Biosystems and Biomaterials Division

Welcome to the Biosystems and Biomaterials Division

BBD is focused on developing methods that will assure reliability and confidence in the measurements that underpin research and applications in genomic measurements, biomaterials, protein therapeutics and cell therapies, cancer diagnostics, nanoparticle safety, and microbial identification and quantifi­cation. We carry out this work through fundamental research in measurement science and the development of reference materials, reference data, and protocols.  Click here for an overview video of the Biosystems and Biomaterials Division.

PRIMARY FOCUS AREAS     

Regenerative Medicine and Advanced Therapies
Advanced therapies are demonstrating promising clinical efficacy and could change the paradigm for treating a wide range of diseases and injuries. Clinical translation of this broad class of new therapeutics requires better defined and characterized products and more robust, reliable, and cost-effective manufacturing processes.

Microbiome Community Measurements
Microbial communities (microbiomes) abound everywhere, forming resilient ecological networks adapted to their environments. Research has connected the behavior of these cooperative communities to both beneficial and problematic outcomes in diverse biological systems including: human health, agricultural productivity, water and food safety, waste remediation, and infrastructure corrosion.

Precision Medicine
The conventional approach to medicine is rapidly changing to a data-driven strategy in which therapies are individually targeted to a patient based on genome, physiology, environment, or lifestyle. This approach is revolutionizing health care— especially in the treatment of cancer—but its success depends on using data from bioanalytical measurements with potential wide-ranging biases and uncertainties.    

Synthetic Biology
Rapid advances in the ability to genetically modify biological organisms have advanced a new engineering discipline, commonly referred to as synthetic biology. This approach seeks to harness the power of living systems for a variety of manufacturing applications, such as advanced therapeutics, sustainable fuels, chemical feedstocks, and advanced materials.