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Linda Griffith

Biosketch

BS Chemical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 1982
PhD Chemical Engineering, UC Berkeley, 1988
Professor of Biological and Mechanical Engineering
Director, MIT Biotechnology Process Engineering Center
Chair, MIT Biological Engineering Undergraduate Programs Committee

Research summary
Research in the Griffith laboratory is in the field of tissue engineering, or the process of creating living, physiological, 3D tissues and organs. Research projects address problems across the spectrum, from the basic biological and biophysical processes at the molecular and cellular level, to the development of new materials and devices that are needed to direct the process of tissue formation. A central objective is creation of complex tissue physiological surrogates as more powerful experimental testbeds for systems biology studies.

At the molecular level, our lab focuses on developing polymeric materials that control receptor-mediated cell behaviors. One emphasis area is using materials that present defined adhesion and growth factor ligands to control cell behaviors for applications such as connective tissue progenitor cell selection and growth on bone regeneration scaffolds. We are currently evaluating the use of engineered EGF to promote the growth of osteogenic colonies from bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells.

We are also developing microscale 3D tissues in order to capture the full spectrum of human pathologies and their responses to therapy in a reasonably high throughput format. We recently developed and evaluated an in vitro hepatocyte cell culture model that may help identify drugs that induce liver injury. Such a tool would be useful in preclinical drug trials because drug hepatoxicity is a leading cause of acute liver failure in the U.S.