• Making/handling Spheroids (Medium Change, Drug treatment)
• Preparing High-Throughput MPS (Mimetas)/Handling ECM
• Automation of Microfluidic Platform Loading
• Spheroid Viability Assay
• Barrier Integrity Assay Gut-on-a-Chip Cultures
• 3D Culture Data Analysis: Image J

Course Director

Dr. Joseph Bressler is a research scientist at Kennedy Krieger Institute. He is also an associate professor of environmental health sciences at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University.
Dr. Bressler received his bachelor's of science degree in biology from the State University of New York at Stony Brook in 1973 and his doctoral degree in physiology from Rutgers University in 1978. His post-doctoral training at UCLA was in neurosciences, where he studied the involvement of glial cells in response to toxic agents. After his post-doctoral training, Dr. Bressler continued his studies on glial cells at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD. Dr. Bressler has been a research scientist at the Kennedy Krieger Institute since 1988.

Guest Lecturers and Lab Instructors

	Dr. Kristin Bircsak Kristin Bircsak, PhD is a Principal Scientist at Mimetas in Gaithersburg, Maryland. In 2016, she received her Ph.D. in Toxicology from Rutgers University following which she completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. In her training, Kristin utilized various model system to characterize the negative impact of drugs and environmental chemicals on reproduction and development. In her role at Mimetas, Kristin drives the development of innovative 3D in vitro organotypic models and assays. Her research is centered on recapitulating the liver, kidney, and prostate tumor microenvironment to aid in the accurate prediction of safe and effective candidate compounds.
	Haylee Bachman Graham, PhD Haylee Bachman Graham, PhD is a Product Applications Specialist with Lonza Bioscience. She received her PhD in Biochemistry from Georgia Institute of Technology in 2017 where she focused on better understanding the deregulation occurring in IPF based on cellular responses to ECM protein motifs. At Lonza Haylee focuses on various customer applications using Lonza’s primary cells in in vitro models, 3D cell culture, and screening methods as well as Lonza’s electroporation transfection technology, Nucleofector.
	Helena Hogberg PhD Helena Hogberg PhD just became the Acting Deputy Director of the National Toxicology Program (NTP) Interagency Center for the Evaluation of Alternative Toxicological Methods (NICEATM), NIEHS. Previous, from 2016, she was the Deputy Director of the Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing (CAAT) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore MD. She received her PhD in Toxicology from the Physiology Department at Stockholm University, Sweden in 2009. The scientific work during her PhD was performed at the European Centre for the Validation of Alternative Methods (ECVAM), European Commission, Ispra, Italy and aimed to develop new in vitro approaches to detect chemicals with developmental neurotoxicity (DNT) potential with a focus on gene expression and electrical activity recordings. Together with Dr. Hartung she started the current laboratory at CAAT as a Postdoctoral Fellow in 2010 with a focus on DNT with the use of emerging tools such as 3D organotypic cell models, induced pluripotent stem cells and omics (transcriptomics and metabolomics) approaches. As the Deputy Director she also coordinated the administration to support the different programs of the Center and directed the different research activities. She is appointed to the OECD expert group on DNT, the EPA Scientific Advisory Panel (SAP) for FIFRA, EPA on NAMs for DNT assessment, and the Scientific Advisory Board for the European Commission funded Horizon 2020 grant – Novel Testing Strategies for Endocrine Disruptors in the Context of Developmental NeuroToxicity (ENDpoiNTs).
	Olive-Jung Olive Jung is a predoctoral Intramural Research Training Award (IRTA) fellow in the 3-D Tissue Bioprinting Program of the Early Translation Branch within NCATS’ Division of Preclinical Innovation. In this position, she is working to develop relevant tissue models that can be used in drug screenings and that are predictive of clinical trial outcomes. Prior to joining NCATS, Jung completed her first two years of medical school at Case Western Reserve University as part of her M.D.-D.Phil. training and will return to medical school to complete the last two years after finishing the doctoral program at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the University of Oxford. Prior to her M.D.-D.Phil. training, Jung worked from 2015 to 2017 as a postbaccalaureate IRTA fellow at NCATS and the National Human Genome Research Institute through a trans-Institute/Center collaboration between Juan Jose Marugan, Ph.D., and Ellen Sidransky, M.D. Jung received her bachelor’s degree, with honors, in chemistry from Northwestern University in 2015 and worked under the supervision of Richard B. Silverman, Ph.D., during her undergraduate research career in medicinal chemistry.
	Steve Titus Steve has spent more than 25 years’ of research experience spanning Academia and Industry. Within the past decade, he shifted his focus to High Content Imaging and Analysis. Steve holds an MS degree in Genetics from UW-Madison where he focused on the neurogenetics of Drosophila melanogaster. Steve has spent almost 10 years at the NIH Center for Advancing Translational Sciences as a High Throughput Assay Biologist. In 2018, Steve moved to GSK where he is currently working in the High Throughput Biology and Imaging group as a Scientific Leader. Steve has co-authored over 40 peer reviewed publications and holds several patent inventions.

January, 2022

“Very well-designed class and lab.  I now have an indispensable skill that I can take back to my lab at ATCC and expand our contracting portfolio.”  Ryan A., ATCC

“Excellent, Comprehensive and detailed course.  The contents are so up-to-date and advanced that despite working on organoids on a regular basis, I was able to learn a lot of new techniques.”  Semanti R., PhD, Cleveland Clinic Foundation

“Great workshop! I thought the hands-on laboratory training was very useful.”  Ana B., NIST

“The program presented a lot of good information and hands-on experiences.”  Melissa V., Florida International University

“Thank you for organizing this amazing course.  The quality and knowledge of the presenters is outstanding.”  Francy C., University of Florida

“Thank you for the nice introduction, from bottom to top.  We got a lot of theoretical and practical information.  You won’t find another 3D Cell Culture workshop in the world!”  Eva I., CEITEC MU  Editor’s note – Eva traveled from the Czech Republic to attend this workshop.  She was unable to find a comprehensive workshop like this anywhere, "period."