Spotlight Archive

On April 24 UW-River Falls hosted the second annual UWRF Tissue and Cellular Innovation Center/CVTC Nanobiotechnology Workshop.

This event is one of the cornerstones of the growing collaborative relationship with the CVTC NanoRite Center in Eau Claire. This relationship, in turn, is also a cornerstone in the teaching/training component of the Tissue and Cellular Innovation Center.

The day-long workshop was a great success with nine nanotechnology students and three instructors from CVTC gaining both background knowledge and practical experience with cell culture, stem cell biology and tissue engineering fundamentals. The workshop was also an introduction to labeling cells and fluorescent microscopy.

 

CVTC Nanotechnology Program Director, Hans Mickelson commented to me that “this was the perfect ending to our semester course in nanobiotechnology”. During the day these students handled human and rat cell cultures, established their own “artificial tissues” and examined established artificial tissues based on avian fetal bone and human embryonic stem cells. In addition, the class returned to Eau Claire with samples of avian bone rudiment from my research projects and will process these samples for examination by SEM.

 

This will then complete the data generation and gathering cycle in a compressed format that was designed to inform these students of the complexities and advantages of tissue engineering within the context of nanotechnology.

 

Submitted by Timothy Lyden, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Anatomy and Physiology Director
UWRF Tissue and Cellular Innovation Center