The overarching goal of MatMed laboratory is Personalized Medicine. Towards that, we are pursuing cutting-edge research in three major frontiers: translational nanomedicine, molecular carcinogenesis, and nanotoxicity. Our laboratory is located at the newly founded Biomedical Research Center (BRC) at Carle Foundation Hospital and Mills Breast Cancer Institute. In a close collaboration with clinical scientists from Carle Foundation Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine we aim to integrate basic science and engineering with medicine. In a true ‘bench-to-bedside’ type research, we also drive to bring nanotechnology quickly to the clinic.
The major thrust of this research is to create defined nano-architectures for molecular imaging, drug delivery and non viral gene delivery applications with a focus on structure, function and engineering processes. Our multidisciplinary approaches encompass a variety of chemical, polymeric, molecular biological and analytical methods to address issues related to cardiovascular and cancer diseases. Enquires include detection of molecular changes responsible for disease pathogenesis (cardiovascular, inflammatory, and cancer) and site-specific delivery of therapeutic agents (chemotherapeutic, thrombolytic, and siRNA/RNAi) with biochemically triggered release mechanisms.