As an assistant professor at SBU, I continued to work on electrospun structures with applications as tissue engineering scaffolds, wound dressings, drug delivery systems, ambient energy harvesting nanogenerators, superabsorbent materials, and composite reinforcements. In addition, my tenure at SBU has provided me with tremendous opportunities in terms of teaching, leading research projects, and mentoring graduate students. The unique experience of close collaboration with fellow PIs and researchers in the lab offered me first-hand experience in working with a variety of polymers, from synthetic polymers to biopolymers derived from agricultural and industrial waste, as well as a wide range of polymeric structures, from foams, hydrogels, and aerogels to micro/nano-particles and -fibers for various applications. Some of the projects I have supervised include “Fabrication and evaluation of a triboelectric nanogenerator fabricated using cellulose-based composite nanofibers”, “Fabrication and evaluation of a nanocomposite scaffold based on bacterial nanocellulose-reinforced hydrogel for tissue engineering of intervertebral discs”, and “Fabrication and characterization of self-healing carboxymethyl cellulose/graphene oxide nanocomposite hydrogel”. My research experience which are intimately interconnected with the design, fabrication, characterization, and optimization of polymers and biomaterials earned me a diverse skill set of operating laboratory equipment, technologies, and software. Skills including but not limited to running electrospinning and electrospraying, SEM, confocal microscopy, mechanical and rheological test instruments, FTIR, UV-visible spectroscopy, DSC, and TGA, performing drug release assays and antioxidant assays, studying release kinetics, evaluating nanogenerator’s performance, doing cell culture, protein quantification, and immunofluorescent staining methods, as well as using software like MATLAB, ImageJ, SPSS, S-Plus, and Design-Expert (DoE).

I have collaborated with the Physiology Research Center at Isfahan University of Medical Sciences in order to fabricate an electrospun nanofibrous tubular graft and investigate its potential to be used as a small-diameter vascular graft. At the same time, in partnership with scientists at the Department of Anatomical Sciences and Molecular Biology, I fabricated and characterized electrospun nanofibrous nerve guidance conduits as carriers for neurotrophic factor delivery.