Uniting education, research, healthcare, and society to advance women's heart health.

Complex health challenges require professionals to operate across disciplines and to better connect with society. Here, we showcase a community-engaged and challenge-based educational model in which undergraduate students conduct transdisciplinary research on authentic complex biomedical problems. This concept reinforces translational medicine, human capital, and exemplifies synergy between education, research, healthcare, and society.

The Impact of Nanobody Density on the Targeting Efficiency of PEGylated Liposomes.

Nanoparticles (NPs) are commonly modified with tumor-targeting moieties that recognize proteins overexpressed on the extracellular membrane to increase their specific interaction with target cells. Nanobodies (Nbs), the variable domain of heavy chain-only antibodies, are a robust targeting ligand due to their small size, superior stability, and strong binding affinity. For the clinical translation of targeted Nb-NPs, it is essential to understand how the number of Nbs per NP impacts the receptor recognition on cells.

Nanobody-targeted photodynamic therapy for the treatment of feline oral carcinoma: a step towards translation to the veterinary clinic.

Nanobody-targeted photodynamic therapy (NB-PDT) has been developed as a potent and tumor-selective treatment, using nanobodies (NBs) to deliver a photosensitizer (PS) specifically to cancer cells. Upon local light application, reactive oxygen species are formed and consequent cell death occurs. NB-PDT has preclinically shown evident success and we next aim to treat cats with oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC), which has very limited therapeutic options and is regarded as a natural model of human head and neck SCC.

A New Predictive Technology for Perinatal Stem Cell Isolation Suited for Cell Therapy Approaches.

The use of stem cells for regenerative applications and immunomodulatory effect is increasing. Amniotic epithelial cells (AECs) possess embryonic-like proliferation ability and multipotent differentiation potential. Despite the simple isolation procedure, inter-individual variability and different isolation steps can cause differences in isolation yield and cell proliferation ability, compromising reproducibility observations among centers and further applications.

The Potential of Nanobody-Targeted Photodynamic Therapy to Trigger Immune Responses.

Nanobody-targeted photodynamic therapy (NB-PDT) has been recently developed as a more tumor-selective approach rather than conventional photodynamic therapy (PDT). NB-PDT uses nanobodies that bind to tumor cells with high affinity, to selectively deliver a photosensitizer, i.e.

MAGE-A antigens as targets for cancer immunotherapy.

Targeted anti-cancer therapies aim at reducing side effects while retaining their anti-cancer efficacy. Immunotherapies e.g.