Mark Ahearne

Mark received a BEng. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Limerick in 2001, a MSc. in Cell and Tissue Engineering from Keele University (United Kingdom) in 2003 and a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Keele University in 2007. His PhD research focused on the development of a novel spherical indentation system to characterise the mechanical behaviour of cell seeded hydrogels. He subsequently worked as a post-doctoral research associate for three years at Keele University where he developed an in vitro corneal wound healing model for pharmaceutical screening, in addition to working on other projects. Mark joined the Trinity Centre for Bioengineering (TCBE) as a post-doctoral research fellow in October 2010 to primarily work on developing a growth factor delivery scaffold for articular cartilage repair. In 2012 he commenced work as a research fellow and principle investigator in TCBE in the field of corneal tissue engineering and cornea repair after obtaining an Starting Investigator Research Grant from Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) and the Marie-Curie COFUND. In 2015 he was award an ERC starting grant to conduct research on developing artificial cornea. In 2016 he was appointed to the position of assistant professor in biomedical engineering.

Publications and Further Research Outputs

• Peer-Reviewed Publications

Peer-Reviewed Publications

All 92 peer-reviewed publications

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Description

My primary area of research is in corneal tissue engineering and regeneration. Corneal blindness affect millions of people worldwide and there is a shortage of healthy donor corneas that are suitable for transplantation. This has led to alternative therapies being investigated. Tissue engineering approaches that combine three-dimensional scaffolds and stem cells are currently under investigation by my group. Several parameters that affect the phenotypic behaviour of corneal cells are being investigated in addition to different methods of fabricating biomimetic scaffolds with the ultimate goal of developing functional corneal tissue alternative that is suitable for transplantation.

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