The ability to control stem cell functions, particularly neuronal progenitors, has long since been believed to be the key to successful treatment of neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and accidents involving head trauma. The neurology field calls for many new solutions to address the controlled neural stem cell seeding and placement of cells for neural tissue regeneration. Self-assembled monolayers (SAM) from the alkanethiol group provide a straightforward applicable, reliable treatment for cell adhesion. An ODT/gold treatment was used to adhere the cells to patterned areas, due mainly to a high confluence of cells attracted to it, as well as the viable environment it produced for the cells. Arrays of micropillars, made of SU-8 photoresist, then covered with a thin film of gold and treated with the ODT, created scaffolding allowing manipulation of neural stem cells. Based on multiple trials of observing varying cross-sectional geometric parameters, metal layer thicknesses and the ODT/Gold treatment, this study explores seeding density control, base and circumferential cell population dependence on those parameters.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:etd-4694 |
| Date | 01 January 2008 |
| Creators | Wesser, Andrea |
| Publisher | STARS |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Electronic Theses and Dissertations |
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