Our team works at the interface of biology, material science, chemistry, and medicine to engineer improved therapeutics for treating disease.
Engineering for biopharmaceutical delivery
Protein therapeutics and other biologics increasingly make up effective treatments for a number of diseases, including chronic inflammatory diseases, diabetes and cancer. These biopharmaceuticals can be used to help restore homeostasis in disease states and are potent, specific, and targeted in action. However, homeostatic processes are highly dynamic, consisting of complex spatial and temporal interactions, and thus drug delivery strategies that are adaptive in response to biological cues are required to make advances in precision medicine.
Dynamic Polymer Materials
Polymer materials are powerful tools to modulate the delivery of therapeutics. Our team works on developing polymer systems that respond to biological cues present in disease in order to improve biopharmaceutical delivery. We use these dynamic polymer materials to enhance precision medicine with the goal of increasing treatment efficacy and improving patient outcomes. These materials can be designed to address three key challenges in biopharmaceutical delivery: (i) targeting therapeutics to the disease site, (ii) timing the release of therapeutics, (iii) monitoring local biomarkers to monitor or adjust treatments.
Localized delivery
Biopharmaceuticals are highly effective to treat diseases. However, they are often delivered systemically, which means the entire body is exposed to therapeutic doses of the drug, causing off-target adverse effects. We work to develop dynamic biomaterials that allow for spatial control of drug delivery to target disease site. We leverage interactions between our materials and the disease environment to enhance local drug exposure, reducing systemic exposure while maintaining treatment efficacy.
Stimuli-responsive release
Endogenous biological signaling cascades are highly complex and involves spatial and temporal interactions between biological cues. Biomaterials can be used to modulate the presentation of therapeutics to more closely mimic the way these interactions happen naturally. We develop stimuli-responsive materials that control the timing of drug release in response to biological cues. These materials control circulating drug concentrations to maintain tight therapeutic windows. These technologies can be used to for highly personalized medicine that tunes the therapeutic dose to an individuals needs.
Local biomarker sensing
A key to effective drug delivery is timing. In order to enhance personalized medicine simple methods to monitor local biomarkers are needed. By developing systems for biosensing, we can monitor disease progression and treatment effect. We aim to develop simple materials-based sensing technologies that can be administered by patients to monitor chronic diseases. This data can inform adjustments to treatment regimens and may enable improved preventative care.
