Oct 20 2009
Shrink Nanotechnologies, Inc. ("Shrink") (OTCBB:INKN), an innovative nanotechnology company developing products and licensing opportunities in the solar energy production, medical diagnostics and sensors and biotechnology research and development tools businesses, today announced that Bruce R. Conklin, M.D., a Senior Investigator at the Gladstone Institute and Professor of Medical Genetics and Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology at the University of California San Francisco, and Dr. Kara McCloskey, Professor at the School of Engineering, University of California, Merced, have joined its Scientific Advisory Board (SAB).
Drs. Conklin and McCloskey, respectively, bring their IPS (or induced pluripotent stem cell) and tissue engineering expertise to the Shrink`s suite of biotechnology research tools, StemDisc and CellAlign. Dr. Conklin in particular is a recognized international leader in the movement to use stem cells to discover cutting-edge drugs and to eventually use stem cell research to create therapies to cure disease. These important additions further strengthen the SAB, which already includes Dr. Michelle Khine, the scientific founder of Shrink`s nanofabrication platform.
"We are extremely honored to have these two distinguished scientists join our advisory board. The Scientific Advisory Board plays a key role in keeping Shrink closely associated with the scientific community and provides both scientific and industry guidance to our evolving technologies, supporting our company mandate, which is to bring these technologies to commercialization," said Mark L. Baum, CEO of Shrink Nanotechnologies. "Shrink now has an exceptional group of scientific advisors who bring complementary skills and expertise to our novel biological research and development tools."
Shrink is developing biological research and development tools that employ its technology and microfabrication expertise to offer a new paradigm for cell biology, molecular biology, immunodiagnostics and stem cell research.
Shrink`s current products include:
StemDisc, designed to improve embryoid body (EB) formation of stem cells at a higher rate and efficiency over current EB formation methods. It also allows for a multitude of applications across many currently existing microwell plate formats, thereby increasing the flexibility of use for researchers.
CellAlign, a platform technology that allows for the structured alignment of biological tissues, particularly tissues which naturally grow in a linear fashion--cardiac or nerve tissue. The key feature is a microfabricated substrate with non-periodic linear patterned grooves that allow for the alignment of cells along a single axis. One such potential use for CellAlign is the creation of "heart patches" for the treatment of damaged heart tissue during cardiac infarction.