Dr Matthew Walker
- Research Associate (Biomedical Engineering)
telephone:
01413304796
email:
Matthew.Walker@glasgow.ac.uk
Biography
In 2014 I received my Bachelor's degree in Biology from the University of Hull with upper second class honours (68.5%)
After my Bachelor's degree, I joined the research group of Dr. Daniel Ungar at the University of York to undertake an MRes involving the characterisation of glycosylation mutants in Drosophila melanogaster. Following the completion of my MRes in 2015, I was accepted onto an EPSRC-funded studentship at the University of York to undertake a 3-year PhD supervised by Dr. Daniel Ungar, Prof. Paul Genever, Dr. Victor Chechik and Dr. Andrew Pratt. This was a highly interdisciplinary project across the departments of Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Electronics focusing on the development of magnetically-responsive nanoparticles for the delivery of bioactive therapeutics in joint disease.
The introduction of biomaterials and tissue engineering during my PhD research sparked my interest in their possibilities for cross-disciplinary translational research and motivated me to continue researching in these fields.
In 2019, I joined the Biomedical Engineering Research Division at the University of Glasgow to work as a postdoctoral researcher; since thenm I have worked with Dr. Marco Cantini, Prof. Delphine Gourdon and Prof. Massimo Vassalli.
My work is carried out within the Centre for the Cellular Microenvironment (CeMi), a multidisciplinary university initiative combining the expertise of cell biologists and bioengineers across the James Watt School of Engineering and College of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences (MVLS). The CeMi is co-directed by Prof. Matt Dalby and Prof. Manuel Salmeron-Sanchez and is part of the Acellular/Smart Materials Hub of the United Kingdom Regenerative Medicine Platform (UKRMP).
Research interests
My research focuses on engineering hydrogel microenvironments to study cell interactions with the extracellular matrix. I am interested in mechanosensitive regulation of cell behaviour and differentiation for tissue engineering applications in regenerative medicine and modelling disease pathologies.
Grants
- Scottish Universities Life Sciences Alliance (SULSA), SULSA ECR Prize, 'Engineering pancreatic tumour viscoelasticity', 2022-2023, £3k
Supervision
Co-supervision of PhD candidates:
- Eonan William Pringle - Dissipative microenvironments to understand cell response to viscosity (expected 2024)
- Omalola Ajayi - Engineered microenvironments for multiscale mechanobiology of breast cancer (expected 2025)
- Konstantina Soulioti - Correlating viscoelasticity and microstructure of the tumour environment to enable early detection, diagnosis and invasion of breast cancer (expected 2025)
Co-supervision of MSc students:
- Muhd Hazim Rusyduddin Abd Hadi - Correlating hydrogel viscoelasticity and protein coating with cell mechanosensing (completed 2021)
- Thi Thuy Trang Le - Viscoelastic hydrogels for the control of stem cell fate (completed 2022)
- Nandana Shankar - Viscoelastic hydrogels for cartilage tissue engineering (completed 2022)
- Manasvi Sheta - Regulation of breast cancer cells on healthy and tumour-mimetic viscoelastic hydrogels (completed 2022)
- Laura Webster - Viscoelastic hydrogels for mimicking the tumour environment (completed 2022)
- Julia Brown Casquet - Dynamic surfaces for the control of cancer cells survival and tumour progression (competed 2022)
- Antonella Passcuci - Investigating the mechanobiology of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (completed 2023)
Co-supervision of BEng students:
- Ngai Ming Chu - Torsional force microscopy using photothermal excition (expected 2024)
- Kiflom Brhane - Development of a tensile tester to perform aqueous mechanical measurements (expected 2024)