Sacrificial Templating for Accelerating Clinical Translation of Engineered Organs.

Transplantable engineered organs could one day be used to treat patients suffering from end-stage organ failure. Yet, producing hierarchical vascular networks that sustain the viability and function of cells within human-scale organs remains a major challenge. Sacrificial templating has emerged as a promising biofabrication method that could overcome this challenge.

LiverMap pipeline for 3D imaging of human liver reveals volumetric spatial dysregulation of cirrhotic vasculobiliary architecture.

The liver contains an intricate microstructure that is critical for liver function. Architectural disruption of this spatial structure is pathologic. Unfortunately, 2D histopathology - the gold standard for pathological understanding of many liver diseases - can misrepresent or leave gaps in our understanding of complex 3D structural features.

LGBTQIA+ Cultural Competence in Physical Therapist Education and Practice: A Qualitative Study From the Patients' Perspective.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of cultural competence and humility among patients of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and asexual (LGBTQIA+) community in physical therapy. Researchers sought to understand the perspectives of adults over 18 years old who have received physical therapy and identify as a member of the LGBTQIA+ community.

Methods: A phenomenological qualitative approach was utilized for this study.

Genetically Encoded XTEN-based Hydrogels with Tunable Viscoelasticity and Biodegradability for Injectable Cell Therapies.

While direct cell transplantation holds great promise in treating many debilitating diseases, poor cell survival and engraftment following injection have limited effective clinical translation. Though injectable biomaterials offer protection against membrane-damaging extensional flow and supply a supportive 3D environment in vivo that ultimately improves cell retention and therapeutic costs, most are created from synthetic or naturally harvested polymers that are immunogenic and/or chemically ill-defined. This work presents a shear-thinning and self-healing telechelic recombinant protein-based hydrogel designed around XTEN - a well-expressible, non-immunogenic, and intrinsically disordered polypeptide previously evolved as a genetically encoded alternative to PEGylation to "eXTENd" the in vivo half-life of fused protein therapeutics.

Privacy and security concerns with passively collected location data for digital contact tracing among U.S. college students.

People continue to use technology in new ways, and how governments harness digital information should consider privacy and security concerns. During COVID19, numerous countries deployed digital contact tracing that collect location data from user's smartphones. However, these apps had low adoption rates and faced opposition.

A complexity-informed in-depth case study into the sustainability and impact of a culture of health: The TR14ers community youth dance group.

There are calls for researchers to study existing community assets and activities that appear to improve health and have achieved longevity. The TR14ers Community Dance Charity Limited is a community youth dance group that has been running since 2005 providing free weekly sessions for children and adolescents in an economically disadvantaged town in the UK. An in-depth case study employing qualitative, quantitative and participatory methods was undertaken with the TR14ers (current participants and those who have left, co-ordinators and families) over 6 months with the aim of understanding the sustainable processes and impact of the Group.

Highly Parallel Tissue Grafting for Combinatorial In Vivo Screening.

Material- and cell-based technologies such as engineered tissues hold great promise as human therapies. Yet, the development of many of these technologies becomes stalled at the stage of pre-clinical animal studies due to the tedious and low-throughput nature of implantation experiments. We introduce a 'plug and play' screening array platform called Highly Parallel Tissue Grafting (HPTG).

Engineered tissue vascularization and engraftment depends on host model.

Developing vascular networks that integrate with the host circulation and support cells engrafted within engineered tissues remains a key challenge in tissue engineering. Most previous work in this field has focused on developing new methods to build human vascular networks within engineered tissues prior to their implant in vivo, with substantively less attention paid to the role of the host in tissue vascularization and engraftment. Here, we assessed the role that different host animal models and anatomic implant locations play in vascularization and cardiomyocyte survival within engineered tissues.

Temporal Dynamics of Metabolic Acquisition in Grafted Engineered Human Liver Tissue.

Liver disease affects millions globally, and end-stage liver failure is only cured by organ transplant. Unfortunately, there is a growing shortage of donor organs as well as inequitable access to transplants across populations. Engineered liver tissue grafts that supplement or replace native organ function can address this challenge.

Single-cell atlas of human liver development reveals pathways directing hepatic cell fates.

The liver has been studied extensively due to the broad number of diseases affecting its vital functions. However, therapeutic advances have been hampered by the lack of knowledge concerning human hepatic development. Here, we addressed this limitation by describing the developmental trajectories of different cell types that make up the human liver at single-cell resolution.

Insecticide Resistance in Alabama Populations of the Mosquito Aedes albopictus.

The insecticide sensitivity and resistance status of both adults and larvae from six Aedes albopictus samples collected in Tuskegee, Tuscaloosa, Birmingham, Dothan, Mobile, and Montgomery, Alabama, were evaluated for the levels of sensitivity and resistance to eight insecticides: β-cyfluthrin, chlorpyrifos, deltamethrin, etofenprox, fenitrothion, permethrin, resmethrin, and malathion. Adult Ae. albopictus from all locations showed similar results for the difference between the time to 100% mortality and the diagnostic time in the CDC bottle bioassay, although Ae.

Engineering the multiscale complexity of vascular networks.

The survival of vertebrate organisms depends on highly regulated delivery of oxygen and nutrients through vascular networks that pervade nearly all tissues in the body. Dysregulation of these vascular networks is implicated in many common human diseases such as hypertension, coronary artery disease, diabetes and cancer. Therefore, engineers have sought to create vascular networks within engineered tissues for applications such as regenerative therapies, human disease modelling and pharmacological testing.

Can't touch this: Stromal-mediated ductal proliferation.

Unraveling and replicating how cells communicate to regenerate organs remains one of the most compelling biological problems of our time. In this issue of Cell Stem Cell, Cordero-Espinoza et. al (2021) untangle how a subpopulation of liver mesenchymal cells residing adjacent to the bile ducts regulate biliary cell proliferation.

Monitoring Incidence of COVID-19 Cases, Hospitalizations, and Deaths, by Vaccination Status - 13 U.S. Jurisdictions, April 4-July 17, 2021.

COVID-19 vaccine breakthrough infection surveillance helps monitor trends in disease incidence and severe outcomes in fully vaccinated persons, including the impact of the highly transmissible B.1.617.

Prediction models in gynaecology: Transparent reporting needed for clinical application.

The clinical application of prediction models is increasing within the field of gynaecology and obstetrics. This is mostly due to the fact that clinicians and patients prefer individualized counselling and person specific, more objective outcome assessment. To prevent using inadequate models, it is important to construct and perform prediction model studies correctly.

Embryo-scale, single-cell spatial transcriptomics.

Spatial patterns of gene expression manifest at scales ranging from local (e.g., cell-cell interactions) to global (e.

Air Quality Enhancement Districts: democratizing data to improve respiratory health.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recently acknowledged that the principal mode for SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) to spread is through airborne particles.

Fund Black scientists.

Our nationwide network of BME women faculty collectively argue that racial funding disparity by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) remains the most insidious barrier to success of Black faculty in our profession. We thus refocus attention on this critical barrier and suggest solutions on how it can be dismantled.

Photopatterned biomolecule immobilization to guide three-dimensional cell fate in natural protein-based hydrogels.

Hydrogel biomaterials derived from natural biopolymers (e.g., fibrin, collagen, decellularized extracellular matrix) are regularly utilized in three-dimensional (3D) cell culture and tissue engineering.

Thermofluidic heat exchangers for actuation of transcription in artificial tissues.

Spatial patterns of gene expression in living organisms orchestrate cell decisions in development, homeostasis, and disease. However, most methods for reconstructing gene patterning in 3D cell culture and artificial tissues are restricted by patterning depth and scale. We introduce a depth- and scale-flexible method to direct volumetric gene expression patterning in 3D artificial tissues, which we call "heat exchangers for actuation of transcription" (HEAT).