Meg Evans
  1. Current research activities

    2. Current activities focused on ophthalmic applications requiring polymer implants – cornea, crystalline lens. Overall activity based on the interaction of cells and tissue with biostable and resorbable polymers of natural or synthetic nature and understanding the polymer characteristics required by a specific cell/tissue type for a defined outcome/application/product in terms of bulk chemistry, surface chemistry, surface topography, porosity/permeability, biostability/resorbability, degradation products, cytotoxicity.

  2. Keywords

    3. polymer, biocompatibility, in vitro, in vivo, histopathology, epithelial.

  3. End-user applications

    • Ophthalmic – novel corneal implants
    • Ophthalmic – improved intraocular lenses
    • Ophthalmic – novel lens replacement

  4. Key publications

    5. I. I. Evans MDM, McLean KM, Hughes TC and Sweeney DF. The development of a synthetic onlay for the correction of refractive error. Biomats 2001; 22:3319-3328.
    II. Evans MDM, Xie RZ, Fabbri M, Bojarski B, Chaouk H, Wilkie J, McLean KM, Chen HY, Vannas A and Sweeney DF. Progress in the development of a synthetic corneal onlay. Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci 2002; 43:3196-3201
    III. Evans MDM, Pavon-Djavid G, Hélary G, Legeais, JM and Migonney V. Vitronectin is significant in the adhesion of lens epithelial cells to PMMA polymers. J Biomed Mater Res 2004 (In Press).
    IV. Evans MDM, Taylor S, Dalton BA and Lohmann D. Polymer design for corneal epithelial tissue adhesion: Pore density. J Biomed Mater Res 2002; 64A(2):357-364.
    V. Evans MDM, McFarland GA, Taylor S, Johnson G and McLean KM. The architecture of a collagen coating on a synthetic polymer influences epithelial adhesion. J Biomed Mater Res 2001; 56(4):461-468.

  5. Outreach activities

    6. None as Yet.

  6. Key organisation membership

    7.  

  7. Early career researcher?

    8. No.

  8. Young investigator?

    9. No.

  9. Skills and expertise

    • Culture of primary cells and tissue
    • Adult stem cells – isolation, establishment, maintenance, differentiation
    • Cell/tissue interaction with polymers in vitro – cytotoxicity, adhesion, proliferation, differentiation, migration
    • Evaluation of tissue interaction with polymers ex vivo
    • Histology, immunocytochemistry, image analysis, histopathology using light, laser confocal and electron microscopy
    • Extracellular matrix – production, purification, characterisation, cell/tissue interaction, identification
    • Antibody production, purification and charcterisation
    • Immunoassays
    • Animal handling and experimentation
    • Some molecular biology
    • Communication: presentations and the preparation of written documents (abstracts, manuscripts, reports, patents, business plans etc)
  10. Specialist equipment and infrastructure

    • biohazard hoods, incubators, centrifuges, inverted microscopes
    • light, fluorescent, laser confocal and electron and scanning electron microscopy – all with digital capability
    • plate readers
    • HPLC, FPLC, column chromatography, gel electrophoresis
    • PCR, real-time PCR
    • Polymer chemistry – formulation, production, casting
    • Surface modification of polymers – gas plasma
    • Surface analysis – XPS, AFM, Maldi
    • Clean rooms
    • Animal house and surgical facilities for small animals (rats, mice, rabbits, guinea pigs)

© 2004

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