Journal of Nanomedicine & Nanotechnology

Responsive polymer pillar arrays

2^nd International Conference on Nanotek and Expo

December 3-5, 2012 DoubleTree by Hilton Philadelphia Center City, USA

Shu Yang

Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J Nanomed Nanotechol

Abstract:

High-aspect-ratio pillar arrays present many unique features, including large surface area, a true surface topography that is well-separated from the underlying substrate, and large mechanical compliance. In Nature, these features have resulted in evolutionary functions, including reversible dry adhesion of gecko foot hairs, superhydrophobic surface of lotus leaves, and enhanced local interactions with cell membrane structures such as microvilli and filopodia. In my talk, I will present our recent work on fabrication of polymer micropillar arrays, study of their stabilities against adhesive and capillary forces in dry and wet states, respectively. By taking advantage of the mechanical compliance and instabilities, we investigate potential applications in cell differentiation, tunable dry adhesion, and switching of optical properties, as well as their integration as sensors in design of energy efficient buildings

Biography :

Shu Yang is Associate Professor in the Department of Materials Science & Engineering at University of Pennsylvania. Her group is interested in engineering polymers and inorganic crystals with predictable size, shape, and morphology; investigating their unique optical, mechanical and structural properties and cell-substrate interactions. Yang received her BS degree from Fudan University, China in 1992, and Ph. D. degree from Chemistry and Chemical Biology under the supervision of Professor Christopher K. Ober in Materials Science and Engineering at Cornell University in 1999. She then joined Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technologies as a Member of Technical Staff till 2004. She is a recipient of ICI (1999) and Unilever award (2001) from ACS for outstanding research in polymer science and engineering under the supervision of Prof. Ober. She was selected by MIT's Technology Review as one of the world?s top 100 young innovators under age of 35 in 2004. She received the prestigious Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award from NSF in 2006. The presentation, "Understanding pattern transformation mechanisms in different responsive hydrogel membranes", won the Arthur K. Doolittle Award in the PMSE symposium at the ACS 2011 Fall National Meeting