Tag: Michael Mitchell

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SCALAR: A Microchip Designed to Transform the Production of mRNA Therapeutics and Vaccines

Led by Michael Mitchell and David Issadore of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, a team of researchers has developed a platform that could rapidly accelerate the development of mRNA-based lipid nanoparticle vaccines and therapeutics at both the small and large scale, SCALAR. (Image: iStock / Anatoly Morozov)

Following the global COVID-19 pandemic, the development and rapid deployment of mRNA vaccines highlighted the critical role of lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) in the context of pharmaceuticals. Used as the essential delivery vehicles for fragile RNA-based therapies and vaccines, LNPs protect the RNA from degradation and ensure effective delivery within the body.

Despite their critical importance, the large-scale manufacturing of these LNPs saw numerous bottlenecks during the pandemic, underscoring the need for scalable production techniques that could keep pace with global demand.

Now, in a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania describe how the Silicon Scalable Lipid Nanoparticle Generation platform (SCALAR), a reusable silicon- and glass-based platform designed to transform the production landscape of LNPs for RNA therapeutics and vaccines, offers a scalable and efficient solution to the challenges exposed during the COVID-19 crisis.

“We’re excited to create a piece of technology platform that bridges the gap between small-scale discovery and large-scale manufacturing in the realm of RNA lipid nanoparticle vaccines and therapeutics,” says co-author Michael Mitchell, associate professor of bioengineering in the School of Engineering and Applied Science at Penn. “By doing so, we’ve effectively leapfrogged the clunky, time-consuming, and costly barriers that slow down the production ramp-up of promising new RNA medicines and vaccines.”

The intricacies of RNA-based therapies require the RNA to be encased in a delivery system capable of navigating the body’s biological obstacles. LNPs fulfill this role, allowing the RNA to reach the intended cells for maximum therapeutic impact. SCALAR aims to take this a step further, allowing for an unprecedented three orders of magnitude scalability in LNP production rates, addressing the speed and consistency bottlenecks that hinder existing methods.

Sarah Shepherd, the first author of the paper and a recent Ph.D. graduate who worked in the Mitchell Lab, says, “With SCALAR, we’re not just reacting to today’s challenges but proactively preparing for tomorrow’s opportunities and crises. This technology is flexible, uses mixing architectures well-documented in microfluidics, and is scalable enough to meet future demands in real time. That’s an enormous leap forward for the field.”

Shepherd says that SCALAR builds on prior work from the Mitchell lab and is based on a microfluidic chip platform. Akin to a computer chip, wherein a computer’s electrically integrated circuit has numerous little transistors transporting signals as ones or zeroes to produce an output, the SCALAR microchip precisely controls their two key reagents, lipids and RNA, to generate LNPs.

Read the full story in Penn Today.

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Penn and CHOP Researchers Show Gene Editing Tools Can be Delivered to Perinatal Brain

Genetic diseases that involve the central nervous system (CNS) often impact children before birth, meaning that once a child is born, irreversible damage has already been done. Given that many of these conditions result from a mutation in a single gene, there has been growing interest in using gene editing tools to correct these mutations before birth.

However, identifying the appropriate vehicle to deliver these gene editing tools to the CNS and brain has been a challenge. Viral vectors used to deliver gene therapies have some potential drawbacks, including pre-existing viral immunity and vector-related adverse events, and other options like lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) have not been investigated extensively in the perinatal brain.

Now, researchers in the Center for Fetal Research at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and Penn Engineering have identified an ionizable LNP that can deliver mRNA base editing tools to the brain and have shown it can mitigate CNS disease in perinatal mouse models. The findings, published in ACS Nano, open the door to mRNA therapies that could be delivered pre- or postnatally to treat genetic CNS diseases.

The research team began by screening a library of ionizable LNPs – microscopic fat bubbles that have a positive charge at low pH but neutral charge at physiological conditions in the body. After identifying which LNPs were best able to penetrate the blood-brain barrier in fetal and newborn mice, they optimized their top-performing LNP to be able to deliver base editing tools. The LNPs were then used to deliver mRNA for an adenine base editor, which would correct a disease-causing mutation in the lysosomal storage disease, MPSI, by changing the errant adenine to guanine.

The researchers showed that their LNP was able to improve the symptoms of the lysosomal storage disease in the neonatal mouse brain, as well as deliver mRNA base editing tools to the brain of other animal models. They also showed the LNP was stable in human cerebrospinal fluid and could deliver mRNA base editing tools to patient-derived brain tissue.

“This proof-of-concept study – co-led by Rohan Palanki, an MD/PhD student in my lab, and Michael Mitchell’s lab at Penn Bioengineering – supports the safety and efficacy of LNPs for the delivery of mRNA-based therapies to the central nervous system,” said co-senior author William H. Peranteau, MD, an attending surgeon in the Division of General, Thoracic and Fetal Surgery at CHOP and the Adzick-McCausland Distinguished Chair in Fetal and Pediatric Surgery. “Taken together, these experiments provide the foundation for additional translational studies and demonstrate base editing facilitated by a nonviral delivery carrier in the NHP fetal brain and primary human brain tissue.”

This story was written by Dana Bate. It originally appeared on CHOP’s website.

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Balancing Dentistry and Engineering to Bring New Innovations to the Clinic

by Liana F. Wait

Kyle Vining, who is jointly appointed in the School of Dental Medicine and the School of Engineering and Applied Science, hopes that his research will help to push forward the state of clinical dentistry.

When trying to choose between two career paths—dentistry and engineering—Kyle Vining decided ‘Why not both?’ Vining joined Penn in July 2022 and is jointly appointed in the School of Dental Medicine and the School of Engineering and Applied Science.

“During my training, I saw that there was overlap where I could do clinical work and science at the same time, and so that’s what I’ve been doing ever since,” Vining says. “As far back as middle school, I always wanted to be a biomedical engineer, and then the clinical side became interesting to me because I didn’t want to only do the theoretical or research side of things. I also wanted the hands-on, practical interaction of a skilled profession.”

The benefits of a dual career: Variety and opportunities to give back

Vining finds that wearing two hats offers the best of both worlds: opportunities to help both individual patients and to contribute to scientific and clinical progress.

“On the dentistry side, what I enjoy is getting to see patients, solving clinical problems, and trying to perform the best treatment I can; it has this rapid pace, which is kind of exciting and keeps you motivated,” Vining says. “And then research allows me to explore my interests and think about making an impact more broadly, not just in dentistry, but in medicine or in the world in general.”

Vining says dental school was demanding, yet a good time to explore his varied interests. He says he’d encourage others to pursue dentistry with an interdisciplinary approach. “Having exposure to different fields or different knowledge while you’re a student is really good for students and the profession in general,” he says.

The path towards a dual career

Vining first delved into research as a biomedical engineering undergraduate at Northwestern University. “I had the opportunity to work in a materials science lab studying the chemistry of surfaces. We would use molecules to modify the properties and surfaces that environments or cells could interact with,” he says.

Then, as a student at the University of Minnesota School of Dentistry, Vining realized that this same materials science research had many applications in dentistry. While in dental school, Vining conducted independent research in a materials science lab and also took the opportunity to do a yearlong fellowship in a cell and developmental biology lab at the National Institutes of Health.

Vining credits this fellowship with launching him towards a Ph.D., which he completed in bioengineering at Harvard in 2020. After earning his Ph.D., Vining conducted research at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute prior to joining Penn.

Using biomaterials to understand how cells and tissues interact

Vining’s research at Penn aims to understand how the biophysical properties of materials impact cellular processes such as inflammation and fibrosis.

“Fibrosis is a physical change in tissues that produces a scar-like matrix that can inhibit healing, impair cancer treatment, and in general is not compatible with tissues regeneration,” Vining says. “There’s been a lot of effort on antifibrotic drugs, but we’re trying to look at fibrosis a little bit differently. Instead of directly inhibiting fibrosis, we’re trying to understand its consequences for the immune system because the immune system can be hijacked and become detrimental for your tissues.”

Through a better understanding the feedback loop between fibrotic tissue and the immune system, Vining hopes to design interventions to facilitate wound healing and tissue remodeling during restorative dental procedures and for treating diseases including head and neck cancer.

He’s also investigating how biomaterials like the resin used in tooth fillings interact with dental tissues. “Dental fillings rely on decades-old technologies that have been grandfathered in and contain toxic monomers that are not safe for biological systems,” Vining says. “We found a biocompatible resin chemistry that supports cells in vitro, and we’re trying to apply this to new types of dental fillings that promote repair or generation of dental tissues.”

Fostering interdisciplinary collaborations at Penn

Vining was recruited to be part of the Center for Innovation & Precision Dentistry (CiPD), the joint center of Penn Dental Medicine and Penn Engineering.

“Dr. Vining is an ideal fit for the vision and mission of the CiPD,” says Penn Dental’s Hyun (Michel) Koo, co-founder and co-director of the CiPD. “With a secondary appointment in the School of Engineering, he will be instrumental in continuing to strengthen our engineering collaborations and teaching our students to work across disciplines to advance research, training, and entrepreneurship in this realm.”

Ultimately, Vining says it was Penn’s scientific community and the opportunities for interdisciplinary collaborations that drew him here.

“It was very apparent that there were a lot of potential research paths to pursue here and a lot of opportunities for collaborations,” Vining says. “One of the most exciting things for me so far has been meeting with faculty, whether it’s at Penn Medicine, the School of Engineering, Wharton, Penn Dental, or the Veterinary School. These meetings have already opened up new projects and collaborations.”

One such collaboration is with Michael Mitchell, associate professor of bioengineering. The pair were awarded the second annual IDEA (Innovation in Dental Medicine and Engineering to Advance Oral Health) Prize in May 2023 to kickstart a project exploring the potential for using lipid nanoparticles to treat dental decay.

The collaboration sparked when Vining saw Mitchell present on a new technology that uses lipid nanoparticles to bind and target bone marrow cells at the 2022 CiPD first annual symposium. “It got me thinking because the dentin inside of teeth is a mineralized tissue very similar to bone, and the pulp inside the dentin is analogous to bone marrow tissue,” Vining says.

Read the full story in Penn Today.

Vining and Koo are members of the Penn Bioengineering Graduate Group.

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2023 Graduate Research Fellowships for Bioengineering Students

Congratulations to the fourteen Bioengineering students to receive 2023  National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (NSF GRFP) fellowships. The prestigious NSF GRFP program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported fields. The recipients honorees were selected from a highly-competitive, nationwide pool. Further information about the program can be found on the NSF website.

Carlos Armando Aguila, Ph.D. student in Bioengineering, is a member of the Center of Neuroengineering and Therapeutics, advised by Erin Conrad, Assistant Professor in Neurology, and Brian Litt, Professor in Bioengineering and Neurology. His research focuses on analyzing electroencephalogram (EEG) signals to better understand epilepsy.

Joseph Lance Victoria Casila is a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering in the lab of Riccardo Gottardi, Assistant Professor in Pediatrics and Bioengineering. His research focuses on probing environmental factors that influence stem cell differentiation towards chondrogenesis for cartilage engineering and regeneration.

Trevor Chan is a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering in the lab of Felix Wehrli, Professor of Radiologic Science. His research is in developing computational methods for medical image refinement and analysis. Two ongoing projects are: self-supervised methods for CT super-resolution and assessment of osteoporosis, and semi-supervised segmentation of 3D and 4D echocardiograms for surgical correction of congenital heart-valve defects.

Rakan El-Mayta is an incoming Ph.D. student in the lab of Drew Weissman, Roberts Family Professor in Vaccine Research. Rakan studies messenger RNA-lipid nanoparticle vaccines for the treatment and prevention of infectious diseases. Prior to starting in the Bioengineering graduate program, he worked as a Research Assistant in Weissman lab and in the lab of Michael Mitchell, Associate Professor in Bioengineering.

Austin Jenk is a Ph.D. student in the lab of Robert Mauck, Mary Black Ralston Professor in Orthopaedic Surgery and Bioengineering. Austin aims to develop early intervention, intra-articular therapeutics to combat the onset of post-traumatic osteoarthritis following acute joint injuries. His work focuses on developing a therapeutic that can be employed not only in conventional healthcare settings, but also emergency and battlefield medicine.

Jiageng Liu is a Ph.D. student in the lab of Alex Hughes, Assistant Professor in Bioengineering. His work aims to precisely control the bio-physical/chemical properties of iPSC-derived organoids with advanced synthetic biology approaches to create functional replacement renal tissues.

Alexandra Neeser is a Ph.D. student in the lab of Leyuan Ma, Assistant Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. Her research focuses on solid tumor microenvironment delivery of therapeutics.

 

William Karl Selboe Ojemann, a Ph.D. Student in Bioengineering, is a member of the Center for Neuroengineering and Therapeutics directed by Brian Litt, Professor in Bioengineering and Neurology. His research is focused on developing improved neurostimulation therapies for epilepsy and other neurological disorders.

Savan Patel (BSE Class of 2023) conducted research in the lab of Michael Mitchell, Associate Professor in Bioengineering, where he worked to develop lipid nanoparticle formulations for immunotherapy and extrahepatic delivery of mRNA. He will be joining the Harvard-MIT HST MEMP Ph.D. program in the fall of 2023.

David E. Reynolds, a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering, is a member of the lab of Jina Ko, Assistant Professor in Bioengineering and Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. His research focuses on developing novel and translatable technologies to address currently intractable diagnostic challenges for precision medicine.

Andre Roots is a Ph.D. student in the lab of Christopher Madl, Assistant Professor in Materials Science and Engineering. His research focuses on the use of protein engineering techniques and an optimized 3D human skeletal muscle microtissue platform to study the effects of biophysical material properties on cells.

Emily Sharp, a second year Ph.D. student in Bioengineering, is a member of the lab of Robert Mauck, Mary Black Ralston Professor in Orthopaedic Surgery and Bioengineering, part of the McKay Orthopaedic Research Laboratories. Her research focuses on designing multi-functional biomaterials to enhance tissue repair, specifically intervertebral disc repair following herniation and discectomy.

Nat Thurlow is a Ph.D. student in the lab of Louis J. Soslowsky, Fairhill Professor in Orthopedic Surgery and Bioengineering. Their current work focuses on delineating the roles of collagens V and XI in tendon mechanics, fibril structure, and gene expression during tendon development and healing.

Maggie Wagner, Ph.D. student in Bioengineering, is a member in the labs of Josh Baxter, Assistant Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery, and Flavia Vitale, Assistant Professor in Neurology and Bioengineering. Her research focuses on the development of novel sensors to record and monitor muscle neuromechanics.

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RNA Nanoparticle Therapy Stops the Spread of Incurable Bone Marrow Cancer

by Melissa Pappas

Myeloma cells producing monoclonal proteins of varying types, created by Scientific Animations under the Creative Commons Attributions-Share Alike International 4.0 License

Multiple myeloma is an incurable bone marrow cancer that kills over 100,000 people every year. Known for its quick and deadly spread, this disease is one of the most challenging to address. As these cancer cells move through different parts of the body, they mutate, outpacing possible treatments. People diagnosed with severe multiple myeloma that is resistant to chemotherapy typically survive for only three to six months. Innovative therapies are desperately needed to prevent the spread of this disease and provide a fighting chance for those who suffer from it.

Michael Mitchell, J. Peter and Geri Skirkanich Assistant Professor of Innovation in Bioengineering (BE), and Christian Figueroa-Espada, doctoral student in BE at the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science, created an RNA nanoparticle therapy that makes it impossible for multiple myeloma to move and mutate. The treatment, described in their study published in PNAS, turns off a cancer-attracting function in blood vessels, disabling the pathways through which multiple myeloma cells travel.

By shutting down this “chemical GPS” that induces the migration of cancer cells, the team’s therapy stops the spread of multiple myeloma, helping to eliminate it altogether.

Read the full story in Penn Engineering Today.

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Penn Bioengineering Graduate Ella Atsavapranee Wins 2023 Fulbright Grant

Ella Atsavapranee (BE 2023)

Twenty-nine University of Pennsylvania students, recent graduates, and alumni have been offered Fulbright U.S. Student Program grants for the 2023-24 academic year, including eight seniors who graduated May 15.

They will conduct research, pursue graduate degrees, or teach English in Belgium, Brazil, Colombia, Denmark, Ecuador, Estonia, France, Germany, Guatemala, India, Israel, Latvia, Mexico, Nepal, New Zealand, the West Bank-Palestine territories, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan, and Thailand.

The Fulbright Program is the United States government’s flagship international educational exchange program, awarding grants to fund as long as 12 months of international experience.

Most of the Penn recipients applied for the Fulbright with support from the Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships.

Among the Penn Fulbright grant recipients for 2023-24 is Ella Atsavapranee, from Cabin John, Maryland, who graduated in May with a bachelor’s degree in bioengineering from the School of Engineering and Applied Science and a minor in chemistry from the College. She was offered a Fulbright to conduct research at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland.

At Penn, Atsavapranee worked with Michael Mitchell, J. Peter and Geri Skirkanich Assistant Professor in Bioengineering, engineering lipid nanoparticles to deliver proteases that inhibit cancer cell proliferation. She has also worked with Shan Wang, Leland T. Edwards Professor in the School of Engineering and Professor of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University, using bioinformatics to discover blood biomarkers for cancer detection. To achieve more equitable health care, she worked with Lisa Shieh, Clinical Professor in Medicine at the Stanford School of Medicine,  to evaluate an AI model that predicts risk of hospital readmission and study how room placement affects patient experience.

Outside of research, Atsavapranee spread awareness of ethical issues in health care and technology as editor-in-chief of the Penn Bioethics Journal and a teaching assistant for Engineering Ethics (EAS 2030). She was also a Research Peer Advisor for the Penn Center for Undergraduate Research & Fellowships (CURF), a student ambassador for the Office of Admissions, and a volunteer for Service Link, Puentes de Salud, and the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. She plans to pursue a career as a physician-scientist to develop and translate technologies that are more affordable and accessible to underserved populations.

Read the full list of Penn Fulbright grant recipients for 2023-24 in Penn Today.

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CiPD Fellows Recognized with Research Awards

Members of the inaugural cohort of fellows in the Center for Innovation and Precision Dentistry (CiPD)’s NIDCR T90/R90 Postdoctoral Training Program have been recognized for their research activities with fellows receiving awards from the American Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research (AADOCR), the Society for Biomaterials, and the Osteology Foundation. All four of the honored postdocs are affiliated with Penn Bioengineering.

Zhi Ren

Zhi Ren won first place in the Fives-Taylor Award at the AADOCR Mini Symposium for Young Investigators. A postdoctoral fellow in the labs of Dr. Hyun (Michel) Koo at Penn Dental Medicine (and member of the Penn Bioengineering Graduate Group) and Dr. Kathleen Stebe of Penn Engineering, Dr. Ren’s research focuses on understanding how bacterial and fungal pathogens interact in the oral cavity to form a sticky plaque biofilm on teeth, which gives rise to severe childhood tooth decay that affects millions of children worldwide. In his award-winning study, titled “Interkingdom Assemblages in Saliva Display Group-Level Migratory Surface Mobility”, Dr. Ren discovered that bacteria and fungi naturally present in the saliva of toddlers with severe decay can form superorganisms able to move and rapidly spread on tooth surfaces.

Justin Burrell

Justin Burrell won second place in the AADOCR Hatton Competition postdoctoral category for his research. Dr. Burrell has been working with Dr. Anh Le in Penn Dental Medicine’s Department of Oral Surgery/Pharmacology and Dr. D. Kacy Cullen of Penn Medicine and Penn Bioengineering. Together, their interdisciplinary team of clinician-scientists, biologists, and neuroengineers have been developing novel therapies to expedite facial nerve regeneration and increase meaningful functional recovery.

Marshall Padilla

Marshall Padilla earned third place at the Society for Biomaterials Postdoctoral Recognition Award Competition for a project titled, “Branched lipid architecture improves lipid-nanoparticle-based mRNA delivery to the liver via enhanced endosomal escape”. Padilla was also a finalist in the AADOCR Hatton Award Competition, presenting on a separate project titled, “Lipid Nanoparticle Optimization for mRNA-based Oral Cancer Therapy”. Both projects employ lipid nanoparticles, the same delivery vehicles used in the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine technology. A postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Dr. Michael J. Mitchell of Penn’s Department of Bioengineering, Dr. Padilla’s research focuses on developing new ways to enhance the efficacy and safety of lipid nanoparticle technology and its applications in dentistry and biomedicine. He has been working in collaboration with Dr. Shuying (Sheri) Yang and Dr. Anh Le in Penn Dental Medicine.

Dennis Sourvanos

Dennis Sourvanos (GD’23, DScD’23) was the recipient of the Trainee Travel Grant award through the Osteology Foundation (Lucerne Switzerland). Dr. Sourvanos will be presenting his research related to medical dosimetry and tissue regeneration at the International Osteology Symposium in Barcelona, Spain (April 27th – 29th 2023). He also presented at the 2023 AADOCR/CADR Annual Meeting for his project titled, “Validating Head-and-Neck Human-Tissue Optical Properties for Photobiomodulation and Photodynamic Therapies.” Dr. Sourvanos has been working with Dr. Joseph Fiorellini in Penn Dental Medicine’s Department of Periodontics and Dr. Timothy Zhu in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Radiation Oncology and the Smilow Center for Translational Research (and member of the Penn Bioengineering Graduate Group).

Read the full announcement in Penn Dental Medicine News.

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Michael Mitchell and Kyle Vining Win IDEA Prize from CiPD and Penn Health-Tech

Michael J. Mitchell

Kyle Vining

 Michael J. Mitchell, J. Peter and Geri Skirkanich Assistant Professor of Innovation in Bioengineering, and Kyle Vining, Assistant Professor in Materials Science and Engineering and in Penn Dental Medicine and member of the Penn Bioengineering Graduate Group, have been awarded the second-annual IDEA (Innovation in Dental Medicine and Engineering to Advance Oral Health) Prize, issued by the Center for Innovation & Precision Dentistry (CiPD) and Penn Health-Tech.

“Through their collaborative research, they are aiming to develop next-generation treatments for dental caries (tooth-decay) using lipid nanoparticles, the same delivery vehicles employed in the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine technology.

‘This project shows the type of innovative ideas and collaborations that we are kickstarting through the IDEA prize,’ says Dr. Michel Koo, co-director of the CiPD and Professor at Penn Dental Medicine. ‘This is a great example of synergistic interaction at the interface of engineering and oral health’ adds Dr. Kate Stebe, co-director of the CiPD and Professor at Penn Engineering.”

Read the full announcement in Penn Dental Medicine News.

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2023 Solomon R. Pollack Awards for Excellence in Graduate Bioengineering Research

The Solomon R. Pollack Award for Excellence in Graduate Bioengineering Research is given annually to the most deserving Bioengineering graduate students who have successfully completed research that is original and recognized as being at the forefront of their field. This year, the Department of Bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania recognizes the stellar work of four graduate students in Bioengineering.

Margaret Billingsley

Dissertation: “Ionizable Lipid Nanoparticles for mRNA CAR T Cell Engineering”

Maggie Billingsley

Margaret earned a bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Delaware where she conducted research in the Day Lab on the use of antibody-coated gold nanoparticles for the detection of circulating tumor cells. She conducted doctoral research in the lab of Michael J. Mitchell, J. and Peter Skirkanich Assistant Professor in Bioengineering. After defending her thesis at Penn in 2022, Margaret began postdoctoral training at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the Hammond Lab where she is investigating the design and application of polymeric nanoparticles for combination therapies in ovarian cancer. She plans to use these experiences to continue a research career focused on drug delivery systems.

“Maggie was an absolutely prolific Ph.D. student in my lab, who pioneered the development of new mRNA lipid nanoparticle technology to engineer the immune system to target and kill tumor cells,” says Mitchell. “Maggie is incredibly well deserving of this honor, and I am so excited to see what she accomplishes next as a Postdoctoral Fellow at MIT and ultimately as a professor running her own independent laboratory at a top academic institution.”

Victoria Muir

Dissertation: “Designing Hyaluronic Acid Granular Hydrogels for Biomaterials Applications”

Victoria Muir

Victoria is currently a Princeton University Presidential Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the lab of Sujit S. Datta, where she studies microbial community behavior in 3D environments. She obtained her Ph.D. in 2022 as an NSF Graduate Research Fellow at Penn Bioengineering under the advisement of Jason A. Burdick, Adjunct Professor in Bioengineering at Penn and Bowman Endowed Professor in Chemical and Biological Engineering at the University of Colorado, Boulder. She received a B.ChE. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Delaware in 2018 as a Eugene DuPont Scholar. Outside of research, Victoria is highly active in volunteer and leadership roles within the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), currently serving as Past Chair of the Young Professionals Community and a member of the Career and Education Operating Council (CEOC). Victoria’s career aspiration is to become a professor of chemical engineering and to lead a research program at the interaction of biomaterials, soft matter, and microbiology.

“Victoria was a fantastic Ph.D. student,” says Burdick. “She worked on important projects related to granular materials from the fundamentals to applications in tissue repair. She was also a leader in outreach activities, a great mentor to numerous undergraduates, and is already interviewing towards an independent academic position.”

Sadhana Ravikumar 

Dissertation: “Characterizing Medial Temporal Lobe Neurodegeneration Due to Tau Pathology in Alzheimer’s Disease Using Postmortem Imaging”

Sadhana Ravikumar

Sadhana completed her B.S. in Electrical Engineering at the University of Cape Town, South Africa in 2014 and her M.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in 2017. Outside of the lab, she enjoys spending time in nature and exploring restaurants in Philadelphia with friends. She focused her doctoral work on the development of computational image analysis techniques applied to ex vivo human brain imaging data in the Penn Image Computing and Science Laboratory of Paul Yushkevich, Professor of Radiology at the Perelman School of Medicine and member of the Penn Bioengineering Graduate Group. She hopes to continue working at the intersection of machine learning and biomedical imaging to advance personalized healthcare and drug development.

“Dr. Sadhana Ravikumar’s Ph.D. work is a tour de force that combines novel methodological contributions crafted to address the challenge of anatomical variability in ultra-high resolution ex vivo human brain MRI with new clinical knowledge on the contributions of molecular pathology to neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease,” says Yushkevich. “I am thrilled that this excellent contribution, as well as Sadhana’s professionalism and commitment to mentorship, have been recognized through the Sol Pollack award.”

Hannah Zlotnick

Dissertation: “Remote Force Guided Assembly of Complex Orthopaedic Tissues”

Hannah Zlotnick

Hannah was a Ph.D. candidate in the lab of Robert Mauck, Mary Black Ralston Professor in Orthopaedic Surgery and in Bioengineering. She successfully defended her thesis and graduated in August 2022. During her Ph.D., Hannah advanced the state-of-the-art in articular cartilage repair by harnessing remote fields, such as magnetism and gravity. Using these non-invasive forces, she was able to control cell positioning within engineered tissues, similar to the cell patterns within native cartilage, and enhance the integration between cartilage and bone. Her work could be used in many tissue engineering applications to recreate complex tissues and tissue interfaces. Hannah earned a B.S. in Biological Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2017 during which time she was also a member of the women’s varsity soccer team. At Penn, Hannah was also involved in the Graduate Association of Bioengineers (GABE) intramurals & leadership, and helped jumpstart the McKay DEI committee. Since completing her Ph.D., Hannah has begun her postdoctoral research as a Schmidt Science Fellow in Jason Burdick’s lab at the University of Colorado Boulder where she looks to improve in vitro disease models for osteoarthritis.

“Hannah was an outstanding graduate student, embodying all that is amazing about Penn BE – smart, driven, inventive and outstanding in every way,” says Mauck. “ I can’t wait to see where she goes and what she accomplishes!”

Congratulations to our four amazing 2023 Sol Pollack Award winners!

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Two Penn Bioengineering Students Win SFB STAR Awards

Congratulations to two Bioengineering graduate students who were awarded Student Travel Achievement Recognition (STAR) Awards from the Society for Biomaterials (SFB). The STAR Award recognizes research excellence and develops future leaders within SFB and comes with a certificate and a monetary award of $250. Penn Bioengineering graduate students Rebecca Haley and Alex Hamilton, both members of the lab of Michael J. Mitchell, Skirkanich Assistant Professor of Innovation in Bioengineering, received their awards and presented on their research in the SFB annual meeting in April 2023.

Rebecca Haley, Ph.D. student in Bioengineering

Rebecca Haley is a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering and a NSF Graduate Research Fellow. In the Mitchell Lab, she focuses on the use of ionizable lipid nanoparticles for the delivery of protein cargos. Supported by this STAR award, she presented her work delivering small protein RAS-inhibitors that reduce cancer cell proliferation. Rebecca is interested in expanding the applications of lipid nanoparticle technology, allowing currently limited therapeutics to achieve functional delivery and, hopefully, clinical success.

Alex Hamilton, Ph.D. student in Bioengineering

Alex Hamilton is a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering and an NSF Graduate Research Fellow. Alex’s work in the Mitchell lab focuses on non-viral nucleic acid delivery. His research interests include cancer immunotherapy, vaccines, and fetal-maternal medicine. He is currently engaged in using novel high-throughput screening techniques to accelerate the discovery process for lipid nanoparticle development for a variety of disease applications.

Two more Mitchell Lab members were likewise recognized with honorable mention inn the STAR Awards: Hannah Safford, a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering and NSF Fellow, and Rohan Palanki, a M.D.-Ph.D. student in Bioengineering and NIH Fellow

Learn more about the Mitchell Lab’s research in biomaterials science, drug delivery, and cellular and molecular bioengineering in the lab’s website.

Read more stories featuring Mitchell and his team here.