Hyunjoon Kong, Ph.D.

Thin tissue grafts and flexible electronics have a host of applications for wound healing, regenerative medicine and biosensing. A new device inspired by an octopus’s sucker rapidly transfers delicate tissue or electronic sheets to the patient, overcoming a key barrier to clinical application, according to researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and collaborators.

“For the last few decades, cell or tissue sheets have been increasingly used to treat injured or diseased tissues. A crucial aspect of tissue transplantation surgery, such as corneal tissue transplantation surgery, is surgical gripping and safe transplantation of soft tissues. However, handling these living substances remains a grand challenge because they are fragile and easily crumple when picking them up from the culture media,” said study leader Hyunjoon Kong, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at Illinois… Continue reading.

In regenerative medicine, an ideal treatment for patients whose muscles are damaged from lack of oxygen would be to invigorate them with an injection of their own stem cells.

In a new study published in the journal ACS Nano, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign demonstrated that “nanostimulators” – nanoparticles seeded with a molecule the body naturally produces to prompt stem cells to heal wounds – can amp up stem cells’ regenerative powers in a targeted limb in mice.

“We wanted to utilize the natural functions of the stem cells and the stimulating factors to address muscle ischemia locally,” said study leader Hyunjoon Kong, a Robert W. Schafer Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Illinois… Continue reading.

WASHINGTON, D.C.— The American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) has announced the pending induction of Hyunjoon Kong, Ph.D., Professor, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, to its College of Fellows. Dr. Kong was nominated, reviewed, and elected by peers and members of the College of Fellows For outstanding contributions to the fields of biomaterials, bioimaging contrast agents and tissue engineering..