Sea Creatures and Cell Research
Sea creatures and cell research may seem like a strange pairing, but they have helped James Dugan become the first student in the UK to win the prestigious Graduate Student Award from the American Chemical Society’s Cellulose & Renewable Materials Division.
His paper, based on research carried out during the second year of his PhD in Materials Science, supervised by Dr Stephen Eichhorn and Dr Julie Gough, focuses on how Nanowhiskers – a type of fibre derived from tunicates – can be used to influence cell behaviour.
Nanowhiskers, at a mere 5-15 nanometers in diameter, are the smallest structures able to cause skeletal muscle cells to align parallel to each other.
James said: "The material itself is interesting because cellulose is found in plants and not the human body.
"Nanowhiskers in general are used in renewable, environmentally friendly, high performance materials.
"The fact that they are very small means that they have a high surface to volume ratio; they are also very crystalline. This means they can be used to strengthen and stiffen components, like a polymer resin.
"We wanted to see if this material from tunicates could be used for medical or biological applications, because they’ve not been shown to be used this way before."
Their linear and crystalline structure makes them ideal for re-growth applications.
Dr Stephen Eichhorn, a Reader in Polymer Physics and Biomaterials, will be travelling to California with James to receive the Eastman Chemicals-sponsored award.
Speaking about the methods used to produce the findings of the paper, he said: "The way we aligned the nanowhiskers was simple, using spin coating, it is this centripetal force that we used to align the whiskers on a flat substrate, rather like when you are a child on a roundabout; when it’s moving very fast you feel pulled towards the edge, in one direction.
"The muscle cells then recognise this and align themselves along the same pattern as the nanowhiskers.
He added: "We used them for skeletal muscle cells but they could be used for other tissues as well, where you need to have directed growth, for instance in tendons or in nerve cells. There are all sorts of applications we can look at.
"There were ten other applications for this award, but this is the first time a British student has ever won it. We are very proud."
James will travel to California in March to receive his award and cash prize of $2000.