(520a) Bio/Nanomaterials for Control of Stem Cell Fates and for Biomolecule Delivery | AIChE

(520a) Bio/Nanomaterials for Control of Stem Cell Fates and for Biomolecule Delivery

Authors 

Mallapragada, S. - Presenter, Iowa State University
This talk will focus on how bio/nanomaterials can be designed to control stem cells fates for neural tissue engineering, and also deliver biomolecules for cancer treatment as well as for vaccine delivery. The first part of the talk will focus on the development of 2D graphene circuits on biodegradable substrates to electrically stimulate bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells to transdifferentiate them to Schwann cell-like phenotypes to facilitate peripheral never regeneration. This approach allows us to potentially have spatial control over stem cell differentiation on substrates by spatially varying the electric fields and stimulation conditions on the substrates. The second part of the talk will focus on how nanomaterials developed in our laboratory can be used to deliver biomolecules such as combination therapies for the treatment of pancreatic cancer or pathogenic proteins and act as vaccine adjuvants. We have developed dual delivery nanoscale devices to deliver miRNA and gemcitabine together, resulting in downregulation of the Sonic hedgehog signaling pathway and leading to inhibition of desmoplasia. This, in turn, improved therapeutic outcomes of GEM in pancreatic cancer in mice, and also led to significant reduction of metastasis. We have also developed virus-mimicking nanomaterials or nanovaccines that provide a depot for the antigen and enhance and modulate the immune response by targeting immune cells. We have shown long-term sustained neutralizing antibody titers, reduction of viral loads and effective protection against influenza viral challenge in both young and aged mice as a result of administration of the nanovaccines.

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