Shaochen Chen named AAAS Fellow, wins NIH grant for cardiac nanostructure development

SPIE Fellow Shaochen Chen (Univ. of California, San Diego) is among those recently named Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Chen is the principal investigator for a four-year, $1.5-million grant awarded in November to UCSD NanoEngineers by the National Institutes of Health, to develop tools to manufacture biodegradable frames around which heart tissues will grow.

Developing methods for growing tissues that mimic nature's fine-grained details, including vasculature, could lead to breakthroughs in efforts to grow replacement cardiac tissues for people who have suffered a heart attack, noted the UCSD press release announcing the grant. The work could also lead to better systems for growing and studying cells, including stem cells, in the laboratory.

Read more about the UCSD NanoEngineers project.