Dr. Eden Tanner, Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Mississippi, will present: "Hitching a Ride for Effective Drug Delivery"

Can you imagine if only 1% of your text messages got sent to the right person? This is the reality for almost all nanoparticles used for drug delivery, and especially for treating cancer. At this rate, you’d need to give someone a trillion nanoparticles to see any effect, which is not practical or healthy in a person. In our lab, we use a material called ionic liquids – essentially salts that are liquid at room temperature – as our nanoparticle GPS to make sure they get to exactly where they need to go in the body. The ionic liquids are selectively attracted to different kinds of blood components like red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets. This results in them hitching a ride on the blood cells, letting the cells do all the hard work! For example, by hitching a ride on red blood cells, we are able to deliver about half of the particles we inject to the brain. This could revolutionize medicine by allowing us to effectively and selectively deliver drugs to treat brain cancer, Alzheimer’s, depression, and many other diseases. 

When: Tuesday, September 20, 2022, 6:00pm - 7:00pm.

Where: Heartbreak Coffee, 265 North Lamar Boulevard Suite G, Oxford, Mississippi 38655

or you can join virtually via: https://olemiss.zoom.us/j/99989536748

Cost: Free!

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