbulence and combustion validations.

1 Slide. 3 Minutes. Outstanding Ideas!

Date:   Thursday, February 16, 2017

Time:  10:00 am- 12:00 pm

Location:  E6 2024

Please arrive early so the event can start on time.

Attendance at this event may be counted  toward Masters and PhD students Seminar Attendance milestone.   Please note, you will be required to stay for the duration of the competition.

 Light refreshments provided. 

ABSTRACT:  Implanted medical devices are at significant risk of developing bacterial biofilm-associated infections and approximately 60% of all hospital-acquired infections are due to biofilm formation on implanted devices. Bacterial biofilms are encased in an extracellular matrix, largely polysaccharide, which protects from antibiotics and the host immune system. Herein I will present three ‘bio-inspired’ approaches to design surfaces to prevent bacterial attachment and biofilm formation.

ABSTRACT:  Thermal plasma (TP) reactors are used extensively for the generation of particles having specific compositions or phase structures, while nanoparticles (NPs) are also being generated using precursors that are either in the gas phase, in liquid solutions or even sometimes in the solid phase. More difficult is the controlled homogeneous nucleation of pure nanomaterials, or controlled two-step systems for heterogeneous nucleation of materials such as carbon nanotubes (CNTs). One material of strong interest is the bi-dimensional structure of graphene.

ABSTRACT:  One of the grand challenges facing humanity today is the development of an alternative energy system that is safe, clean, and sustainable and where combustion of fossil fuels no longer dominates. A distributed renewable electrochemical energy and mobility system (DREEMS) could meet this challenge. At the foundation of this new energy system, we have chosen to study a number of electrochemical devices including fuel cells, electrolyzers, and flow batteries.

ABSTRACT:   While multiple types of smart, environmentally-responsive materials have been explored for a variety of biomedical applications (e.g. drug delivery, tissue engineering, bioimaging, etc.), their ultimate clinical use has been hampered by their lack of biologically-relevant degradation as well as challenges regarding their non-surgical administration to the body.  These factors have particularly limited the clinical use of temperature-responsive hydrogels, which are either highly labile in diluting environments like the body (e.g.