Close-up of green and pink leaf veins under a microscope.

Vascular Mechano-Medicine Laboratory

PI: Shailaja Seetharaman

Mechanobiology Institute, National University of Singapore

Department of Physiology, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore

Our lab decodes and engineers the fundamental feedback mechanisms driving vascular tissue function in health and disease, with the goal of translating these discoveries into disease prediction and novel therapeutic strategies.

Research Areas

Microscopic image of cells showing VE-Cadherin and Actin proteins, with VE-Cadherin marked in green and Actin in purple.

How do endothelial cells respond to flow or shear stress, stretch, and curvature? Identify and tune the mechano-chemical feedback loops that go awry in atherosclerosis.

Endothelial Mechanobiology in Cardiovascular Aging

Fluorescent microscopy image of a neural cell with colorful glowing structures, including cell body, dendrites, and nuclei, on a black background with scale bar indicating 50 micrometers.

Angiogenesis is a common feature across several cancer tissues. Decode how endothelial barrier function and angiogenesis are disrupted to drive tumor invasion.

Vascular Growth and Remodeling in Cancer

Diagram showing the process of analyzing microscopy images for disease prediction using Machine Learning models. The workflow starts with microscopy images providing mechano-chemical info as input, which is then processed by multiple machine learning models to output disease prediction.

Machine learning models for tissue mechanobiology

We gather rich biological information through microscopy, sequencing, and high-throughput functional assays. Can we interpret and leverage these fundamental mechanobiology insights to build predictive models of tissue function in health and disease?

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Mechanobiology across scales

Interdisciplinary Research

  • We use classical and cutting-edge approaches including high-resolution live- and fixed-cell microscopy, biochemical assays, and measurement of forces, in 2D and 3D endothelial models to uncover mechanisms of cell and tissue mechanobiology.

  • We employ microfluidics, microfabrication, and optogenetics to precisely tune mechanical forces and signaling in endothelial tissues of the vasculature to decode mechanoresponses across scales.

  • We integrate quantitative systems biology, mechanobiology, and machine learning to map how signaling feedbacks drive endothelial function in health and disease.

We are recruiting enthusiastic scientists to join the team!