Michael Albro

About

Michael Albro, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the College of Engineering at Boston University, with primary appointments in Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science & Engineering, and Biomedical Engineering. He holds a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Columbia University. His research focuses on the investigation of the role of mechanical loading and extracellular matrix interactions on the regulation of signaling molecules within the extracellular environment of biological tissues. This work emphasizes the progression and treatment of osteoarthritis, aiming to develop innovative molecular-based intervention strategies for osteoarthritis and novel approaches to address major challenges in cartilage tissue engineering. Dr. Albro has been recognized with the CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation in 2024 and is a member of the Orthopedic Research Society since 2015. He was also awarded the Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Stevens Group at Imperial College of London. His affiliations include the Division of Materials Science & Engineering, the Department of Biomedical Engineering, and he is involved with affiliated faculty in Synthetic Biology, Tissue Engineering, and Mechanobiology.

Research topics

• Pathology
• Anatomy
• Medicine
• Biomedical engineering
• Biology
• Biochemistry
• Optics
• Chemistry
• Physics
• Cell biology

Selected publications

• Advances in viscosupplementation and tribosupplementation for early-stage osteoarthritis therapy

  Nature Reviews Rheumatology · 2024-06-10 · 49 citations

  reviewOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Raman needle arthroscopy for in vivo molecular assessment of cartilage

  Journal of Orthopaedic Research® · 2021 · 26 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  O scores) predicted 94% of the variation in elastic modulus of ovine explants (p < 0.001). Finally, we demonstrated the first in vivo Raman arthroscopy assessment of an ovine femoral condyle through intraarticular entry into the synovial capsule. This study advances Raman arthroscopy toward a transformative low-cost, minimally invasive diagnostic platform for objective monitoring of treatment outcomes from emerging OA therapies.

  DOI

• Label-free 3D molecular imaging of living tissues using Raman spectral projection tomography

  Nature Communications · 2024-09-09 · 16 citations

  articleOpen access

  The ability to image tissues in three dimensions (3D) with label-free molecular contrast at the mesoscale would be a valuable capability in biology and biomedicine. Here, we introduce Raman spectral projection tomography (RSPT) for volumetric molecular imaging with optical sub-millimeter spatial resolution. We have developed a RSPT imaging instrument capable of providing 3D molecular contrast in transparent and semi-transparent samples. We also created a computational pipeline for multivariate r…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Multiplexed polarized hypodermic Raman needle probe for biostructural analysis of articular cartilage

  Optics Letters · 2020 · 15 citations

  In this Letter, we report a multiplexed polarized hypodermic Raman needle probe for the biostructural analysis of articular cartilage. Using a custom-developed needle probe with a sapphire ball lens, we measure polarized Raman spectra of cartilage. By imaging two polarizations simultaneously on the charge-coupled device (CCD) and binning them separately, we capture both biochemical and structural tissue information in real time. Here, we demonstrate that polarized Raman spectroscopy can distingu…

  DOI

• A multi-tissue human knee single-cell atlas identifies that osteoarthritis reduces regenerative tissue stem cells while increasing inflammatory pain macrophages

  Communications Biology · 2025-08-02 · 13 citations

  articleOpen access

  Osteoarthritis (OA) affects the entire knee joint, yet cross-tissue molecular interplay remains poorly understood. To address this, we constructed the first single-cell RNA sequencing atlas of knee OA, profiling articular cartilage, meniscus, synovium, and subchondral bone. Our analysis revealed that healthy synovium and meniscus harbor abundant tissue stem cells (TSCs) and immune cells, which are significantly altered in OA. Regenerative TSCs expressing SDF1, SOX9, CD146, PDGFRB, and CD105 are…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• A Bio-inspired Latent TGF-beta Conjugated Scaffold for Patient-specific Cartilage Regeneration

  NIH · $2.1M · 2022–2027

• Arthroscopic Raman Monitoring of Cartilage Content for PTOA Diagnosis and Chondroregenerative Treatment Response

  NIH · $2.2M · 2022–2027

Frequent coauthors

• Gerard A. Ateshian

  31 shared

• Clark T. Hung

  Columbia University

  26 shared

• Mads S. Bergholt

  King's College London

  23 shared

• Molly M. Stevens

  Imperial College London

  15 shared

• Tianbai Wang

  14 shared

• Robert J. Nims

  Washington University in St. Louis

  14 shared

• A. Cigáň

  Institute of Measurement Science of the Slovak Academy of Sciences

  13 shared

• Jean‐Philippe St‐Pierre

  University of Ottawa

  9 shared

Awards & honors

• CAREER Award. National Science Foundation, 2024
• Member, Orthopedic Research Society, 2015
• Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Stevens Group, Im…

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