Joseph A. Gardella, Ph.D. [http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~gardella/]

University at Buffalo
Department of Chemistry
470 Natural Sciences Complex
Buffalo, NY  14260-3000
Phone: (716) 645-6800 ext. 2111
Fax: (716) 645-6963
E-mail: gardella@buffalo.edu

Gardella's group has worked in many areas of polymer surface chemistry relevant to bioengineering, biomaterials, tissue engineering and wound healing. His group has developed new methods to measure the surface reaction kinetics of biodegradable polymers, and combined that with methods to measure drug release kinetics, allowing fundamental insight into the mechanisms and kinetics that control of drug release in the initial stages of biodegradation, or in thin films. His group has also synthesized new classes of biodegradable materials that combine surface chemical barrier functionality with biodegradation. A combination of laminated thin film drug loaded biodegradable polymers comprises the concept behind the resorbable  laminated repair membrane (RLRM) project in collaboration with Bright, Hicks, Hard, Lwebuga-Mukasa and Professor Rena Bizios (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute).

For many years, the Gardella group has studied the surface chemistry of materials and designed novel polymer surface chemistry and its relationship to cellular and tissue/material adhesion, bioadhesion and bioabhesion. Basic approaches to incorporation of molecular biological concepts into the development of polymers which enhance or inhibit cellular and tissue adhesion have been developed. Endothelial, neural, epithelial and most recently fibrous tissue adhesion to synthetic polymer surfaces, including modified surfaces have been under study. The effect of protein adsorption and reorganization at polymer surfaces has also been an area of study. Effective, long term collaborations with the Bright group, a long term collaboration with Aebischer at Brown and Lausanne, and the last seven years with the Hicks and Hard groups has evolved into the present research program for materials wound healing and drug delivery for increased reepithelialization.

Related fundamental work determines the surface structure-property relationships of polymer materials relevant to biomaterial applications, polymer mixtures, and copolymers with specific surface properties and surface composition. The dynamics of polymer reorganization under environmental and biological challenges have been studied with newly developed surface measurements. Students working with Professor Gardella learn surface and spectroscopic analysis methods, the fundamentals of quantitative measurement, and new approaches to quantitation, reaction kinetics, polymer synthesis and modification, polymer processing, cell biology, especially cell adhesion methods and surface chemical analysis.