Kwon LabBioTherapeutics Engineering Laboratory (BioTEL)kwonyj@uci.eduhttps://sites.google.com/a/biotel.biz/home/biotel

Research Summary: Timely, complete, and convenient treatment of many diseases is not yet within reach, although many potent therapeutics have been identified and developed. Synthesis of novel nanomaterials, innovative fabrication of carriers, elucidation of extracellular and intracellular behaviors of drug/carriers, and development of new drug release mechanisms are the key scientific emphases in the BioTEL. The ultimate goal in BioTEL is to develop universally applicable delivery platforms for combined diagnosis and therapy with pinpointed specificity and accuracy, and hence, maximum therapeutic effects in vitro and in vivo, by bridging biology and medicine using techniques from engineering, synthetic chemistry, and nanotechnology. Representative current research projects are:

1. Acid-degradable polymers for nonviral gene delivery2. Viral/nonviral chimeric core-shell nanoparticles for synergistic

therapy 3. Bioorthogonally engineered enveloped viruses for gene therapy

and vaccination4. Stimuli-responsive nanomaterials for combined imaging and

therapy (nanotheragnostics)5. DNA-based cancer vaccine6. Nanoantibiotics for treating drug-resistant infections

Key Publications: Cho SK, Kwon YJ. Simultaneous gene transduction and silencing using stimuli-responsive viral/nonviral chimeric nanoparticles. Biomaterials (in press; published online). Kwon YJ. Before and after endosomal escape: Roles of stimuli-converting siRNA/polymer interactions in determining gene silencing efficiency. Accounts of Chemical Research (in press; published online). Huh AJ, Kwon YJ. "Nanoantibiotics': A new paradigm for treating infectious diseases using nanomaterials in the antibiotics resistant era. Journal of Controlled Release 156, 128-145 (2011). Wong S, Kwon YJ. Synthetically functionalized retroviruses produced from the bioorthogonally engineered cell surface. Bioconjugate Chemistry 22, 151-155 (2011). Shim MS, Kim CS, Ahn Y-C, Chen Z, Kwon YJ. Combined multi-modal optical imaging and targeted gene silencing using stimuli-transforming nanotheragnostics. Journal of the American Chemical Society 132, 8316-8324 (2010). Shim MS, Kwon YJ. Acid-transforming polypeptide micelles as efficient, biocompatible, and versatile nonviral gene carriers. Biomaterials 31, 3404-3413 (2010).

Prof. Young Jik KwonAssociate Professor

• B.S. Biological Engineering, Inha University, Korea (1998)• M.S. Chemical Engineering,

University of Southern California (2000)• Ph.D. Chemical Engineering,

University of Southern California (2003)