CLAUDIA FISCHBACH-TESCHL
Cornell University

CANCER RESEARCH FROM A TISSUE ENGINEERING AND BIOMATERIALS PERSPECTIVE

Perturbed microenvironmental conditions play important roles in tumor initiation, progression, and therapy response; however, the underlying molecular, cellular, and tissue-level mechanisms remain relatively poorly understood. By integrating biomaterials, tissue engineering, and microfabrication strategies our lab has developed a variety of in vitro and in vivo models to study tumorigenesis under pathologically relevant conditions. In particular, we are applying these model systems to evaluate the regulatory roles of extracellular matrix (ECM) physicochemical properties on tumor-stroma interactions with a focus on tumor angiogenesis and metastasis. This talk will summarize some of our efforts in this area and discuss tumormediated differences in mesenchymal stem cell fate, the effect of these changes on ECM physicochemical properties, and the resulting functional consequences on endothelial and tumor cell behavior.

CLAUDIA FISCHBACH-TESCHL is an Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Cornell University. She received her Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Technology from the University of Regensburg, Germany, and holds an M.S. in Pharmacy from the Ludwigs-Maximilians-University, Munich, Germany. She conducted her postdoctoral work at Harvard University in the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences and joined the faculty of Cornell in 2007.
Her research broadly focuses on utilizing engineering tools and strategies to gain a better understanding of cancer development, progression, and therapy resistance with a particular focus on adipose stroma contributions to breast cancer, bone metastasis and tumor angiogenesis. She has received multiple awards for her work including an AAOS / ORS Molecular Biology and Therapeutics in Musculoskeletal Oncology Young Investigator Award and a Humboldt Research Fellowship for Experienced Researchers from Germany. Furthermore, she is an editorial board member of various journals including the new ACS journal Biomaterials Science and Engineering and serves as a permanent member of the NCI Tumor microenvironment study section.

For more info: www.chem-eng.utoronto.ca/news.htm

Websites of Interest

• University of Toronto
• Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering
• Department of Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry