Cross-talk between mechanical and functional aspects
There is tight cross-talk between the mechanical state of mammary glands and their biological function. For instance, towards lactation the rigidity and density of the tissue increase due to massive cellular proliferation and then decline during involution. Another example is that during milking / nursing, the vacuum pulses exert mechanical forces that activate the milk secretion.
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In the lab we aim to deepen our understanding of these mechano-functional links using multidisciplinary approaches. By that we wish to gain "out of the box" insight that can contribute to applications in various fields such as animal welfare, agricultural efficiency, and food technologies.
What we do
A prime focus of the lab is to set up systems to apply various types of mechanical forces to bovine mammary epithelial cells in both 2D and 3D cultures.
One purpose is to mimic the forces that act on the tissue during milking or nursing. This allows us to examine how the mechanical stress impact different functional aspects of the cells. ​​
Moreover, we design culture environments that can mimic the physical conditions found in animals. Apart from the application of external forces, this also includes the control of cellular structures, culture topography, and the environment mechanics. By achieving culture systems as close as possible to nature, we envision to reduce the necessity for animal experiments.
In addition to the experimental work we construct computational tools for both novel data analysis and biophysical modelling.​​
The strength of combining cell culture schemes with force experiments, bioengineering, and computational modeling
Biomechanical-based multidisciplinary tools can provide unique insights in the field of cellular animal science. Our previous experience has demonstrated that such approaches contribute valuable applicative perspectives in other fields such as biomedicine and drug design. ​
​One example is the mechanical targeting scheme that we developed solely based on a physical hypothesis that the enhanced mechanical deformability of cancer cells relative to normal ones can be utilized both for drug specificity and for diagnostics.
Another illustration is given by the use of physical theories for prediction of the cytotoxicity of inert particles based on their size and shape.
