About the Project
Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have significant potential for a range of applications including both tissue-engineering, where cells are directly differentiated into new tissue, and in cell therapies where factors produced by the cells promote tissue repair and regeneration. MSCs are highly sensitive to physical stimuli from their surrounding microenvironment, including matrix viscoelastic properties, topography, extracellular matrix (ECM) specificity and mode of ligand presentation. It is vital for us to understand how cells sense and respond to these cues if we are to control MSC growth, differentiation, motility and regenerative signalling.
This project will develop biomaterials to control the MSC extracellular environment and use these to interrogate MSC responses to physical cues and investigate the underlying mechanisms that control these behaviours. In the final stages, this project will apply this knowledge and engineer the extracellular environment to promote MSC-based tissue repair and regeneration.
Research Environment:
Monash University is one of Australia’s leading research-intensive universities, ranked in the top 100 globally (Times Higher Education). The successful candidate will be based within New Horizons, a $180M collaborative research hub on the Monash Clayton campus. The PhD candidate will have access to state-of-the-art PC2 labs with all the requirements for cell and molecular work as well as all prerequisite facilities for material synthesis and characterisation. The Monash campus is also home to Monash FlowCore (flow cytometry), Micromon (Nextgen sequencing) and Monash Bioinformatics platform, Centre for Electron Microscopy (MCEM) and Monash MicroImaging (MMI) providing ready access to all the facilities required for this multidisciplinary project.
Funding Notes
We are looking for a highly motivated, passionate and competitive candidate for a project spanning stem cell biology, biomaterials and tissue-engineering. The candidate may have a background primarily in Biomaterials or Cell Biology but should be eager to expand their skillset in this multi-disciplinary project.
All applicants must meet Monash entry requirements- further details are available here: http://www.eng.monash.edu.au/research/degrees/
References
• Kusuma, GD, Carthew J, Lim R and Frith JE. Effect of the microenvironment on mesenchymal stem cell paracrine signalling: opportunities to engineer the therapeutic effect. Stem Cells Dev, 2017 (In press).
• Li F, Truong VX, Thissen H, Frith JE and Forsythe JS. Microfluidic Encapsulation of Human Mesenchymal Stem Cells for Articular Cartilage Tissue Regeneration. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces, 2017. 9(10): p. 8589-8601.
• Frith JE, Porrello ER, and Cooper-White JJ. Concise review: new frontiers in microRNA-based tissue regeneration. Stem Cells Transl Med, 2014. 3(8): p. 969-76.
• Frith JE, Cameron AR, Menzies DJ, Ghosh P, Whitehead DL, Gronthos S, Zannettino AC and Cooper-white JJ. An injectable hydrogel incorporating mesenchymal precursor cells and pentosan polysulphate for intervertebral disc regeneration. Biomaterials, 2013. 34(37): p. 9430-40.
• Frith, J.E., R.J. Mills, and J.J. Cooper-White. Lateral spacing of adhesion peptides influences human mesenchymal stem cell behaviour. J Cell Sci, 2012. 125(Pt 2): p. 317-27.
• Frith JE, Thomson B, and Genever PG. Dynamic three-dimensional culture methods enhance mesenchymal stem cell properties and increase therapeutic potential. Tissue Eng Part C Methods, 2010. 16(4): p. 735-49.
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