Illinois Institute of Technology View Institution's Website 4 articles published in JoVE Developmental Biology X-ray Diffraction of Intact Murine Skeletal Muscle as a Tool for Studying the Structural Basis of Muscle Disease Weikang Ma1, Thomas C. Irving1 1BioCAT, Dept. of Biological Sciences, Illinois Institute of Technology We present detailed protocols for performing small-angle X-ray diffraction experiments using intact mouse skeletal muscles. With the wide availability of transgenic mouse models for human diseases, this experimental platform can form a useful test bed for elucidating the structural basis of genetic muscle diseases Cancer Research A Method of Targeted Cell Isolation via Glass Surface Functionalization Ali Ansari1, Reema Patel2, Kinsey Schultheis1, Vesna Naumovski3, P. I. Imoukhuede1 1Department of Bioengineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2Department of Liberal Arts & Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 3Department of Biomedical Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology This protocol describes customizable surface functionalization of the desthiobiotin, streptavidin, and APTES system in order to isolate specific cell types of interest. In addition, this manuscript covers the applications, optimization, and verification of this process. Chemistry Towards Biomimicking Wood: Fabricated Free-standing Films of Nanocellulose, Lignin, and a Synthetic Polycation Karthik Pillai1,2,3, Fernando Navarro Arzate2,4, Wei Zhang2,5, Scott Renneckar1,2,5,6 1Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science, Virginia Tech, 2Macromolecules and Interfaces Institute, Virginia Tech, 3Institute for Food Safety and Health, Illinois Institute of Technology- Moffett Campus, 4Wood, Cellulose, and Paper Research Department, University of Guadalajara, 5Department of Sustainable Biomaterials, Virginia Tech, 6Sustainable Nanotechnology Interdisciplinary Graduate Education Program, Virginia Tech The objective of this research was to form synthetic plant cell wall tissue using layer-by-layer assembly of nanocellulose fibrils and isolated lignin assembled from dilute aqueous suspensions. Surface measurement techniques of quartz crystal microbalance and atomic force microscopy were used to monitor the formation of the polymer-polymer nanocomposite material. Medicine Generation of Alginate Microspheres for Biomedical Applications Omaditya Khanna1, Jeffery C. Larson2, Monica L. Moya3, Emmanuel C. Opara4, Eric M. Brey2,5 1Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, 2Department of Biomedical Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, 3Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of California at Irvine, 4Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine and Department of Biomedical Engineering, Wake Forest University Health Sciences, 5Research Service, Hines Veterans Administration Hospital In the following sections, we outline procedures for the preparation of alginate microspheres for use in biomedical applications. We specifically illustrate a technique for creating multilayered alginate microspheres for the dual purpose of cell and protein encapsulation as a potential treatment for type 1 diabetes.