Human development – the process by which a single celled zygote transforms into a human being – involves the incredibly complex and self-orchestrated specification, differentiation, and assembly of trillions of cells. Despite nature’s power during development, the adult body cannot always reassemble or repair itself after injury, such as following a heart attack or pathogen infection.

My research seeks to hijack and rewire aspects of nature’s developmental programs in order to control the processes by which communities of cells assemble to form human systems. To do this, I use diverse tools taken from stem cell biology, tissue engineering, synthetic biology, micro/nanofabrication, and bioprinting.  I am currently integrating these technologies to build human platforms for understanding and treating infectious disease, interrogating biological programming in human development, and controlling artificial tissue for organ regeneration in animal model systems. I ultimately seek to translate my work into new therapies for patients with heart and liver disease.