Nanomedicines for Drug Delivery
Engineering and evaluating nanoparticles for targeted, tailored, effective chemotherapy
Technology Overview
Dr. Joelle P. Straehla
Children with cancer often undergo chemotherapy or radiation treatments with serious adverse effects and long-term health impacts. Some pediatric cancers such as diffuse midline gliomas have no lifesaving treatments.
Nanomedicines provide an opportunity for more targeted delivery of drugs for pediatric cancers. Pediatric oncologist and bioengineer Joelle P. Straehla, MD, develops and tests nanoscale drug delivery systems — including across the blood-brain barrier — for precise localization and improved retention of cancer drugs. Her laboratory has expertise in organic nanoparticle systems, including lipid nanoparticles such as those used in mRNA vaccines.
Using her clinical experience and background in materials science and chemical engineering, Dr. Straehla designs and synthesizes new nanoparticle-based therapeutics. She also works with industry partners to advance and test their clinical-grade nanoparticles for new indications and delivery routes. Her laboratory has expertise in creating innovative formulations and encapsulation methods for small molecule drugs that are challenging to load into nanoparticles or deliver to specific organs.
Dr. Straehla and team leverage cutting-edge tools such as CRISPR to conduct large-scale genomic screens, investigating how nanoparticles interact with cells. By testing libraries of nanoparticles with varying traits such as size, composition and surface coatings in screens of pooled cells, they unlock new biological insights about nanomedicine delivery. The screens have already identified new drug targets and biomarkers of nanomedicine effectiveness. A screen for predictors of nanoparticle-cell interactions demonstrated that the lysosomal transporter SLC46A3 is a negative regulator of lipid-based nanoparticle uptake.
The team is using the SCL46A3 biomarker as a model for developing combination nanotherapies of drugs plus nanoparticle components that improve their uptake and therapeutic effectiveness. Combination drugs could target the immune system or the tumor microenvironment, in addition to cancerous cells.
Dr. Straehla is interested in partnerships to accelerate the design, manufacturing and scaling of nanomedicines and to improve their formulation for better targeted drug delivery and retention. She has expertise in preclinical studies supporting nanomedicine clinical trials. The Straehla Lab has experience testing nanomedicines for their potential in treating pediatric cancers and other diseases using patient-derived cell lines and animal models. Dr. Straehla is available for consulting on nanoparticle drug encapsulation strategies and biomarker screening and efficacy testing in vitro, in vivo and in microfluidic tissue models.
Stage of Development
- Preclinical in vitro
- Preclinical in vivo
- Preclinical ex vivo
Partnering Opportunities
- Collaborative research and development
- Sponsored research agreement
- Consultation agreement
- Clinical trials
- Tissue sample access
- Cell line access
- Animal model access
- High-throughput screening
Publications
Pickering AJ, Lamson NG … Straehla JP, et al. Convection-enhanced delivery of auristatin-conjugated layer-by-layer nanoparticles for glioblastoma treatment. Am Chem Soc. 2025;147, 11: 9457–9471.
Lamson NG, Pickering AJ, Wyckoff J … Straehla JP, et al. Trafficking through the blood-brain barrier is directed by core and outer surface components of layer-by-layer nanoparticles. Bioeng Transl Med. 2024;9(4):e10636.
Pickering AJ, Lamson NG, Marand MH … Straehla JP, et al. Layer-by-layer polymer functionalization improves nanoparticle penetration and glioblastoma targeting in the brain. ACS Nano. 2023;17(23):24154-24169.
Straehla JP, Reardon DA, Wen PY, et al. The blood-brain barrier: Implications for experimental cancer therapeutics. Ann Rev Cancer Biol. 2023;7:265-289.
Anchordoquy T, Artzi N, Balyasnikova IV … Straehla JP, et al. Mechanisms and barriers in nanomedicine: Progress in the field and future directions. ACS Nano. 2024;18(22):13983-13999.
Straehla JP*, Hajal C*, Safford HC, et al. A predictive microfluidic model of human glioblastoma to assess trafficking of blood-brain barrier-penetrant nanoparticles. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 2022;119(23):e2118697119. *equal contribution or co-first and co-corresponding authors
Boehnke N*, Straehla JP*, Safford HC, et al. Massively parallel pooled screening reveals genomic determinants of nanoparticle delivery. Science. 2022;377(6604):eabm5551.
Johanssen T, McVeigh L, Erridge S, … Straehla JP, et al. Glioblastoma and the search for non-hypothesis driven combination therapeutics in academia. Front Oncol. 2023;12:1075559.
Boehnke N, Correa S, Hao L … Straehla JP, et al. Theranostic layer-by-layer nanoparticles for simultaneous tumor detection and gene silencing. Angew Chem (International ed. in English). 2020;59(7):2776-2783.
Straehla JP, Warren KE. Pharmacokinetic principles and their application to central nervous system tumors. Pharmaceutics. 2020;12(10);948.
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