Jennifer L. West

About

Jennifer L. West is the Saunders Family Professor of Engineering and serves as the Dean of the University of Virginia School of Engineering and Applied Science. She has a distinguished record spanning 30 years as a researcher, teacher, mentor, inventor, and entrepreneur. Her research focuses on the use of biomaterials, nanotechnology, and tissue engineering, applying engineering approaches to studying biological problems and addressing unmet medical needs, particularly in the fight against cancer. Prior to her current role at UVA, she was the Fitzpatrick Family University Distinguished Professor of Engineering and Associate Dean for Ph.D. Education at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering, with appointments in biomedical engineering and mechanical engineering and materials science. Dean West is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Medicine, and the National Academy of Inventors, holding 20 patents licensed to ten companies, including Nanospectra Biosciences Inc., which is conducting human clinical trials of a cancer therapy she invented. Her leadership priorities include enhancing research, increasing experiential learning opportunities, and fostering pathways to entrepreneurship for faculty and students.

Research topics

• Biomedical engineering
• Materials science
• Polymer chemistry
• Social Science
• Computer Science
• Sociology
• Nanotechnology
• Composite material
• Political Science
• Medicine

Selected publications

• Tunable PEG Hydrogels for Discerning Differential Tumor Cell Response to Biomechanical Cues

  Advanced Biology · 2022-08-22 · 15 citations

  articleSenior author

  Increased extracellular matrix (ECM) density in the tumor microenvironment has been shown to influence aspects of tumor progression such as proliferation and invasion. Increased matrix density means cells experience not only increased mechanical properties, but also a higher density of bioactive sites. Traditional in vitro ECM models like Matrigel and collagen do not allow these properties to be investigated independently. In this work, a poly(ethylene glycol)-based scaffold is used which modifi…

  PublisherDOI

• Reductionist Three-Dimensional Tumor Microenvironment Models in Synthetic Hydrogels

  Cancers · 2022-02-26 · 13 citations

  reviewOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  The tumor microenvironment (TME) plays a determining role in everything from disease progression to drug resistance. As such, in vitro models which can recapitulate the cell-cell and cell-matrix interactions that occur in situ are key to the investigation of tumor behavior and selecting effective therapeutic drugs. While naturally derived matrices can retain the dimensionality of the native TME, they lack tunability and batch-to-batch consistency. As such, many synthetic polymer systems have bee…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Neurogenic Cell Behavior in 3D Culture Enhanced Within a Highly Compliant Synthetic Hydrogel Platform Formed via Competitive Crosslinking

  Cellular and Molecular Bioengineering · 2024-02-01 · 4 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Detection of fluorescent protein mechanical switching in cellulo

  Cell Reports Methods · 2024-07-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  The ability of cells to sense and respond to mechanical forces is critical in many physiological and pathological processes. However, determining the mechanisms by which forces affect protein function inside cells remains challenging. Motivated by in vitro demonstrations of fluorescent proteins (FPs) undergoing reversible mechanical switching of fluorescence, we investigated whether force-sensitive changes in FP function could be visualized in cells. Guided by a computational model of FP mechani…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Synthetic Hydrogels with Entangled Neutrophil Extracellular Traps Influence Tumor Progression in MDA-MB-231 Cells

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2023-09-29 · 1 citations

  preprintOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  ABSTRACT We incorporated neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs) in a poly(ethylene glycol)-based synthetic extracellular matrix to study their impact on tumorigenesis in triple negative breast carcinoma (TNBC) cells in a highly controlled environment. We observed that NETs helped to increase cell survival, proliferation, and pro-metastatic morphological phenotype. We also showed that the presence of NETs influenced the secretion of IL-8, a pro-NETosis factor, and that conditioned media from cells…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• NIH Grant T32GM008362

  NIH · $4.8M · 2011

• NIH Grant R01HL060485

  NIH · $1.3M · 2003

• NIH Grant R01HL097520

  NIH · $1.9M · 2015

Frequent coauthors

• Naomi J. Halas

  Rice University

  42 shared

• Rebekah A. Drezek

  Rice University

  27 shared

• Mary E. Dickinson

  21 shared

• L. R. Hirsch

  19 shared

• André M. Gobin

  University of Louisville

  18 shared

• John H. Slater

  University of Delaware

  17 shared

• Jennifer E. Saik

  15 shared

• Elizabeth A. Olmsted‐Davis

  Temple University

  13 shared

Awards & honors

• Capers and Marion McDonald Teaching and Research Award, Duke…
• Clemson Award, Society for Biomaterials 2015
• ACS Editors' Choice Manuscript, ACS Journals 2015
• Thomson Reuters Highly Cited Researcher in Materials Science…
• BioHouston's 2009 Women in Science Award 2012

Similar researchers at University of Virginia

• Matthew J. Lazzarah-30
• Bryan Bergerh-26
• Steven R. Caliarih-26