(72a) Immunomodulatory Biomaterials for Vaccines, Cancer, and Inflammation
AIChE Annual Meeting
2022
2022 Annual Meeting
Materials Engineering and Sciences Division
Biomaterials and Life Sciences Eng: Faculty Candidates II
Monday, November 14, 2022 - 8:00am to 8:18am
The immune system is crucial to our bodyâs ability to fight diseases such as viruses and cancer. However, its overactivation can also cause certain diseases, for example as a result of chronic inflammation. Therefore, modulating immunity in these contexts is critical to improving human health. In this presentation, I will give a brief overview of the three main projects of my postdoctoral studies which use immunomodulatory biomaterials in the development of novel vaccines, cancer immunotherapies, and anti-inflammatory therapies.
First, I will discuss how engineering nanoparticles to look more like virus particles enhances immunity against SARS-CoV-2. Second, I will discuss how altering the genetic material of cancer cells improves their responsiveness to immune checkpoint inhibitors. Third, I will discuss how targeting cytokines to sites of inflammation results in local immunosuppression without systemic effects. Finally, I will discuss how my future lab will use biomaterials to modulate immunity in the contexts of cancer and autoimmunity.