Events

Engineering Polymeric Drug Carriers for Cancer Immunotherapy

Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Lecture / Panel
 
For NYU Community
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Speaker

John T. Wilson, Ph.D.

Associate Professor
Department of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Vanderbilt University 

 

Abstract

Engineering Polymeric Drug Carriers for Cancer Immunotherapy

Cancer immunotherapy is revolutionizing the treatment of an ever-expanding diversity of cancer types, yielding impressive complete and durable responses in a subset of patients. However, most patients do not respond to currently approved immune checkpoint inhibitors. Our group is working to solve this emergent grand challenge in immuno-oncology through the development of molecularly engineered technologies that increase immune recognition of tumors. This talk will focus on our recent work in the design of polymeric drug delivery platforms for activation of antitumor innate immunity and how we are leveraging these materials to increase tumor immunogenicity and responses to immunotherapy.

Bio

John T. Wilson is an Associate Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering and the Ingram Associate Professor of Cancer Research at Vanderbilt University, where he also Co-Leads the Host-Tumor Interactions Program within the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center. Dr. Wilson graduated from Oregon State University with a B.S. in Bioengineering and received his Ph.D. in Bioengineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology. He was awarded a Cancer Research Institute (CRI) Postdoctoral Fellowship to support his postdoctoral research at the University of Washington. Dr. Wilson started his independent career at Vanderbilt in 2014 and was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 2021. His multidisciplinary Immunoengineering Laboratory works at the interface of engineering and immunology, bringing together expertise in molecular engineering, nanotechnology, and pharmaceutical science to develop strategies for more precisely modulating immune and inflammatory responses at the tissue, cell, and subcellular level. He is a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) and has received several awards including the NSF CAREER award, Stand Up To Cancer Innovative Research Grant Award, CBME Young Innovator Award, the Vanderbilt Chancellor’s Award for Research, and the Vanderbilt Chancellors Faculty Fellowship.