September 15, 2023 Beebe, Skala collaborate on new microfluidics platform Written By: Staff Departments: Biomedical Engineering Categories: Faculty|Research Biomedical engineering Professors David Beebe and Melissa Skala are among the authors of a new paper in the journal Communications Biology presenting a new microfluidic platform that better mimics the complex microenvironment in the body’s tissues. The researchers call their platform Griddent, which features 32 microfluidic chambers and a 384 well-array. In the paper, published in the Nature Portfolio open-access journal, they demonstrate its usefulness in studying cancer progression. Beebe, the John D. MacArthur Professor and Claude Bernard Professor in BME and the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, is an expert in developing microfluidics and other technologies behind medical diagnostic tools. Skala, who holds the Carol Skornicka Chair at the Morgridge Institute for Research and the Retina Research Foundation Daniel M. Albert Chair at the McPherson Eye Research Institute, lent her expertise in optical imaging technologies. Jose Ayuso, an assistant professor in the Department of Dermatology and former postdoc in the Beebe and Skala labs, was senior author on the paper.