WUSTL engineers find common ground in brain folding, heart development

Photo by David KilperLarry A.Taber, Ph.D., (left) the Dennis and Barbara Kessler Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Philip Bayly, Ph.D., the Hughes Professor of Mechanical Engineering, employ a microindentation device to measure the mechanical properties of embryonic hearts and brains. The researchers are examining mechanical and developmental processes that occur in the folding of the brain’s surface, or cortex, which gives the higher mammalian brain more surface area (and more intellectual capacity) than a brain of comparable volume with a smooth surface.

WUSTL engineers find common ground in brain folding, heart development

Engineers at Washington University in St. Louis are finding common ground between the shaping of the brain and the heart during embryonic development. Larry A.Taber, Ph.D., the Dennis and Barbara Kessler Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Philip Bayly, Ph.D., the Hughes Professor of Mechanical Engineering, are examining mechanical and developmental processes that occur in the folding of the brain’s surface, or cortex, which gives the higher mammalian brain more surface area (and hence more intellectual capacity) than a brain of comparable volume with a smooth surface.

Engineers study brain folding in higher mammals

David Kilper/WUSTL Photo(L-R) Larry Taber, postdoctoral researcher Gang Xu and Philip Bayly examine brain and heart cells to learn something of the mechanics involved in brain folding.Engineers at Washington University in St. Louis are finding common ground between the shaping of the brain and the heart during embryonic development. Larry A.Taber, Ph.D., the Dennis and Barbara Kessler Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Phillip Bayly, Ph.D., Hughes Professor of Mechanical Engineering, are examining mechanical and developmental processes that occur in the folding of the brain’s surface, or cortex, which gives the higher mammalian brain more surface area (and hence more intellectual capacity) than a brain of comparable volume with a smooth surface.