Happy Father’s Day to all the Fathers in the world!!

We have great newssssss as well! Dr. Chen and his spouse have a new addition to his family, a newborn baby girl, Leah! The past week, UCONN Instagram posted a celebratory Happy Father’s Days post for UCONN DADs! How exciting is this!!

Dr. Chen and his daughter, Leah, on Happy Father’s Day weekend!

Dr. Chen, your new daughter makes an adorable addition to an already wonderful family!! May her beautiful smile make your world seem a little brighter every day! We are all so excited for you. Our best wishes to you and your firstborn!

Hello, everyone! It has been a hot second since the last update! We started from No Mask April to Masked Up April in a month, unfortunately! But enough with the bad news! Now onto good news!!

The first news we have!! NEW students joining our lab!!

We are going to welcome a few students back to our lab next Fall! Maxwell will be joining us as a first-year Ph.D. student! Leah and Olivia will be back for their 4+1 degree getting their Master’s degree! Amazing and congratulations!!

Next news! We want to congratulate Ian Sands for getting an honorable mention for his National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) competition )NSF GRFP) 2022! It is very hard to get it and the fact that he reaches this stage is an amazing feat! The stats from last year in getting honorable mention was phenomenal!

Last and definitely not least, Allison will graduate this semester (Sad for us, but good for her :P) and she found a job at Regeneron, a big pharmaceutical company around the area!!! CONGRATS!!!

It has been an exciting month, to be honest! More news to come! 🙂

Recently two of our doctoral students participated in the poster competition organized by SAGE of the School of Engineering. Both Anne Yau and Ian Sands were able to showcase their projects in this competition.  We were super thrilled that Ian got first place amongst the BME participants!! He went ahead to the next round presenting his poster (and public speaking). Both Delaram and Allison volunteered for the event as well!

Happy New Year of 2022, everyone!

The last year 2021, we finished STRONG despite the pandemic!!! I applaud everyone for working so hard! AND definitely, THANK YOU for all your hard work! Dr. Chen just gave a recent update on what happened in 2021, and we DID NOT disappoint! HATS OFF to all of us! 🙂

In 2021,
1. We have 22 current lab members (and counting), bringing the total of 27 lab members (5 alumni)
2. We have 7 papers/manuscripts published (including PNAS and ACS AMI – high-impact journals). WOW! Good work!
3. We have 1 book and 3 book chapters published!
4. Our students went on 17 conference presentations! Can you BELIEVE THAT!
5. We also have 3 patent applications! (WOW!!)
6. Lastly, we have 3 NIH, 2 NSF, and 1 DOD grants!

We are working so hard, and thank you everyone for your contributions! We are looking for another year full of publications, presentations and grants! We are growing strong!

Dr. Libo Zhou and co-authors published a new paper recently titled “Controlled Self-Assembly of DNA-Mimicking Nanotubes to Form a Layer-by-Layer Scaffold for Homeostatic Tissue Constructs” (doi: https://doi.org/10.1021/acsami.1c13345). The image is also featured as one of the journal covers which is awesome!!! Congratulations!!

Abstract as seen in the manuscript

Various biomaterial scaffolds have been developed for improving stem cell anchorage and function in tissue constructs for in vitro and in vivo uses. Growth factors are typically applied to scaffolds to mediate cell differentiation. Conventionally, growth factors are not strictly localized in the scaffolds; thus, they may leak into the surrounding environment, causing undesired side effects on tissues or cells. Hence, there is a need for improved tissue construct strategies based on highly localized drug delivery and a homeostatic microenvironment. This study developed an injectable nanomatrix (NM) scaffold with a layer-by-layer structure inside each nanosized fiber of the scaffold based on controlled self-assembly at the molecular level. The NM was hierarchically assembled from Janus base nanotubes (JBNTs), matrilin-3, and transforming growth factor β-1 (TGF-β1) via bioaffinity. JBNTs, which form the NM backbone, are novel DNA-inspired nanomaterials that mimic the natural helical nanostructures of collagens. The chondrogenic factor, TGF-β1, was enveloped in the inner layer inside the NM fibers to prevent its release. Matrilin-3 was incorporated into the outer layer to create a cartilage-mimicking microenvironment and to maintain tissue homeostasis. Interestingly, human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) had a strong preference to anchor along the NM fibers and formed a localized homeostatic microenvironment. Therefore, this NM has successfully generated highly organized structures via molecular self-assembly and achieved localized drug delivery and stem cell anchorage for homeostatic tissue constructs.

It is that time of the year! It is the BMES Conference time! Many of Dr. Yupeng Chen’s students are going to presenting at upcoming the BMES 2021 Conference!! We are all excited to go! The conference is taking place in Orlando, Florida from October 6th to October 2021. More information in the link below!

https://www.bmes.org/annualmeeting

Below is the list of time and dates and presentation titles that we will be presenting! One of our graduate students, Allison Surian, will be doing an oral presentation at this conference! Exciting (and nerve wrecking) but nonetheless, FUN! Please come check out our presentations! 🙂

Allison Surian –  Codelivery of Doxorubicin and siRNA via Janus Based Nanopiece for Improved Cancer Treatment – 10/9/2021 at 8 am

Jinhyung Lee – DNA-inspired Nanopieces for RNA delivery and Enhanced Endosomal Escape – 10/8/2021 at 3 pm-4 pm

Ian Sands – Electrically Conductive DNA-Inspired Nano-Coating for Enhanced Neural Interfaces – 10/8/2021 at 3 pm-4 pm

Anne Yau – A library of Janus Base Nano-Matrices to Selectively Promote Different Cell Lineage Adhesion – 10/7/2021 at 9.30 am-10.30 am

Aaron Beams – Intracellular Protein Delivery using Nanopieces for Anticancer Applications – 10/7/2021 at 9.30 am-10.30am

Dr.Yupeng Chen has been awarded a prestigious grand award from the U.S. Department of Defense.

Using our developed Janus base nanotubes (JBNTs), we are planning to create a targeted delivery to improve muscular and skeletal injuries which often lead to arthritis. Dr. Chen wants to use nanopieces, based on JBNTs to create a targeted delivery platform, targeting tissues in the joints relieving pain, and treating arthritis at the same time.

More information here! UConn Professor Earns Prestigious DoD award!

Dr. Yupeng Chen with our graduate students, Jinhyung Lee, Ian Sands and post-docs Dr. Libo Zhou and Dr. Wuxia Zhang recently published a paper in PNAS!! Amazing! This high impact factor journal published our manuscript on May 11th 2021, edited by Pablo G. Debenedetti, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, titled

DNA-inspired nanomaterials for enhanced endosomal escape

This brief report explains a new type of delivery system using nanopieces (NPs) based on DNA-inspired Janus base nanotubes (JBNTS) for RNAi delivery. These NPs have composition of current delivery vehicle but with an extra benefit of low toxicity with high efficacy! Similar to Lipid nanoparticles (LPNs), they are delivered via macropinocytosis into endosomes. However, the difference lies in the endosomal escape ability of the NPs compared to LPNs.

They have shown this proof of concept by delivering siRNA to inhibit GAPDH comparing NPs to LPNs and found that NPs achieve better inhibition efficacy than LNPs! In addition to that, NPs also show better cytotoxicity compared to various commonly used delivery vehicles such as PLL and PEI, or single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs).

This amazing paper is reported both at the UCONN page as well as Phys.org! Congratulations!!!!

UCONN Page May 17th 2021

Full story at Phys.org 

UConn Health Journal, a website ran by UConn Health publishing stories of significance for medical professionals and patients in their seasonal issues every year since Winter 2015. Recently, Dr. Yupeng Chen’s Nanomedicine lab’s research has been highlighted and featured on the first page of the Fiscal Year 2021 Spring entitled “Engineering Cartilage in Space” by Kim Krieger.

Other than our achievement, this issue covers a variety of topics ranging from how to cope in the year plagued by COVID-19 from face-to-face to screen-to-screen due to the pandemic (page 10). Other than that, the issue also features how the UConn Sleep Disorders Center honed in on the causes of sleep disorder by doing studies on the affliction (page 18). Other exciting news covered by the UConn Health Journal is the efforts put forth by UConn into providing COVID-19 Vaccines across UConn (page 3) as well as an innovative stroke damage treatment nearing human clinical trials (page 8) which could put an end to the long term damage caused by stroke.

Read more PDF here