Brian Aguado, left, takes a picture with his colleagues at a past conference.
CU Boulder postdoctoral researcher Brian Aguado will serve as the chair for the Gordon Research Seminar in Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering in July in Castelldefels, Spain.
Aguado is currently a postdoctoral fellow in the Chemical and Biological Engineering Department and is funded by a National Institutes of Health postdoctoral fellowship and the Burroughs Wellcome Fund.
Gordon Research Seminars feature presentations on cutting-edge research in the biological, chemical and physical sciences. They allow postdoctoral fellows and graduate students to gather at a remote site, encouraging scientific exchange and building relationships. They generally happen ahead of Gordon Research Conferences and are exclusively for postdoctoral researchers and PhD students.
Aguado said he was thrilled to be the chair for the 2019 seminar, which will be held near Barcelona.
“I have been a part of the biomaterials community since I started my research career in 2007 during college. I am excited to have the opportunity to give back to the community, and humbled that my colleagues placed trust in me to organize a successful seminar,” he said.
Aguado earned his bachelor’s degree in biomechanical engineering from Stanford University and his master’s and PhD in biomedical engineering from Northwestern University. Since 2013, he has attended several of the Gordon Research Conferences on Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering and was an invited speaker at the conference on Signal Transduction in Engineered Matrices in 2018.
At that conference, Aguado presented on his research developing precision biomaterials for personalized medicine applications. In his postdoctoral work, he is developing specialized biomaterials known as hydrogels. These are used as cell culture platforms to understand how proteins in an individual patient's blood serum may impact valvular cellular phenotypes during heart valve disease. With an increased understanding of the molecular mechanisms guiding heart valve disease progression, future research could look at stopping diseased cells in the valve by using small molecule drugs.
“It was exhilarating - I felt truly honored to be speaking about my research in front of so many professors and colleagues that I admire,” he said.
Aguado said he will be applying for tenure-track faculty positions this year in addition to planning the conference.