Pablo Hernandez Cerdan

Citation

Thesis Title
Biopolymer networks: Image Analysis, Reconstruction and Modeling

Read article at Massey Research Online:

Networks of biopolymers, that can be pictured as spaghetti-like structures made from sugars, polynucleotides, or proteins, have very special mechanical properties hardly found in any other material. Current theories fail to capture all their complexity, mainly because they take the approach of extrapolating properties of single-chains, assuming simplified and unrealistic network connectivity. Mr Hernandez Cerdan investigated the full architecture of biopolymer networks. He found that the network architecture could be captured by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy, and uses state-of-the-art image analysis techniques on 3D microscopy images to extract the three-dimensional architecture of the network, allowing current models to use acquired geometries from real images. His research provides the first step for future theoretical models to explain the complex behaviour of these biopolymers. It also implements a myriad of tested, well documented, high-performance open-source tools and algorithms to the field.

Supervisors
Professor Bill Williams
Dr Shaun Hendy
Professor Geoff Jameson