Date published: 03/10/18
Electrospun material for controlled drug release
- Name: Zohya Azhar
- Current Organisation: University of Bradford
In May, Translate opened its summer student project scheme to support small medical technology development projects in the Leeds City Region. The scheme proved to be a massive success and 26 unique projects were funded. Learn more about their work in this blog.
My name is Zohya Azhar, I am a medical engineering student at the University of Bradford and I am interested in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. My project is to develop electrospun scaffold materials incorporating controlled drug release. The main aspects of this project included producing polycaprolactone (PCL) solutions with (“release”) and without (“control”) ibuprofen. Once the fibres were produced through electrospinning I compared the stable peaks to changing peaks using a Fourier-transform infrared spectroscope (FTIR) which can be used to measure how much drug is within the polymer and can also measure the change during release.
The summer student project has allowed me to think and work more independently and expand my research into the medical and pharmaceutical aspects of engineering. I have also advanced my laboratory and workshop skills, as the project involved using many different machines and software.