报告内容摘要：

The development of the vertebrate body plan with left-right (LR) asymmetry (also known as handedness and chirality) requires the emerging chiral morphogenesis of epithelial cells at specific embryonic stages Changes in orientation of the LR axis due to genetic or environmental factors can lead to malformations and disease. We demonstrate that the cultivation of cells on micropatterned 2D surface and in 3D graded hydrogels reveals an intrinsic cellular LR asymmetry. By patterning cells on the 2D soft substrate embedded with fluorescent beads, we are able to directly measure mechanical forces that are responsible for the formation of cellular chiral alignment and directional migration. Mechanical forces are sufficiently large to deform a substrate with a stiffness of several kilopascals. By embedding epithelial cells between two layers of Matrigel, we find that cellular hollow spheroids undergo spontaneous rotation, the direction of which depends on actin function. Overall, our results demonstrate that individual cells are chiral, and they can organize and form asymmetric tissues in both 2D and 3D. We propose that in vitro platforms could be used as effective in vitro tools to study the initiation of LR asymmetry, to diagnose disease, and to study factors involved with birth defects in laterality.

报告人简介：

Dr. Leo Q. Wan is an associate professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY. His research interests focus on understanding physical biology in tissue development and regeneration, and include Tissue Morphogenesis, Stem Cell Mechanobiology, and Functional Tissue Engineering. He received his Bachelor and Master degrees in Theoretical and Applied Mechanics and Fluid Mechanics, respectively, from the University of Science and Technology of China. After completing his PhD in Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University in 2007 (with Professor Van C. Mow), he became a postdoctoral scientist in the Laboratory for Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering (with Professor Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic). Leo is a Pew scholar (Class 2013), and a recipient of the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award (2014), National Science Foundation Early Career Award, American Heart Association Scientist Development Grant, and the March of Dimes Basil O’Connor Starter Scholar Research Award.

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