Immune-directing polymeric biomaterials and coatings

利用可植入材料来利用人体免疫系统的力量，将带来新的发现，并加快现有治疗方法的改进。我们对免疫系统与可植入生物材料沟通的理解正在迅速扩大，这使我们能够阻碍或促进治疗益处的途径。为此，我们正在开发改变局部环境以控制免疫细胞活动的材料，应用范围从癌症免疫疗法到医疗植入物表面涂层。具体来说，我们将开发必要的工具来定位疾病部位的蛋白质和修改植入物表面以改变免疫细胞群和活动。为了局部控制免疫反应，我们需要高效但有潜在毒性的蛋白质的递送策略。利用我们在蛋白质治疗和生物分子相互作用方面的专业知识，我们正在开发用于在疾病部位注射的递送载体，以维持蛋白质释放并防止毒性全身浓度。载体将与疾病部位细胞周围的结构成分结合，以尽量减少外来注射物质的数量；疾病组织将被用作药库。这项技术将用于递送改变局部免疫细胞群的蛋白质，用于癌症免疫治疗。此外，该平台技术还可用于阐明控制免疫反应的新方法，并有助于任何需要局部蛋白质递送的治疗，如视网膜退行性疾病。对于长期的医疗植入物，我们需要控制局部免疫反应和炎症的表面。为此，我们正在开发新的表面涂层，以防止植入后不必要的相互作用，并提供制造免疫定向聚合物涂层的技术，以实现更好的控制。我们的技术将增加聚合物涂层的密度，以阻止植入后的有害反应。此外，聚合物可以被调整以促进有利的相互作用，以延长植入物功能的寿命。预期的结果。我们将建立新的免疫导向材料，用于蛋白质的递送，以改善当前的免疫疗法，并建立新的方法，用于增强医疗器械表面的免疫导向涂层。除了潜在的疗法发现和改进，我们的项目将有助于建立数据集，以更好地阐明材料对免疫反应的影响，这将导致下一代治疗干预和发现的材料。对加拿大的好处。通过公平和包容的招聘策略，我们将培养一支多样化的高素质人才队伍，成为免疫导向生物材料领域的领导者，为加拿大快速发展的学术和工业生物技术领域做出贡献。

Harnessing the power of the body's immune system using implantable materials will result in new discoveries and expedite the improvement of current therapies. Our understanding of the immune system's communication with implantable biomaterials is rapidly expanding, allowing us to hinder or promote pathways for therapeutic benefit. To this end, we are developing materials that alter local environments to control immune cell activities for applications ranging from cancer immunotherapies to medical implant surface coatings. Specifically, we will develop the tools necessary to localize proteins at disease sites and modify implant surfaces to alter immune cell populations and activities. To locally control immune responses, we require delivery strategies for highly potent yet potentially toxic proteins. Using our expertise in protein therapeutics and biomolecule interactions, we are developing delivery vehicles for injection at the disease site to sustain protein release and prevent toxic systemic concentrations. The vehicles will bind to structural components surrounding cells at the disease site to minimize the amount of foreign injected material; the disease tissue will be used as a drug depot. This technology will be used to delivery proteins that alter the local immune cell populations for applications in cancer immunotherapy. Moreover, the platform technology could also be used to elucidate new methods to control immune responses and contribute to any therapy requiring local protein delivery, such as retinal degenerative diseases. For long term medical implants, we require surfaces that control the local immune response and inflammation. To this end, we are developing new surface coatings to prevent unwanted interactions after implantation, as well as providing the technology to create immune-directing polymer coatings for greater control. Our technology will increase the density of polymer coatings to discourage deleterious reactions after implantation. Furthermore, the polymers can be tuned to encourage advantageous interactions to extend the lifetime of implant function. Anticipated Outcomes. We will establish new immune-directing materials for the delivery of proteins towards improving current immunotherapies and establish new methods for enhanced immune-directing coatings on medical device surfaces. Beyond the potential discovery and improvement of therapies, our program will contribute towards the establishment of data sets to better elucidate the influence of materials on immune responses, which will lead to the next generation of materials for therapeutic interventions and discovery. Benefits to Canada. With equitable and inclusive recruitment strategies, we will train a diverse team of high quality personnel as leaders in immune-directing biomaterials to contribute to the rapidly growing academic and industrial biotechnology fields within Canada.