Mark Allenby

Engineering vessels from blood to predict transplant-associated cardiovascular disease

The application deadline for this fully-funded international PhD scholarship is 5th January, 2025.

This project is funded by the National Heart Foundation, and in collaboration with local hospitals.

The use of stem cell and solid organ transplants is growing rapidly, saving 200,000 lives in 2024, but each transplant runs the risk of life-threatening rejection from the cardiovascular system. Activation of our cardiovascular defence system is useful in fighting pathogens but can become fatal during transplant-associated thrombotic microangiopathy (TA-TMA).

We have invented the first vascularised immune cell culture derived from one or two blood donations (auto- or allo-transplant) to model TA-TMA. This project leverages our progress to establish the first diagnostic TA-TMA model to predict patient transplant rejection risk, optimise patient-specific transplant management, and evaluate promising treatments.

High content screening of 3D cell culture environments for biopharmaceutical discovery

This fully-funded PhD scholarship is only for ANZ citizens. The deadline for applications are rolling, interested candidates should get in contact with Mark.

3D cell cultures grow greater numbers of higher-quality cells with lower costs than the traditional liquid suspension or 2D cultures used in biopharmaceutical industries. However, biopharma’s adoption of 3D cell culture remains limited due to current dependence on high content screening (HCS) for high-throughput 2D culture optimisation or drug screening. Our collaborative team has engineered high-throughput microchip platforms where single-cells can be live-imaged to track stem cell expansion in 3D hydrogels, creating the first 3D HSC platforms. We aim to establish a robust microchip 3D culture platform and computer software for biopharmaceutical industry adoption.

Aims: 1.Design and fabricate ultra-thin, scalable microfluidic chips for imaging and automation-friendly 3D cell culture, surpassing the limitations of 2D cell culture models. 2.Construct biophysical models of the 3D culture environment to screen the effects of the hydrogel in the culture microenvironment and optimize performance. 3.Validate the new combined HCS platform by conducting rigorous tests on our microchips across cell types and environments, ensuring industry-standard compatibility and reliability for drug testing.