Colorado State University chemical and biological engineering professor Ashoke Prasad has been awarded a five-year, $400,000 National Science Foundation CAREER grant to study how stem cells respond to the geometry and topography of their environment.
The grant will allow Professor Prasad’s laboratory to develop mathematical and computational models to help interpret how physical cues can direct stem cell differentiation into different cell types. These models will help to improve the understanding of cells and how they renew themselves, particularly, when they begin to form bone. “If we understood the details of the processes,” Prasad says, “we could aid bone formation for fracture healing, help in prevention of heart disease, and perhaps even help cancer therapeutics by manipulating mechanical signals.”
The grant also contains an educational component that requires Prasad to collaborate with the Education and Outreach Center of the College of Natural Sciences, to aid in the training of K-12 science teachers and students. This includes introducing modeling elements to ongoing and new classroom projects, one of which will be a simple computer model to help students understand the non-intuitive effects of feedback in the natural world.
The NSF CAREER grant is one of the most prestigious awards offered by the NSF’s Faculty Early Career Development Program, which recognizes the early career-development activities of teacher-scholars who most effectively integrate research and education within the context of the mission of their organization.