BioE Graduate Seminars

Event Introduction

Approaches to engineer stronger skin

About the speaker

Dr. Claire Higgins was appointed as a Lecturer in the Department of Bioengineering in April 2014.  She joined Imperial after postdoctoral training in the laboratory of Prof. Angela Christiano, in the Department of Dermatology, at Columbia University in New York.  At Columbia she received a Career Development Award from the Dermatology Foundation to research the 'Molecular basis of human hair follicle induction'.  Claire obtained a Ph.D. in Skin Developmental Biology from Durham University in 2007, and holds a B.Sc. in Natural Sciences. 
The main focus of the research group is to understand mechanisms of tissue development, and regeneration, both in normal conditions, and in response to disease or injury.  The hair follicle is used as a model, as it is an accessible and elegant system to study organ regeneration.  Research into developmental, and regenerative processes means we can try and recreate them in a lab setting, and exploit the inherent properties of interacting cells to engineer new tissues and structures.

Abstract

After injuries to the skin, epithelial cells migrate to close the wound, while dermal cells synthesise collagen to fill the wound bed.  These coordinated processes enable healing to occur, however, we are left with a permanent reminder of the injury – a scar. Scar tissue never regains the strength of healthy tissue and is prone to injury. It also has limited functionality compared to healthy skin. In this talk, I will present the interdisciplinary research ongoing in my lab that is determining ways to accelerate wound closure, reduce scar formation, and make skin resilient to injury in the first place.