New Strategies for Cancer Treatment Using Chemically Modified Biomolecules

The Francis Research lab merges modern chemical synthesis with biochemical engineering techniques to provide new avenues for cancer treatment. As one approach, they have developed methods to covert the empty protein shells of viruses into targeted carriers that can bind to cancer cells and deliver therapeutic cargo, as well as new methods that can target a person's own T-cells to cancer tissue, leading to tumor destruction. The therapeutic potential of both of these strategies will be described, along with the new technologies that have been developed to enable them.

Speaker: Matt Francis, UC Berkeley