Graham Taylor
Graham Taylor, a PhD student in the MABE department, recently had his paper, “Direct in situ measurement of specific capacitance, monolayer tension, and bilayer tension in a droplet interface bilayer,” accepted in Soft Matter, a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Taylor’s work describes recent efforts to develop a method for measuring surface tension and thickness in model cell membranes. The techniques introduced in the paper demonstrate the ability to screen for and detect the presence of small cholesterol molecules as well as other membrane-permeating solvent molecules. Paving the way for drug-delivery and related applications, additional testing performed since the paper submission to Soft Matter investigates the use of the method for detecting and studying the effects of model anesthetics and antihistamines on cell membranes.
Taylor and his advisor, Dr. Andy Sarles, have filed a provisional patent on the technique to protect the method, which could easily be implemented as part of a new class of screening and measurement equipment for the increasing number of researchers, drug companies, and other biotechnology arenas centered around cell membranes.
Taylor will be sharing new information about the technology at the BMES Conference in Tampa Bay in October. Graham is nearing completion of his fourth full year in graduate school and works as a graduate research assistant in the Bioinspired Materials and Transduction Laboratory of Dr. Sarles. For more information regarding the work, please inquire with Dr. Sarles (ssarles@utk.edu).