Nanosystems Engineering Research Center for Directed Multiscale Assembly of Cellular Metamaterials with Nanoscale Precision: CELL-MET

心脏病是美国人死亡的头号原因，也是世界范围内的主要原因，但目前的医学不能再生或修复患病的人类心脏组织。今天，没有治愈心脏病发作的方法。细胞超材料定向多尺度组装纳米级精密（CELL-MET）纳米系统工程研究中心的愿景就是改变这一点。CELL-MET将开发组织工程原理，以创建可扩展的低成本技术，从细胞水平的构建块中培养临床重要的心脏组织。研究方法是适应和推进新的纳米制造技术，将各种功能生物结构和元件集成到支持和引导心脏细胞的柔性聚合物支架中。这个项目的目标是制造心脏贴片，有朝一日可以修复因心脏病发作或其他疾病而受损的心脏。除了修复受损心脏的潜力之外，人造心脏组织还将被用于测试心脏药物或其他药物的效果，比目前可能的更现实、更有效。更广泛的影响将包括从幼儿园到博士后的教育和培训计划，这些计划将产生多样化的、训练有素的、具有世界意识的劳动力，以支持CELL-MET研究所带来的数十亿美元的新产业。工业合作伙伴将与CELL-MET合作创建这些新产业，开发研究突破带来的商机。CELL-MET旨在通过控制不同长度尺度的心脏结构，在实验室中创建功能性的、具有临床意义的心脏组织。在小于1微米到10微米大小的细胞中，CELL-MET将使心肌细胞排列整齐，并通过特殊的细胞结构将它们彼此连接起来，使它们能够同步收缩和放松。在多细胞尺度上，它将监测和控制这些细胞之间以及它们与支持细胞之间的化学信号。在组织构建的规模上，CELL-MET将创造出排列着上皮细胞的高度结构化的血管网络，这是任何厚组织所需要的。十年的愿景包括合并心内膜细胞，这些细胞有助于确定心脏的大规模结构和电生理功能，以及确保单向血液流动的瓣膜。cel - met汇集了来自波士顿大学、密歇根大学、佛罗里达国际大学、哈佛大学、哥伦比亚大学、阿贡国家实验室、EPFL（瑞士）和Centro Atomico-Bariloche（阿根廷）的多元化世界级团队。该团队在半导体、光子学、纳米技术、光学系统、有机分子、心脏生物学和细胞组装方面拥有丰富的经验。CELL-MET在利用这些学科之间的能力和协同作用方面具有独特的定位。CELL-MET计划结合50纳米或更小尺度的分子模式和纳米分辨率的3d打印支架的新技术。3D纳米打印技术将生产出原子书法和有机蒸汽喷射打印的支架，在支架上书写，创造出附着细胞的焦点附着力。先进的组织工程技术将用心肌细胞和其他心脏细胞类型填充这些纳米结构，以产生活组织。随着CELL-MET技术的进步，它将与创新生态系统的商业成员合作，创造全新的行业。通过其教育和劳动力发展计划，CELL-MET将招募和培训多样化的，具有世界意识的劳动力，以支持其创建的行业。

Heart disease is the number one cause of death in the US and a leading cause worldwide, but current medicine cannot regenerate and or repair diseased human heart tissue. Today, there is no cure for a heart attack. The vision of Directed Multiscale Assembly of Cellular Metamaterials with Nanoscale Precision (CELL-MET) Nanosystems Engineering Research Center is to change this. CELL-MET will develop tissue-engineering principles to create scalable, low-cost technologies for growing clinically significant cardiac tissues from cell-level building blocks. The research approach is to adapt and advance novel nanomanufacturing techniques to integrate a variety of functional biological structures and elements into flexible polymer scaffolds that support and guide heart cells. The goal of this project is to create cardiac patches that will someday allow for the repair of hearts damaged by a heart attack or other diseases. In addition to their potential for repairing damaged hearts, artificial cardiac tissues will be used to test the effects of heart drugs or other drugs more realistically and efficiently than is currently possible. Broader impacts will include kindergarten to post-doctoral education and training programs that will produce a diverse, well-trained, world aware workforce to support the new billion dollar industries enabled by CELL-MET research. Industrial partners will work with CELL-MET to create these new industries, developing the business opportunities generated by the research breakthroughs.CELL-MET aims to create functional, clinically significant heart tissue in the laboratory by controlling the cardiac structure across different length scales. At sizes smaller than a micron and up to the ten micron scale of cells, CELL-MET will align heart muscle cells (cardiomyocytes) and connect them to one another via special cellular structures, enabling them to contract and relax in synchrony. At the multicellular scale, it will monitor and control chemical signaling both among these cells and between them and supporting cells. At the scale of tissue constructs, CELL-MET will create highly structured networks of blood vessels lined with epithelial cells, which are needed for any thick tissue. The ten-year vision encompasses the incorporation of endocardial cells that help define the large-scale structure and electrophysiological function of the heart, as well as the valves that ensure unidirectional blood flow.CELL-MET brings together a diverse, world-class team from Boston University, the University of Michigan, Florida International University, Harvard, Columbia, Argonne National Lab, EPFL (Switzerland), and Centro Atomico-Bariloche (Argentina). The team has expertice in semiconductors, photonics, nanotechnology, optical systems, organic molecules, cardiac biology, and cellular assembly. CELL-MET is uniquely positioned to harness the capabilities and synergies among these disciplines. CELL-MET plans to combine novel techniques for patterning molecules on the scale of 50 nm or less with nanometer resolution 3D-printed scaffolds. 3D nanoprinting technologies will produce scaffolds that Atomic Calligraphy and Organic Vapor Jet Printing will write upon to create the focal adhesion points, the places that attach the cells. Advanced tissue engineering techniques will populate these nanostructures with cardiomyocytes and other cardiac cell types to produce the living tissues.As CELL-MET advances the technology, it will work with commercial members of its Innovation Ecosystem to create entirely new industries. Through its Education and Workforce Development programs, CELL-MET will recruit and train a diverse, world aware workforce to support the industries that it creates.