CMU > Materials Science and Engineering

Professor Newell R. Washburn

Assistant Professor of Chemistry, Biomedical Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering

Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley

Pittsburgh Technology Center

700 Technology Drive

Carnegie Mellon University

Pittsburgh, PA 15219

Email address:
Phone: (412) 268-2130
Fax: (412) 268-6897

Research Interests

The goal of the Washburn Group is to develop biomimetic matrices for tissue engineering. Using fluorescence spectroscopy techniques, we measure the dynamics of powerful signaling molecules in therapeutically effective biological materials. With these measurements as design criteria, we synthesize functional equivalents incorporating novel ligands for tuning interactions between signaling molecules and engineered matrices. Finally, we screen cellular responses to these complex matrices using combinatorial methods in order to develop a global understanding of the ways in which these matrices can guide cellular responses.

Biography

Newell Washburn received a B.S. in Chemistry from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1993 and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley in 1998. Following post-doctoral research at the University of Minnesota in the Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, he moved to the Polymers Division at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, first as a National Research Council Post-Doctoral Fellow then as Leader of the Biomaterials Group. During this time he was also an Adjunct Professor at Johns Hopkins University in the Graduate Program in Biotechnology. He joined the faculty of Carnegie Mellon University in the Departments of Chemistry and Biomedical Engineering in 2004. His research interests center on development of polymeric biomaterials.

Recent Publications

Lin-Gibson S, Jones RL, Washburn NR, Horkay F. Structure-Property Relationships of Photopolymerizable Poly(ethylene glycol) Dimethacrylate Hydrogels. Macromolecules. 2005;38 (7): 2897-2902.

Bailey LO, Lippiatt S, Biancanello FS, Ridder SD, Washburn NR. The quantification of cellular viability and inflammatory response to stainless steel alloys. Biomaterials. 2005;26(26):5296-5302.

Zhang K, Washburn NR, Simon CG Jr. Cytotoxicity of three-dimensionally ordered macroporous sol-gel bioactive glass (3DOM-BG). Biomaterials. 2005;26(22):4532-4539.

Washburn NR, Weir M, Anderson P, Potter K. Non-invasive characterization of bone formation in polymeric scaffolds by proton magnetic resonance microscopy and X-ray microtomography. J Biomed Mater Res. 2004;69A(4):738-747.

Dunkers J, Cicerone MT, Washburn NR. Collinear optical coherence and confocal fluorescence microscopies for tissue engineering. Opt Express 2003;11(23):3074-3079.