UC Science Today

In the emerging field of 3D bioprinting, there are those who work with synthetic materials, and others who use materials that come from nature. Bioengineer Monica Moya of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has used a 3D printer and a ‘bio-ink’ made of materials compatible with the human body to create living blood vessels.

"So one of our inks is made out of the same stuff that you find in a blood clot. And we intentionally do this because we are in a sense, are co-engineering with the cells. So, we’re using materials that the cells recognize and understand what they’re supposed to do. So that kind of takes the pressure off of us because then the cells are going to do the things that they already know how to do without us having to tell them, because you know, they are the original engineers of life. They already know how to build blood vessels – and so what we do is we kind of orchestrate that whole process."

Their bioprinted vasculature system could be used for toxicology studies, medical treatment testing and provide a test bed for the ultimate goal in the field - printing implantable organs.

In the emerging field of 3D bioprinting, there are those who work with synthetic materials, and others who use materials that come from nature. Bioengineer Monica Moya of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has used a 3D printer and a ‘bio-ink’ made of materials compatible with the human body to create living blood vessels.

"So one of our inks is made out of the same stuff that you find in a blood clot. And we intentionally do this because we are in a sense, are co-engineering with the cells. So, we’re using materials that the cells recognize and understand what they’re supposed to do. So that kind of takes the pressure off of us because then the cells are going to do the things that they already know how to do without us having to tell them, because you know, they are the original engineers of life. They already know how to build blood vessels – and so what we do is we kind of orchestrate that whole process."

Their bioprinted vasculature system could be used for toxicology studies, medical treatment testing and provide a test bed for the ultimate goal in the field - printing implantable organs.

Can you trick your genes into extending your life? Biologist Andrew Dillin of the University of California, Berkeley recently found two genes in the worm C.elegans that are affected by their diet during early development. Changes in the expression of these genes can actually alter the worms’ metabolism later on in life and sometimes even double their lifespan.

"And that was very exciting, that basic finding that these genes do actually exist, and when we manipulate them, we could block this event. Or if we could turn them on, we could trick the system into thinking that they were metabolically stressed or metabolically altered, and they would end up living twice as long, for example."

Dillin says future studies are needed to determine the relationship between these genes and longevity in humans.

"If that correlation existed, it may actually predict if you could make a drug that could activate these genes. For example, a person that is predicted to be short-lived, maybe we could actually increase their life span so they would have a healthy normal life span, you know, grow up and be able to see their grandkids."

Can you trick your genes into extending your life? Biologist Andrew Dillin of the University of California, Berkeley recently found two genes in the worm C.elegans that are affected by their diet during early development. Changes in the expression of these genes can actually alter the worms’ metabolism later on in life and sometimes even double their lifespan.

"And that was very exciting, that basic finding that these genes do actually exist, and when we manipulate them, we could block this event. Or if we could turn them on, we could trick the system into thinking that they were metabolically stressed or metabolically altered, and they would end up living twice as long, for example."

Dillin says future studies are needed to determine the relationship between these genes and longevity in humans.

"If that correlation existed, it may actually predict if you could make a drug that could activate these genes. For example, a person that is predicted to be short-lived, maybe we could actually increase their life span so they would have a healthy normal life span, you know, grow up and be able to see their grandkids."

Birdsong is like a dialect – birds in one area may sing a different tune than those elsewhere. But at the level of physiology, it gets much more complicated. Researcher Hamish Mehaffey and his team at the University of California, San Francisco took a look at how two parts of a zebra finch brain not only enable song learning but interact to allow a bird to change its song.

"So you can put electrodes in the pathways and then record in the area where they interact and look at the strengths of those inputs, after different patterns of stimulation. So what we did was we took the patterns of stimulation that we knew that the birds used when they were singing, and used those as, kind of, templates in order to probe what the mechanism might be."

Mehaffey compares such a disturbance to a stroke, which can disturb a person’s language area.

"The interesting part was that there was always some balance between these two pathways. If something happens to it, the bird will sing a horrible, messed-up song."

These regions are analogous to parts of the human brain and are implicated for aspects of learning and adaptation.

Birdsong is like a dialect – birds in one area may sing a different tune than those elsewhere. But at the level of physiology, it gets much more complicated. Researcher Hamish Mehaffey and his team at the University of California, San Francisco took a look at how two parts of a zebra finch brain not only enable song learning but interact to allow a bird to change its song.

"So you can put electrodes in the pathways and then record in the area where they interact and look at the strengths of those inputs, after different patterns of stimulation. So what we did was we took the patterns of stimulation that we knew that the birds used when they were singing, and used those as, kind of, templates in order to probe what the mechanism might be."

Mehaffey compares such a disturbance to a stroke, which can disturb a person’s language area.

"The interesting part was that there was always some balance between these two pathways. If something happens to it, the bird will sing a horrible, messed-up song."

These regions are analogous to parts of the human brain and are implicated for aspects of learning and adaptation.

What qualities spell academic success in schoolchildren? To answer this question, neuroscientist Fumiko Hoeft of the University of California, San Francisco is looking at a mentoring program for children with learning disabilities such as ADHD, and how certain traits may play into the educational process. The program’s goal is to develop resilience and better learning practices in its students.

"We’re doing a study validating these mentoring programs, and see which aspects of resilience might we be able to promote. Motivation, grit, mindset – these are all concepts that are very popular in education right now, on how to raise a successful child. So people have focused largely on academic achievement – reading, language arts, science. math. But now there’s an increased awareness that without motivation or without resilience and perseverance that your child is not going to succeed, even though their IQ might be high or their test scores might be initially high."

The hope is to inspire a nation-wide evaluation of these types of mentoring programs and their impact on learning.

What qualities spell academic success in schoolchildren? To answer this question, neuroscientist Fumiko Hoeft of the University of California, San Francisco is looking at a mentoring program for children with learning disabilities such as ADHD, and how certain traits may play into the educational process. The program’s goal is to develop resilience and better learning practices in its students.

"We’re doing a study validating these mentoring programs, and see which aspects of resilience might we be able to promote. Motivation, grit, mindset – these are all concepts that are very popular in education right now, on how to raise a successful child. So people have focused largely on academic achievement – reading, language arts, science. math. But now there’s an increased awareness that without motivation or without resilience and perseverance that your child is not going to succeed, even though their IQ might be high or their test scores might be initially high."

The hope is to inspire a nation-wide evaluation of these types of mentoring programs and their impact on learning.

Nature always manages to surprise us, and the diversity of life is no exception. At the University of California, Berkeley, microbiologist Karthik Anantharaman recently helped construct biology’s new tree of life, but he also knows what scientists are up against when it comes to documenting every living organism.

"Now with regard to finding more and more organisms that we didn’t think exist or we didn’t have a good understanding, I think it has to do with complexity of the environment. By complexity, I mean how many different organisms live in a particular environment at the same time and can thrive. Now when you look at something like, say, a human environment, it’s a relatively simple environment . There aren’t a lot of microbes that live on us. When you look at something like water, it’s a little more complex, but we can still understand it. And finally, the most complex environments are soils and sediments. There are thousands of microorganisms that are coexisting. There are a lot of extreme environments. But I think slowly but steadily, we are uncovering a lot of it."

Nature always manages to surprise us, and the diversity of life is no exception. At the University of California, Berkeley, microbiologist Karthik Anantharaman recently helped construct biology’s new tree of life, but he also knows what scientists are up against when it comes to documenting every living organism.

"Now with regard to finding more and more organisms that we didn’t think exist or we didn’t have a good understanding, I think it has to do with complexity of the environment. By complexity, I mean how many different organisms live in a particular environment at the same time and can thrive. Now when you look at something like, say, a human environment, it’s a relatively simple environment . There aren’t a lot of microbes that live on us. When you look at something like water, it’s a little more complex, but we can still understand it. And finally, the most complex environments are soils and sediments. There are thousands of microorganisms that are coexisting. There are a lot of extreme environments. But I think slowly but steadily, we are uncovering a lot of it."