I am interested in the development of viral nanoparticles as a nano-sized platform for applications in biomedicine, electronics and sensing. My current training is the development of tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) for imaging atherosclerosis. The use of nanoparticles to diagnose and treat diseases such as cancer and coronary artery disease has shown great potential. The key is to engineer a multifunctional nanoparticle with well-defined properties, i.e. morphology, size, charge, surface ligands for optimal trafficking to sights of disease in vivo. My career has focused on engineering tobacco mosaic virus (TMV), which presents a robust hollow rod-shaped platform capable of undergoing chemical conjugation to its interior and exterior surfaces. TMV is also capable of transforming to RNA-free spherical nanoparticles (SNPs). The size and polydispersity of these SNPs is highly controllable, therefore offering a unique platform to test the effect that shape has on biomedicine.

Development of a viral nanoparticle for biomedical applications

244th National Meeting (2012)

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