Advances in cancer research have shown that a tumor can be likened to a foreign species that disrupts delicately balanced ecological interactions, compromising the survival of normal tissue ecosystems. In efforts to mitigate tumor expansion and metastasis, experimental approaches from ecology are becoming more frequently and successfully applied by researchers from diverse disciplines to revers...

Nanotechnology has made a major impact on industry, leading to, for example, batteries that store more energy and solar cell coatings that absorb more light. In theory, scientists can also engineer nanoparticles that carry drug payloads, avoid healthy tissue, and seek out tumors. “The concept is really beautiful: A drug loaded into a nanoparticle will destroy the tumor with no side effects,” sa...

Engineer-Computer Interaction (ECI), is a new sub-domain of Human-Computer Interaction specifically tailored to engineers needs. ECI i) uses an information classification schema, ii) provides a modular approach to task decomposition, and iii) integrates standard engineer characteristics and working procedures into software. A software toolkit that interprets monitoring data taken from bridges w...

The ability to engineer cardiac tissue in vitro is limited by the absence of a vasculature. In this study we describe an in vivo model which allows neovascularization of engineered cardiac tissue. Three-dimensional cardiac tissue, termed "cardioids," was engineered in vitro from the spontaneous delamination of a confluent monolayer of cardiac cells. Cardioids were sutured onto a support framewo...

In native tissues, microscale variations in the extracellular matrix (ECM) structure can drive different cellular behaviors. Although control over ECM structure could prove useful in tissue engineering and in studies of cellular behavior, isotropic 3D matrices poorly replicate variations in local microenvironments. In this paper, we demonstrate a method to engineer local variations in the densi...

Software development is hard, but creating good software even harder, especially if your main job something other than developing software. Engineer Your Software! opens the world of en