Dr. Nicole F. Steinmetz
Aiiso Yufeng Li Family Department of Chemical and Nano Engineering, University of California, San Diego, USA
“Nano Engineering gone viral: plant virus-based therapeutics“
Abstract
Nanoscale engineering is revolutionizing the way we detect, prevent and treat diseases. Viruses are playing a special role in these developments because they can function as prefabricated nanoparticles. We utilize and build-upon the high-precision assemblies of the viral capsids and utilize them as platform technologies, engineered and repurposed for a desired function. More specifically, we turned toward plant viruses as a platform nanotechnology. We have developed a library of plant virus-based nanoparticles and through structure-function studies we are beginning to understand how to tailor these materials appropriately for applications targeting human, veterinary, and plant health. We have developed plant virus-based delivery systems for small molecule, biologics, and nucleic acid therapeutics. Given their immunomodulatory nature, we have developed vaccine and cancer immunotherapy candidates. A lead candidate for intratumoral immunotherapy has undergone testing in canine cancer trials treating companion dogs and is now entering the clinical development pipeline. Another avenue is the repurposing of plant viruses to enable plant health; we employ principles of nanomedicine to target plant pathogens with foliar and soil applications. In this lecture, I will highlight engineering design principles employed to synthesize the next-generation nanotherapeutics using plant virus-based platform technologies, and I will discuss the evaluation of such in preclinical mouse models, canine patients as well as in the agricultural arena.
Short Bio
Dr. Steinmetz is a Professor and Vice Chair of the Aiiso Yufeng Li Family Department of Chemical and Nano Engineering at the University of California, San Diego. She is the founding Director of the Center for Nano-ImmunoEngineering (nanoIE), the Co-Director for the Center for Engineering in Cancer, and serves on the Leadership Team for a UC San Diego Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC), an $18M NSF-funded research center. Dr. Steinmetz trained at The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA; she obtained her PhD in Bionanotechnology from the University of East Anglia/John Innes Centre, Norwich, UK; her early training was at the RWTH-Aachen University in Germany. Dr. Steinmetz’s research program focuses on the engineering of plant virus-based nanomaterials targeting human and plant health applications, such as drug and pesticide delivery, vaccines and immunotherapies. Dr. Steinmetz has authored more than 300 journal articles (H index >70) and she is an inventor of >70 patents and patent applications. Dr. Steinmetz is a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, the Biomedical Engineering Society, the International Association of Advanced Materials, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering. Dr. Steinmetz’s research program is supported through grants from NIH, NSF, NIFA, CDMRP as well as ACS, Susan G. Komen, AHA, amongst other agencies. Over the past 10+ years, Dr. Steinmetz has been awarded grants as PI and Co-PI totaling ~ $50 million in total costs.
If anyone is interested in meeting with the speaker, please contact José Antonio Darós
