Research/Areas of Interest
tissue engineering, regenerative tissue applications
Education
- Ph.D., Biomedical Science and Engineering, University of Maine, Orono, United States, 2013
- M.S., Environmental Toxicology, Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China, 2007
- B.S., Environmental Science, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou, Fujian, China, 2004
Biography
My research focuses on the tissue engineering of the human intestines with the use of human intestinal cells (organoids and primary cells) and 3D silk scaffolds to establish and study human healthy and diseased tissues in the laboratory. Our lab developed a novel three-dimensional (3D) in vitro tissue models of human intestine that mimicked both the structure and function of native intestine. The resulting in vitro intestinal models properly represent the characteristic functions of human intestine, especially maintenance a continuous mucus double layer covering the epithelial surface and a progressive proximal-to-distal reduction in oxygen tension through the intestinal lumen. We adopt the 3D intestine model to study inflammatory bowel disease, drug delivery, nanotoxicity and infections.