Milad Arzani, a second-year BME graduate, is awarded 2nd place in the graduate category and 1st place in the people's choice category in the 2024 competition, Capture Your Research.
"Captured at the Central Microscopy Research Facility at the University of Iowa, this cross-sectional scanning electron microscope (SEM) image reveals the intricate nanogranular structures within a thin silk fibroin film of a thickness of around 800 nm, roughly one-hundredth of the diameter of a human hair (100 µm). The intricating nanostructures imply the potential assembling pathway of silk fibroin molecules, which underlies the spin coating-assisted fabrication. More interestingly, the film is made of 100% proteins, the same building blocks of our bodies. Due to the unique combination of proteinaceous composition and thinness at several hundred nanometers, this film will be advantageous in constructing essential tissue barriers, controlling membrane-mediated mass transport, and interfacing wearable and implantable biomedical devices, thus exhibiting new horizons in various biomedical applications. The SEM image is colored in UIowa gold to highlight the thinness of the silk fibroin film."
We also won awards in the 2023 Capture Your Research competition.
