Personal Statement
I pioneered so-called ‘sol-gel processing’ as a means of solution-based synthesis of a wide range of inorganic and composite nanostructured materials. During the past two decades, by combining sol-gel processing with molecular self-assembly, I have developed robust ‘evaporation-induced self-assembly’ and colloidal procedures (seven Science and Nature papers), enabling the facile synthesis of highly ordered porous and composite nanostructured films and particles.
Nine years ago my team first reported the development of the ‘protocell’ – a mesoporous silica nanoparticle (MSN) loaded with drugs/imaging agents and encapsulated within a protective and biocompatible supported lipid bilayer (SLB) - as a universal, modular, nanocarrier platform for passive or active targeted delivery of multicomponent cargos to cancer (*see following patents and protocell publications). Active targeting has been accomplished by modification of the SLB with peptide, anti-bodies, scFvs, and ligands. Tissue penetrating targeted protocells were recently demonstrated by modification of the SLB with antibodies and protease nanocapsules.
My combined appointments at UNM School of Engineering, the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center, and the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies (CINT), a DOE Office of Science Nanoscale Science Research Center, provide a rich training environment and access to a vast array of nanofabrication and nano-characterization tools and platforms needed to establish structure-activity relationships of functional protocells and to optimize their in vivo performance as nanocarriers.