Biomaterials

Recent news:

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Messersmith’s AsparaGlue named East Bay Innovation Awardee

March 31, 2025

Berkeley startup AsparaGlue, founded on science by Professor Phil Messersmith and postdoc Subhajit Pal, won an East Bay Innovation Award for their bioinspired surgical superglue.

photo of Messersmith

Messersmith named AAAS Fellow

March 27, 2025

Bioengineering Chair Phillip Messersmith has been named to the 2024 class of fellows elected to the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), one of the world’s largest general scientific societies and publisher of the Science family of journals.

Healy Lab startup receives LSEC Venture Grant

October 15, 2024

MuscleMatrix and their hydrogel scaffold for muscle loss injuries is part of LSEC’s 2nd cohort of Venture Grant startups.

Photo of person with hand on stomach, drawing of digestive system superimposed on top. Image by iStock.

Researchers make advances toward more effective IBD therapies

February 1, 2024

Researchers in Professor Phillip Messersmith’s lab have demonstrated that treatment with DPCA, an enzyme inhibitor molecule shown to trigger regeneration in mammals, can protect against and repair colon damage in a mouse model of colitis. This work suggests that short-term use of this small molecule drug could someday provide a restorative therapy for patients with IBD — and a path to remission.