At the invitation of Prof. ZHAO Gang from the School of Information Science and Technology, Dr. Jason Acker, president of Cryobiology Society, visited the Centersfor Biomedical Engineering on November 6, 2013 and gave a talk with the title “Lipidomics and Microfluidicsas Tools to Enhance the Preservation and Storage of Cellular Therapeutics”.

 

In his presentation, Dr. Acker introduced the importance of cryopreservation in the rapeutic and organ transplantation. He pointed out that studying the biological responses during cooling had a profound significance in guiding the developments for the next generation cellular storage solution and clinical diagnostics. Dr.Acker also elaborated the applications of lipidomics and microfluidics in cryopreserving red blood cells (RBCs), in which he introduced how his research group utilized these techniques to improvethe survival rate of cryopreserved RBCs.

 

In the afternoon, Dr. Acker, accompanied by Prof. ZHAO, visited Hefei Blood Center and attended a discussion meeting with Mr. WANG Zhen, director of the blood center, along with other key members of the Center regarding the main steps in manufacturing blood products, such as protocols used in whole blood separation, cryopreservation, product transportation, and quality control. The collaboration, in terms of cryopreserving RBCs and cord blood stem cells, between Prof. ZHAO and the Hefei Blood Center has already lasted more than ten years. A number of high impact research results have already been used clinically in the Center. The meeting between the three parties reached a consensus on deepening international cooperation in the near future.

 

Dr. Jason Acker presenting hisresearch in utilizing Lipidomics and Microfluidics in Cryopreservation

 

Meeting between Dr. Jason Acker, Prof. ZHAO Gang and key members of Hefei Blood Center in the discussion meeting

 

Dr. Jason Acker is a senior scientist of Canada Blood Service and Associate Professor of the University of Alberta, Canada. He has received international recognition for his work on low temperature cellular injury, cryopreservation, and desiccation of mammaliancells. Dr. Acker has published more than 100 journal articles, 5 book chapters and held 7 patents in cell preservation and microfabrication area. Dr. Acker has been serving as the editorial board member or invited reviewer for more than 35 scientific journals. He is also member of the Society for Cryobiology, the American Association of Blood Banks and the Canadian Society for Transfusion Medicine.