Biomimetic control of ovarian follicle development: combining multi-scale soft biomaterials with biochemical interactions

是什么驱动了卵巢卵泡的发育？可视化分子信号和多尺度机制之间的相互作用：排卵（每月释放一个卵子）必须在卵巢中严格调节，以确保女性正常的生育寿命。这一过程的失调可导致发病和生育能力受损，例如多囊卵巢综合征、卵巢功能不全。揭示决定卵子及其包裹卵泡如何发育的因素的复杂性是理解卵巢功能障碍的关键。学生将开发新的技术来研究卵泡发育的系统生物学。他们将创建用于体外卵泡3D培养的空间结构生物材料，并使用这些材料来研究卵泡发育的机械生物学调节如何与激素和生长因子调节的传统概念相互作用。生物材料系统将反映卵巢的复杂结构，其在多个长度尺度上表现出机械性能的显著变化。多尺度力学效应的仿生研究是一个新的概念，在机械生物学和类器官研究中有着广泛的应用。

What drives ovarian follicle development? Visualizing the interplay between molecular signalling and multi-scale mechanics: Ovulation (monthly release of an egg) must be tightly regulated in the ovary to ensure a normal fertile lifetime of a woman. Dysregulation of this process can lead to morbidity and compromised fertility, due to e.g. polycystic ovary syndrome, premature ovarian insufficiency. Unravelling the complexity of factors that determine how eggs, and their encapsulating follicles, develop is key to understanding ovarian dysfunction. The student will develop novel techniques to investigate the systems biology of follicle development. They will create spatially-structured biomaterials for 3D-culture of follicles in vitro and use these to investigate how mechanobiological regulation of follicle development interacts with more traditional concepts of regulation by hormones and growth factors. The biomaterial systems will reflect the complex structure of the ovary which exhibits dramatic variations in mechanical properties across multiple lengthscales. Biomimetic investigation of multiscale mechanical effects is a new concept with broad application in mechanobiology and organoid research.