Chiebuka Okpara, Gerry Ortega Oviedo, Matt O'Connell, Juliana Magarelli, Korina Vida Sinad, and Lesley Chow attended the Penn Center for Musculoskeletal Disorders (PCMD) Annual Symposium in November 2025. Chiebuka, Gerry, Juliana, Korina, and Lesley presented posters about their latest musculoskeletal research. This symposium was a great opportunity to connect and reconnect with fellow researchers with... Continue Reading →

Matt O'Connell and Olivia Lundquist were selected as Lehigh Future Makers, which recognizes exemplary senior students for their high-impact accomplishments that are shaping the future. They were honored at the Future Maker's Convocation on November 12, 2025. We are so proud of all they have done during their undergraduate careers at Lehigh and cannot wait... Continue Reading →

Olivia Lundquist and Matt O'Connell traveled to Columbus, OH in September/October 2025 to present their work at the 2025 Materials Science & Technology (MS&T) meeting in the "Next Generation Biomaterials VII" session. Matt presented a talk titled, "Decoupling Bulk and Surface Properties of Functionalized Solvent-Cast 3D-Printed Scaffolds." Olivia presented a talk titled, "Dual Functionliazing Polymer... Continue Reading →

Alexis Kelerchian presented at the 2025 Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES) Annual Meeting in San Diego, CA last month. She gave a talk titled, "Spatiotemporal Delivery of Growth Factor-Mimetic Peptides." Great job, Alexis!

We are excited to share our new preprint led by Korina Vida Sinad now available on bioRxiv!: Design and Synthesis of Peptide-Polyester Conjugates for Cell-Mediated Scaffold Degradation. This preprint describes how we integrated a protease-sensitive peptide into the polycaprolactone (PCL) backbone to fabricate solid scaffolds that degrade in the presence of collagenase or proteases secreted... Continue Reading →

Diana Hammerstone (MSE '20) defended her dissertation proposal and is officially in candidacy as she rounds out the final year of her PhD. Many thanks to her committee members Profs. Niels Holten-Andersen, Sabrina Jedlicka, Brandon Krick, and Kelly Schultz. You know things are going well when your committee members start brainstorming new ideas because they... Continue Reading →

We are excited to welcome three new undergraduate researchers to the team: Olivia Lundquist (MSE '26), Matthew O'Connell (MSE '26), and Sara Oswald (BIOE '25)! Olivia will be working on developing new materials for cornea replacement with her mentor Christie Ortega. Matt will be tuning surface properties on our 3D-printed scaffolds by grafting polymer brushes... Continue Reading →

Chiebuka Okpara passed his PhD qualifying exam this week! Congratulations on this major milestone! The TGF Lab and Chow Lab are so proud of you!

Michael Dwornicki (BIOE '27) and Alexis Kelerchian (BIOE '26) presented their STEM-SI research projects at Lehigh's Summer Research Expo, which featured over 100 projects by undergraduate students participating in STEM-SI, Hatchery, Marcon Institute, and Mountaintop programs across campus. Michael presented a poster titled, "Synthesis and Characterization of Degradable Peptide-Polymer Conjugate Scaffolds for Bone Tissue Engineering."... Continue Reading →

Lesley received the 2024 Society for Biomaterials Mid-Career Award! She is very thankful to Dr. Sarah Stabenfeldt (ASU) and Dr. Shelly Peyton (Tufts) for nominating her and many others who have supported her throughout her career. She was invited to present a talk during an SFB Awards session alongside a fantastic group of awardees at... Continue Reading →