Investigator, Assistant Professor (M) Center for Genomic Medicine, Mass General Research Institute

BSE Princeton University

PhD Stanford University

3d tissue models; aging; als; alzheimer's disease; alzheimer's disease in down syndrome; artificial intelligence; bioengineering; blood-brain barrier; brain aging; drug delivery; drug development; drug discovery; gene therapy; glial cells; microglia; myelin sheath; neuroimmunology; neuroprotection; neuropsychiatric disorders; neuroscience; neurovascular pathophysiology; organoids; risk factors; translational research The Stanton Lab develops technology towards treatments. At the interface of technology and biological discovery, we develop tools to model, probe, and interface with human tissues, harness them towards accelerating the development of disease-modifying therapeutic interventions, and deploy them across disease areas driven by clinical impact, particularly for neurological disease.  

Driven by the need for better treatments for neurological disease, we combine neurogenetics, omics, and cell biology techniques with tools spanning nanotechnology, microfluidics, microphysiological systems, biomaterials engineering, tissue engineered organoid approaches, and biofabrication. Major focal areas include:

1. Functional Consequences of Genetic Variants & Bioengineered Organoid Models. A critical bottleneck to translating genetic variant discovery into therapeutic strategies is understanding the functional consequences of the variant. As many risk variants reside in non-coding and regulatory regions not well-conserved in other animals, human cell-based systems provide unique advantages for decoding variant effects. We develop variant-specific models to probe phenotypes on both a cell type-specific basis and the tissue scale, resultant from multicellular crosstalk. Leveraging engineering techniques, we advance the biomimicry of these systems, modeling new facets of disease etiology towards increasing predictive power and translational relevance.
2. Enhancing Drug Delivery to the Brain. One of the most formidable challenges in developing effective neurotherapeutics is successfully delivering treatments to the brain--an organ well-protected by tightly regulated brain barriers, including the blood-brain barrier (BBB). Estimates suggest that over 98% of all small molecule drugs and almost all large molecules fail to cross the adult human BBB. To address this, we are engineering carriers for enhanced delivery, developing targeted delivery strategies, and establishing advanced systems aimed at gaining fundamental understanding and more efficiently identifying effective compounds.
3. Towards A Pipeline for Precision Medicine. Many neurological diseases involve a spectrum of disorders with overlapping characteristics, frequently caused by a combination of genetic variants and environmental factors. We have a strong interest in subtyping neurological disease to address underlying mechanisms on a patient-specific basis. We further aim to understand how disparate variants converge in shared pathologies and identify contributors to sporadic disease. To address this we design tools to understand underlying mechanisms and test treatments, with a view to develop precise medicines based on individuals' unique disease profiles.