What do car engines and human brains have in common?

Using that intriguing question as a starting point—and with a visual assist from Eddie Murphy stuffing bananas up a tailpipe—Aditya Raghunandan won first place and $1,000 at this year’s competition for the Steadman Family Postdoctoral Associate Prize in Interdisciplinary Research.

Participants are allowed two slides and three minutes to explain their research in way that is understandable to a general audience.

Raghunandan, a postdoctoral research associate in the Mixing Lab of Douglas Kelley, associate professor of mechanical engineering, investigates how the brain cleanses itself of waste material by pumping it through a complex glymphatic network—much as a car engine removes spent fuel and fumes through an advanced exhaust system.

In the 1984 movie Beverly Hills Cop, Eddie Murphy famously eludes a police stakeout by sticking bananas up the tailpipe of a patrol car, causing the engine to stall.

In collaboration with Medical Center researchers in Maiken Nedergaard’s lab, Raghunandan has used particle tracking velocimetry to demonstrate how cervical lymph vessels in the neck become less elastic with age in mice, effectively creating a similar “banana up a tailpipe” bottleneck for the brain’s removal of waste.

Through their work, Raghunandan and his collaborators have identified a target for the development of drugs that might eventually restore elasticity in aging human cervical lymph nodes. Such treatments might keep the brain’s entire glymphatic system free of accumulating wastes that may be associated with Alzheimer’s disease. Read more about this year’s competition.

CONGRATULATIONS AS WELL TO . . .

Raven Osborn, a student in the UR CTSI’s TL1-funded Translational Biomedical Science Graduate Program, who was awarded the Reviewer and Audience Choice Award at the TL1 Inaugural Symposium on October 11 for her presentation, “The Effect of Age on Innate Immune Responses to SARS-CoV-2 Infection.”

Michael Campbell, a scientific leader in laser science and plasma physics who served as director of the University’s Laboratory for Laser Energetics for the past four years, has announced he will retire on December 31. Campbell will continue to carry out his duties as LLE director until the end of the year and will remain as a consultant to LLE until a new director is named. Details of the University’s national search to find his successor will be shared in the coming weeks.

Rochester President Sarah C. Mangelsdorf praised Campbell’s leadership in expanding the LLE’s capabilities and fostering relationships both with national laboratories and between the LLE and the River Campus.

“Mike has been invaluable to the LLE and the University of Rochester,” says Mangelsdorf, who is also the G. Robert Witmer, Jr. University Professor. “He has elevated the national profile of the LLE and has greatly expanded awareness of the University of Rochester among policymakers in Washington, DC. He has also worked to build strong connections between the LLE and other parts of the University of Rochester. His deep commitment, humor, collegiality, and artistry will be remembered.”

Anne S. Meyer, an associate professor of biology, and her collaborators at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, recently developed a 3D printing technique to engineer and study biofilms—three-dimensional communities of microorganisms, such as bacteria, that adhere to surfaces.

The research provides important information for creating synthetic materials and in developing drugs to fight the negative effects of biofilms.

Biofilms can be both harmful and beneficial to humans: they can coat the surfaces of materials and objects, including medical devices, and cause infections, and they are resistant to many drugs and disinfectants.

However, biofilms are able to degrade toxic chemicals and environmental pollutants, making them useful in areas such as wastewater treatment.

In their latest research, published in the journal ACS Synthetic Biology, Meyer and her colleagues show that engineered biofilms can behave like natural biofilms. The researchers developed a 3D printing technique that allows them to synthetically engineer and study biofilms made of Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacteria. The technique will allow researchers to better study the properties of biofilms so they can harness the beneficial aspects of biofilms and combat their harmful effects.

“This paper shows that our engineered biofilms can behave like native biofilms in many ways—including displaying emergent drug resistance—making them good model systems for anti-biofilm drug development,” Meyer says.

The work is the latest in a series of research efforts led by Meyer’s lab to develop synthetic materials that mimic nature. The Meyer group has used bacteria to develop artificial nacre and graphene and has additionally developed other 3D printing techniques, including a novel bioprinting technique to print algae into living, photosynthetic materials.

Jinjiao Wang, assistant professor at the School of Nursing, has received a one-year pilot award from the U.S. Deprescribing Research Network (USDeN) to help address the overprescribing of medications for elderly patients who receive home care.

“There’s often a lot of crossover when an older person takes on average 10 medications for five or more chronic conditions,” says Wang. Each medication could have a list of side effects that require more medications to offset these side effects. “But if we can achieve better or equivalent treatment outcomes with five meds, why take 10?”

One cause of over-prescribing and polypharmacy is a lack of communication among the multiple health care providers of the patient.

Wang’s study aims to simplify and optimize the patient’s medication regime with a more unified interdisciplinary care team and through the use of telehealth, which will help reduce the cost of medications and burden of symptoms.

Starting this fall, home health care patients in the Rochester area will be selected for their age and the number of medications they’re taking and invited to participate in the study.

In each home visit, Wang’s team will conduct comprehensive medication review, collect complete medication data, have it reviewed by the clinical pharmacist, and then convene with the patient’s primary care provider via telehealth to discuss any opportunities to simplify the medications. The patient will also provide feedback on their experience. Read more.

Biostatisticians and bioinformaticians can assist with designing your studies more efficiently and robustly, apply appropriate analyses, and enhance the rigor and reproducibility of your research.

Ideally, they become full collaborators in your scientific research program.

Three University experts in the field will explain “How to talk to a biostatistician or bioinfomatician” during a Rochester Early Stage Investigator Network (RESIN) Seminar via Zoom from noon to 1 p.m. Wednesday, November 17.

Dalia Ghoneim, lead bioinformatics scientist at the Genome Research Center;  Andrew McDavid, assistant professor of biostatistics and computational biology, and Michael McDermott, associate chair and professor of biostatistics and computational biology, will discuss:

• When it is appropriate to seek statistical or bioinformatics assistance and how to prepare for the initial meeting to make it as productive as possible.
• The importance of a collaborative team and the role of the biostatistician or bioinformatician on that team.
• Biostatistical and bioinformatics resources at the University of Rochester.

The presentation, open to all faculty, staff, and students, is presented by University’s Clinical and Translational Science Institute and the School of Medicine and Dentistry Office for Faculty Development.

Register at https://forms.gle/rLc2EMdqYFtxEZhE6

The next round of applications are due by noon, Monday, November 8 for mini-grants supported and funded by the Center for Community Health & Prevention and the Clinical and Translational Science Institute.

The one-time grants up to $2,000 are available for faculty, staff, and advanced trainees (postdocs, residents) at the Medical Center and community partners associated with a community-based 501(c)(3) organization.

Applicants must be part of a community-Medical Center partnership that serves the Rochester/Monroe County/Finger Lakes region. Learn more and apply online.

The Wilmot Cancer Institute’s Annual Scientific Symposium will be held 1-5:15 p.m. Monday, November 15 in the Class of ‘62 Auditorium. Please register by Friday, November 12 to attend in person or virtually.

The symposium will include a virtual short talk competition in place of the traditional poster presentation competition again this year. All members of the University community are invited to submit short talks on basic, translational or clinical cancer-related research in the form of a PowerPoint presentation.

Faculty judges will evaluate short talk submissions, and two winners will be selected for each research program focus area. All winners will be invited to present live during the symposium. Submit short talk entries by Thursday, November 4, 11:59 p.m.