Dr. Kirill Afonin
Dr. Kirill Afonin
USA
Vice-President, ISRNN
Associate Professor of Chemistry, UNC Charlotte
Dr. Kirill Afonin graduated from Saint Petersburg State University, obtained his doctoral degree from Bowling Green State University.

He is completed postdoctoral training at the University of California Santa Barbara and at the National Cancer Institute, then started his tenure-track appointment at UNC Charlotte in 2016, and was promoted to tenure in 2019.


Topic & Abstract

Immunomodulation with nucleic acid-based nanoparticles.

The integration of nanotechnology into modern therapeutics provides additional control of unique physicochemical properties including size, surface charge, hydrophobicity, and the addition of moieties for biomedical applications. The ability to fine-tune these parameters subsequently allows for the improved efficacy of therapeutic treatments and has implications for the future of personalized medicine. The functionally-versatile molecule, RNA, plays an essential role in living systems and the new discipline of RNA nanotechnology investigates how this intriguing biopolymer can be programmed to assemble into defined shapes and sizes with specified biological activities. Multifunctional nucleic acid-based nanoparticles (NANPs) hold tremendous potential in biomedical applications because of their programmability, biocompatibility, and precise control over their formulation. However, the immunotoxicity and immunomodulatory effects of NANPs are largely unknown and must be defined to permit the successful translation of this technology into the clinic. The understanding of how particular NANPs can trigger the immune response may also open the possibilities to a new field where NANPs are used not only for drug delivery but also as vaccine adjuvants. To address such fundamental problems in a timely fashion, my group initiated the very first systematic investigation of NANP recognition by human immune cells. Despite the anticipations, we did not find a strong, uniform immune response for all NANPs. Instead, the tests found varying and specific responses from different immune cells, depending on each NANP’s shape and formulation. Our results strongly suggest that NANPs can be used not only as nanoscaffolds for controlled drug delivery but also as a tool for communication with the immune system. The ability to control the amounts of cytokines that immune cells produce in response to various NANPs can be used synergistically as an additional therapeutic modality together with the therapeutic agents embedded into the NANPs’ structures.

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