Functional Biointerfaces
 
MrNobody

Hala Dhowre

Hala obtained her B.Sc (Hons.) Biological Chemistry and M.Sc Pharmacology from Aston University. For her M.Sc dissertation she worked on the screening of a drug library for novel opioid receptor agonists using the electrically stimulated isolated Guinea-pig Ileum.

Hala is currently studying for her Ph.D. at the University of Nottingham at the School of Pharmacy as a member of the Laboratory of Biophysics and Surface Analysis (LBSA), and the Neurophotonic Laboratory (NPL) research groups.

  • Hala’s project aims to design and synthesise surfaces that are able to support neuronal cultures by initially guiding the stem cells to differentiate into neurons, as well as have the ability to stimulate neuronal activity (i.e. action potential) on demand in the presence of an external stimulus.
  • A range of challenges have to be met in order to design a surface that provides a biological environment for the cultured cells in which they can survive and behave as if they were in their natural environment. The surface chemistry provides the important detailed understanding of the surface properties at play and how they influence the biological interactions of bio-interfaces, which is crucial for the future of engineering advanced biological devices.
  • A variety of surface analytical techniques (i.e. AFM, ToF – SIMS, XPS and WCA) and biological assays (i.e. live and dead, immunohistochemistry and patch-clamping) will be used to characterise the surfaces, and the differentiated cells in question by using live-imaging techniques
 

Functional Biointerfaces

The University of Nottingham
Boots Science Building, University Park,
Nottingham, NG7 2RD


telephone: +44 (0) 115 74 84519
email:M.Zelzer@nottingham.ac.uk/a>