(371a) Food, Pharmaceutical and Bioengineering Division Award in Chemical Engineering: Ionic Liquids for Therapeutic Applications

Ionic liquids, the liquid salts comprising organic anions and cations, offer exciting opportunities for several therapeutic applications. Their tunable properties offer an exquisite control over their design features and functions. Starting with biocompatible ions, we synthesized a library of ionic liquids and explored them for various drug delivery applications. Ionic liquids provided unique functionalities including overcoming the biological transport barriers of skin, buccal mucosa and the intestinal epithelium. At the same time, they also stabilized proteins and nucleic acids, and enabled their delivery across these barriers. Ionic liquids also provided unique biological functions including adjuvancy towards vaccines and antimicrobial activity against various pathogens. I will present an overview of the design features of ionic liquids and novel biomedical applications enabled by these unique materials.