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CT3N & Penn BE Seminar – Suzie Pun, “Biomaterial Solutions for Immunotherapy and Trauma Medicine”
February 11 at 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
Suzie Pun
Washington Research Foundation Professor, Director of Molecular Engineering and Sciences Institute, Department of Bioengineering, University of Washington
Advances in biomaterials are enabling powerful new strategies to address urgent clinical needs in both trauma care and immunotherapy. This talk will highlight three emerging directions from our laboratory that harness synthetic polymers and molecular engineering to improve patient outcomes. First, I will describe the development of synthetic polymer systems that promote rapid hemostasis after traumatic injury. Next, I will introduce In situ Mobilization: Polymer Activated Cell Therapies (IMPACT), a novel framework for polymer-guided, anatomical control of cell therapies. IMPACT enables local, IF–THEN gated activation of CAR T directly in the tumor microenvironment. This approach aims to enhance efficacy while reducing systemic toxicities traditionally associated with adoptive cell therapies. Finally, I will discuss our efforts to discover and engineer high-specificity aptamers as modular alternatives to antibodies in cell therapy manufacturing. We identify aptamers specific to immune cell populations in order to improve the cost-effectiveness of cell manufacturing processes. Together, projects explore how biomaterial design and lead to new approaches in trauma medicine and immunotherapy