May Bulletin
Issue 68
Community Notices
Marble Center Distinguished Seminar
Drs. Omar Abudayyeh and Jonathan Gootenberg will speak at our annual distinguished seminar on Monday May 16th, 4-5pm at the KI Luria Auditorium. The title of their talk is “New molecular technologies for genome editing and cell control.” Their lab combines natural biological discovery and molecular engineering to develop a suite of new tools for manipulation of DNA, RNA, and cellular states–the cellular engineering toolbox.
Please register here to get additional information about the seminar, including remote access via Zoom. Following the talk, please join us for a social with food and drinks (starting at 5:00pm).
Winners of this month’s poster symposium will also be announced at the seminar on May 16th.
REGISTRATION NOW OPEN: Ten Years at the Koch Institute
Join us on Friday, June 17, 2022 in person or online for our 20th Annual Cancer Research Symposium, featuring Francis Collins, Ned Sharpless, and MIT Koch Institute researchers and alumni.
In the News
Congratulations to Prof. Angela Belcher on her election to the National Academy of Sciences for outstanding contributions to biomolecular engineering!
From burst bubble to medical marvel: How lipid nanoparticles became the future of gene therapy
(Megan Molteni, STAT News Special Report) “There’s no question that LNPs are the hero here,” said Daniel Anderson, a professor of chemical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a scientific founder of Intellia rival CRISPR Therapeutics. “Without them, CRISPR is an exciting technology, but it would simply not be used in this fashion.” You could say the same thing about the mRNA vaccines. Read more…
Liposomes — hollow spheres made up of a bilayer of fat molecules (depicted in purple and yellow) — were early forerunners to the more dense lipid nanoparticles (yellow sphere) used now to deliver CRISPR components and mRNA vaccines (credit: STAT and Adobe)
The FDA publishes final guidance document on "Drug Products, Including Biological Products, that Contain Nanomaterials.”
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently released the final guidance document on "Drug Products, Including Biological Products, that Contain Nanomaterials." This finalizes the draft document which was originally released in 2017. The document discusses quality, nonclinical and clinical considerations for drug and biologic products containing nanomaterials. It also discusses considerations for abbreviated regulatory pathways, including 505(b)(2), 505(j), and 351(k) submissions. Read more…
Satellite Bio lifts off with $110M to fuel development of its implantable tissue therapies
Satellite Bio reported that in vivo tests of its “satellites” in animals showed a “full repertoire” of cell function. (Pixabay)
(Fierce Biotech) Satellite Bio has told mission control it’s ready for launch, blasting out of stealth mode with $110M in seed and series A funding to rocket its implantable tissue treatments forward and progress a product into the clinic. The latest fundraising haul will be used to further develop the company’s Satellite Adaptive Tissue (SAT) platform, which will enable engineered whole cells (called "satellites") to be implanted into patients to repair or even replace damaged organ tissue. The investment was led by aMoon Growth and included additional support from Polaris Partners and Lightspeed, among others.
After spending more than two years under the radar, Satellite’s unveiling marks its official arrival after it was founded in 2020 by Sangeeta Bhatia, M.D., Ph.D., and Christopher Chen, M.D., Ph.D. The two researchers, from MIT and Boston University, respectively, built Satellite off the work of Robert Langer, a Mount Rushmore-type figure in tissue engineering, with the aim of developing a new method of regenerative medicine. What bloomed, with additional assistance from Arnav Chhabra, Ph.D., was the company’s first modality, Tissue Therapeutics. Read more…
Jobs
Associate Scientist, Window Therapeutics.
Window Tx is seeking a highly motivated individual as an early employee in our young company, who would be instrumental to the advancement of our first program into the clinic. The successful candidate will report to WTx’s Director of Therapeutics Development and will be on the forefront of developing and characterizing our novel candidates with respect to enhanced safety and efficacy, as well as validating the mechanism of action and targeted tissues. The results generated will propel the program into the clinic and provide critical contributions towards the design of subsequent clinical trials. Compensations and packages are competitive. Candidates are asked to submit a cover letter and resume to: hnguyen@windowtx.com.
Faculty Positions in Biomedical Engineering, University of Oklahoma.
The Stephenson School of Biomedical Engineering (SBME) is seeking applications for two senior faculty positions at the associate/full professor level to start in Fall 2022, with endowed Stephenson Chairs or Stephenson Professorships available. We seek leading researchers in the field of Biomedical Engineering, with an emphasis on the research area of immunoengineering including, but not limited to, cancer, diabetes, vaccines, aging, and nanomedicine. The SBME strategic plan, in alignment with the Gallogly College of Engineering and the University of Oklahoma strategic plans, has selected immunoengineering and neural engineering as our two focus areas. Individuals with a strong track record in leadership and collaboration in team-based biomedical fields are encouraged to apply. Read more…
Funding opportunities
| Funding Source | Grant ID | Deadline | Convergent Science Cancer Consortium Development Award | N/A | August 17, 2022 | Toward Translation of Nanotechnology Cancer Interventions (R01) | PAR-20-116 | May 17, 2022 |
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