Professor Liam M Grover BMedSc(Hons), PhD, FIMMM

School of Chemical Engineering
Professor in Biomaterials Science
Deputy Head of School
Director of the Healthcare Technologies Institute (HTI)

Contact details

Telephone: +44 (0) 121 371 8544
Email: l.m.grover@bham.ac.uk
PA - Emma Lardner: e.c.lardner@bham.ac.uk

View my research portal

Address: Healthcare Technologies Institute
3rd Floor, Institute of Translational Medicine
Heritage Building (Old Queen Elizabeth Hospital)
Mindelsohn Way
Edgbaston, Birmingham
B15 2TH

Professor Liam Grover is a Professor in Biomaterials Science and the Director of the Healthcare Technologies Institute.

Professor Grover has been at the University of Birmingham since 2006. Prior to this time he was a Skeletal Health Scholar at McGill University, Montreal. His group (www.TRAILab.net) focuses on the application of materials science and chemical engineering to the design of novel technologies for the regeneration of tissues. He is also interested in the fundamental science behind the mechanical performance of both ceramics and soft solids and how they may be influenced by physiological conditions.

His research has been funded by numerous funding agencies, including the UK research councils (EPSRC, BBSRC, MRC), the EU (FP6 and FP7), the regional development agency (AWM), the CIHR, the Furlong Charitable Foundation, the Malaysian Government, the NSF (China), Smith and Nephew, Boots, and JRI.

He has published more than 150 full peer reviewed papers, 20 extended conference papers, more than 70 reviewed conference abstracts, three book chapters and has filed seven patent applications. His work has been cited on more than 3500 occasions. He is also serving on the editorial board of Scientific Reports, Journal of Biomaterials Applications, Advances in Applied Ceramics and have guest edited two special editions of the journal. His work has been featured in Nature Materials, Materials World, and on the BBC. In addition, He is a Fellow of the IOM3 and have given more than fifty invited talks internationally, and maintains active collaborations with the University of Wuerzburg, McGill University, UC Davis, Central South University (China), Scuola Superiore Santa Anna (Pisa), and the Italian Institute of Technology.

Qualifications

PGCert in learning and teaching in higher education, 2011
PhD in Dentistry, School of Dentistry, University of Birmingham, 2004
BMedSc(Hons), Biomedical Materials Science, University of Birmingham, 2001

Teaching

Professor Grover has a PGCert in teaching in further education, his current teaching responsibilities include:

Module coordinator and principle lecturer on Bioscience for Engineers (Level H and Level M)
Coordinator for Bioscience for Engineers practical week.
Module coordinator and principle lecturer on Modern Genome Based Bioscience/Frontier Interdisciplinary Bioscience (Level M)
Module coordinator for MSc summer research projects (Level M)
Lecturer on Sustainable Development module (Level H)

He has also given lectures at Keele University, the University of Wuerzburg and has been invited to lecture at the Technical University of Vienna.

Postgraduate supervision

Liam Grover’s research focuses on the development and characterisation of materials for the regeneration of diseased and damaged tissues, particularly bone and bone-interfacing tissues, but he has also published on the delivery of fibroblasts and keratinocytes for skin regeneration. Within this broader field, four of his principal areas of current research activity are:

Regenerating the hard-soft tissue interface: developing bone-to-bone ligament replacements using fibrin and ceramics; reinforcing ligament replacements

Polymer gel-encapsulation of cells: evaluating how cell encapsulation affects the mechanical properties of hydrogels; hydrogel matrices; cell responses to encapsulation; ultrasonic enhancement of matrix production

Calcium phosphate materials chemistry: involvement of amorphous materials in biomineralisation; developing calcium phosphate cement formulations

Controlling mineralisation: use of cheap proteins to adjust crystal habitats in industrial materials; stabilisation of amorphous minerals

Publications

Recent publications

Article

Hughes, EAB, Robinson, TE, Bassett, DB, Cox, SC & Grover, LM 2019, 'Critical and diverse roles of phosphates in human bone formation', Journal of Materials Chemistry B, vol. 7, no. 47, pp. 7460-7470. https://doi.org/10.1039/c9tb02011j

Hall, T, Blair, J, Moakes, R, Pelan, E, Grover, L & Cox, S 2019, 'Antimicrobial emulsions: formulation of a triggered release reactive oxygen delivery system', Materials Science and Engineering C, vol. 103, 109735. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msec.2019.05.020

Senior, JJ, Cooke, ME, Grover, LM & Smith, AM 2019, 'Fabrication of Complex Hydrogel Structures Using Suspended Layer Additive Manufacturing (SLAM)', Advanced Functional Materials. https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.201904845

Pearson, M, Philip, AM, Nicholson, T, Cooke, M, Grover, L, Newton Ede, M & Jones, S 2019, 'Evidence of intrinsic impairment of osteoblast phenotype at the curve apex in girls with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis', Spine Deformity, vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 533-542. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jspd.2018.11.016

Chouhan, G, Moakes, RJA, Esmaeili, M, Hill, LJ, deCogan, F, Hardwicke, J, Rauz, S, Logan, A & Grover, LM 2019, 'A self-healing hydrogel eye drop for the sustained delivery of decorin to prevent corneal scarring', Biomaterials, vol. 210, pp. 41-50. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biomaterials.2019.04.013

Davies, OG, Cox, SC, Azoidis, I, McGuinness, AJ, Cooke, M, Heaney, LM & Grover, LM 2019, 'Osteoblast-derived vesicle protein content is temporally regulated during osteogenesis: Implications for regenerative therapies', Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology, vol. 7, no. APR, 92. https://doi.org/10.3389/fbioe.2019.00092

Nikravesh, N, Davies, OG, Azoidis, I, Moakes, RJA, Marani, L, Turner, M, Kearney, CJ, Eisenstein, NM, Grover, LM & Cox, SC 2019, 'Physical structuring of injectable polymeric systems to controllably deliver nanosized extracellular vesicles', Advanced Healthcare Materials. https://doi.org/10.1002/adhm.201801604

Iordachescu, A, Williams, R, Hulley, P & Grover, L 2019, 'Organotypic culture of bone‐like structures using composite ceramic‐fibrin scaffolds', Current Protocols in Stem Cell Biology, vol. 48, no. 1, e79. https://doi.org/10.1002/cpsc.79

Hughes, E, Parkes, A, Williams, R, Jenkins, M & Grover, L 2019, 'Formulation of a covalently bonded hydroxyapatite and poly(ether ether ketone) composite', Journal of Tissue Engineering, vol. 9, pp. 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1177/2041731418815570

Burton, HE, Burton, HE, Eisenstein, NM, Eisenstein, NM, Lawless, BM, Jamshidi, P, Segarra, MA, Addison, O, Shepherd, DET, Attallah, MM, Grover, LM & Cox, SC 2019, 'The design of additively manufactured lattices to increase the functionality of medical implants', Materials Science and Engineering C, vol. 94, pp. 901-908. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msec.2018.10.052

Hill, LJ, Moakes, R, Butt, G, Brock, K, Vincent, R, Williams, R, Barnes, N, Wallace, G, Rauz, S, Logan, A & Grover, L 2018, 'Sustained release of decorin to the surface of the eye enables scarless corneal regeneration', npj Regenerative Medicine, vol. 3, 23. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41536-018-0061-4

Snow, M, Williams, R, Pagkalos, J & Grover, L 2018, 'An In Vitro study to determine the feasibility of combining bone marrow concentrate with BST-CarGel as a treatment for cartilage repair', Cartilage. https://doi.org/10.1177/1947603518812564

Cooke, ME, Lawless, BM, Jones, SW & Grover, LM 2018, 'Matrix degradation in osteoarthritis primes the superficial region of cartilage for mechanical damage', Acta Biomaterialia, vol. 78, pp. 320-328. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actbio.2018.07.037

Mccarthy, EM, Floyd, H, Addison, O, Zhang, ZJ, Oppenheimer, PG & Grover, LM 2018, 'Influence of cobalt ions on collagen gel formation and their interaction with osteoblasts', Omega, vol. 3, no. 8, pp. 10129-10138. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsomega.8b01048

Review article

Lowther, M, Louth, S, Davey, A, Hussain, A, Ginestra, P, Carter, L, Eisenstein, N, Grover, L & Cox, S 2019, 'Clinical, industrial, and research perspectives on powder bed fusion additively manufactured metal implants', Additive Manufacturing, vol. 28, pp. 565-584.

View all publications in research portal

Expertise

Tissue regeneration; new implant materials; growth of tissue in the lab that could be implanted or used as a biological model to study factors that may influence tissues in the body.

Expertise

Tissue regeneration; new implant materials; growth of tissue in the lab that could be implanted or used as a biological model to study factors that may influence tissues in the body.