Research Interests: Marine natural products chemistry; antibiotic drug discovery; structure determination of novel natural products using NMR and mass spectrometry; and metabolomics studies of marine invertebrate associated microorganisms.
Research Interests: Genetic and pharmacologic approaches to study disease development and treatment, focusing on cancer and central nervous system diseases.
Research Interests: Understanding the transcriptional networks that control keratinocyte proliferation/differentiation and epidermal barrier functions during development and under pathological conditions. Developing novel therapeutic strategies for the treatment of inflammatory skin diseases and skin cancer.
Research Interests: Developing novel nanometer and micrometer sized drug delivery systems. Application of layer-by-layer selfassembly, dendrimers, halloysite and calixarenes in drug delivery and drug solubilization.
Research Interests: Investigating how nuclear receptors sense environmental clues and regulate Gastrointestinal (GI) homeostasis in healthy and disease states (intestinal development, differentiation, and inflammation).
Research Interests: Synthetic methodology, medicinal chemistry and drug discovery. Optimization of structure-activity and structure-property relationships. Exploratory pharmacological mining of novel chemical scaffolds. Emphasis on development of anticancer and anti-infective agents.
Research Interests: Biomimetic nanotechnology; Nanomaterial-cell interactions; Targeted drug delivery; Cancer immunotherapy; Cancer diagnostics/prognostics; Surface engineering.
Research Interests: Leveraging delivery approaches to address current clinical challenges and facilitate translational research by integrating cell therapy, immunotherapy and personalized therapy.
Research Interests: Study the mechanism and function of protein post-translational modifications using a variety of interdisciplinary approaches, such as chemical biology, enzymology, biochemistry, mass spectrometry, cryo-EM, X-ray crystallography, cell biology, and computational modeling.
Research Interests: Transcriptional control of neuroprotective genes and prevention of neurodegeneration in Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s and neuromuscular disease. A focus on dysfunctional proteostasis in disease progression and viral-mediated delivery of protective genes to the brain.
Research Interests: The role of uncultured symbionts in natural product biosynthesis within marine invertebrates; marine natural product chemistry; drug discovery; next-generation sequencing; metagenomics; bioinformatics; biosynthesis.
Research Interests: Analytical neurochemistry; neuropeptides; proteomics and peptidomics; glycomics and glycoproteomics; biomarker discovery in neurodegenerative diseases; quantitative system biology; metabolomics; microseparations; imaging mass spectrometry and its application to drug delivery and biodistribution; biological mass spectrometry.
Research Interests: Molecular basis of prostate development; prostate cancer progression; benign prostatic hyperplasia; roles of cell-cell signaling pathways and the use of mouse genetics to discover novel pathways that underlie prostatic diseases.
Sandro Mecozzi , Professor and Vice Chair (Drug Delivery) (Drug Discovery)
Research Interests: Di- and tri-block copolymers in drug delivery and imaging; 19F-MRI; nanotechnologies in cancer therapy; immunotherapies; molecular recognition of RNA.
Research Interests: CRISPR-based genetic screens in bioenergy-relevant and pathogenic bacteria to understand gene function and antibiotic mode of action.
Steven Swanson , Professor and Dean (Drug Action) (Drug Discovery)
Research Interests: In vitro and preclinical model systems to investigate the role of the growth hormone/IGF-I axis in prostate carcinogenesis. Mouse-based studies of preclinical efficiency.
Medicinal chemistry and bioassay development. Develop small molecule and protein-based therapeutics to selectively modulate disease-causing proteins. Design and synthesize ligands for carbohydrate binding proteins. Develop cell-based and biochemical assays to evaluate the pharmacological properties of novel therapeutics and to study their mechanism of action in-vitro and in-vivo.
Research Interests: Synaptic plasticity in substance use and major depressive disorders; Development of antibodies against cannabinoids, opioids, sedative-hypnotics, and classical psychedelics; Immunologic biomarkers of drug use; Implementation of novel psychiatric treatments, including vaccine-based approaches and medication-assisted psychotherapy
