Dr. Susana da Silva is an Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology and Developmental Biology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.
The research in Dr. da Silva’s laboratory is centered on a small highly specialized area of the retina named the fovea. The fovea is our high acuity area and is responsible for our ability to perform tasks such as reading, driving and recognizing faces. This area is very distinct from the rest of the retina presenting unique and specialized cellular and functional properties. Trained as a neurodevelopmental biologist, Dr. da Silva is very interested in deciphering the molecular developmental mechanisms orchestrating the formation of such specialization in the retina. To achieve this Dr. da Silva’s laboratory uses a multidisciplinary research program based in multiple model organisms, combining state-of-the-art genomic, molecular, and tissue culture techniques. The overarching goal of Dr. da Silva’s research is to advance the current understanding of basic genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying fovea development and subsequently establish new experimental models of human foveal diseases with wide applicability and therapeutic potential.
Dr. Jincy Joy is a Postdoctoral Associate in the Department of Bioengineering, Swanson School of Engineering with Prof. Jonathan Vande Geest at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.
Her background in chemistry and training as a biomedical engineering during her PhD at the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, India aligned her research interest in designing natural polymer-based bioresorbable biomaterials for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. Understanding the importance to control the interaction of biomaterials with the innate immune system, she designed liposomes for targeted delivery to macrophages as a postdoctoral fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research, Germany.
Her expertise as a biomaterial scientist brought forth this scientific collaboration with the da Silva lab in designing a novel biocompatible gelatin-based Bruch’s membrane-retinal organoid assembloid. This assembloid is designed to serve as an in-vitro platform for studying the mechanistic cellular interaction of human induced-pluripotent stem cell reprogrammed retinal pigment epithelium (hiRPE) cells, and photoreceptors which plays a pivotal role in vision loss in age-related macular degeneration (AMD). This study will enable tailoring a patient-specific assembloid to develop personalized medicine to impede vision loss in AMD.