(7z) Cancer Immunotherapy, Cell Imaging and Drug Delivery from Self-Assembled Structure

Research Interests: Cancer immunotherapy, computational modeling, cell imaging, and drug delivery

Teaching Interests: Colloids, Kinectics, Engineering Mathematics, Bionanotechnology

Cancer immunotherapy, especially monoclonal antibody (mAb)-based solid tumor therapy, is challenging due to various parameters that can impede the tumor delivery and penetration of therapeutic agents. The antigen (Ag)-mediated tumor targeting of mAb may be hampered by the presence of shed antigen in blood circulation because a high shed antigen concentration in the blood could act as a decoy preventing mAbs from binding to antigens expressed on tumor cells. My research is directed toward development of immunotherapy and cancer treatment based on nanomedicine to overcome the challenges in cancer immunotherapy. My research results presented here include: 1. Cancer immunotherapy via radiolabeling and image analysis 2. Computer model development for cancer immunotherapy 3. Stem cell imaging. 4. Drug delivery from self-assembled structures. For cancer immunotherapy, the tumor and organ uptake of Cu-64 or Zr-89 amatuximab has been studied and computer models including pharmacokinetics were developed to simulate the biodistribution and tumor uptake of Cu-64 and immunotoxin therapy effects. These studies further can be extended to simulate animal experiments and clinical studies to evaluate therapy effects and tumor progress. Stem cell tracking is still vital to understand cell and disease fate. To understand better the biological activities, stem cell tracking by multimodal superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticle (SPION) is also presented. Drug delivery based on self-assembled structure especially with biopolymers, vesicles, and liposomes is presented. Future research will explore personalized therapy based on targeted delivery (e.g., using recombinant DNA, antibody and exosome-like liposome nanoparticles) and drug screening for cancer therapy, computer-aided therapy diagnosis and prediction, and cellular engineering. As a scientist, I joined as reviewers in many journals and performed reviewing activities. Currently I serve as editorial members in some journals. I had submitted K99 grant as a fellow to gain grant process and am preparing for grants.