Vivero Research Group

Updated July 2022

Vision

Our vision is that by combining basic science understanding with material science, some of the most relevant problems of our time will be addressed. In particular, we are focusing our efforts toward developing nanoparticle-based technologies for biomedical applications.

Listed below are the main research projects we are currently pursuing:

Projects

Title: “Nanoparticle-based strategies for the effective treatment of pancreatic cancer.”

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is an aggressive and devastating malignant disease of the exocrine pancreas, which is characterized by invasiveness, early metastasis and profound resistance to therapies. Developing reliable methods for the effective treatment of PDAC will have a major impact on the clinical outcome for this deadly disease. My group has designed, synthesized and characterized a target-specific, stimuli-responsive MSN platform for the controlled delivery of anticancer drugs with an optimal drug ratio. Our published data demonstrate that this delivery system effectively targets tumor associated MUC1 (tMUC1), increases therapeutic efficiency with reduced toxicity in both a syngeneic and a spontaneous mouse model that overexpressed tMUC1 (Ref #1). We also recently published on a novel MSN-based sequential therapy for precise stroma modulation, which resulted in an improvement of the PDAC treatment in a xenograft mouse model (Ref #2). My group is building up on these findings to develop a sequential nanoparticle-based regimen where the primary nanoplatform targets the tumor stroma, and the secondary nanocarrier is used to release chemotherapeutics to PDAC cells. Some of the strategies that my group will explore in this area in the following years have been depicted in a recent review (Ref #3).

Recent Publications:

“Advanced Nanoengineering Approach for Target-Specific, Spatiotemporal, and Ratiometric Delivery of Gemcitabine–Cisplatin Combination for Improved Therapeutic Outcome in Pancreatic Cancer.” Mubin Tarannum, Md Akram Hossain, Bryce Holmes, Shan Yan, Pinku Mukherjee, Juan L Vivero-Escoto* Small (2022), 18 (2), 2104449.
“Nanoparticle combination for precise stroma modulation and improved delivery for pancreatic cancer.” Mubin Tarannum, Katherine Holtzman, Didier Dréau, Pinku Mukherjee, Juan L Vivero-Escoto* Journal of Controlled Release (2022), 347, 425-434.
“Nanoparticle-based therapeutic strategies targeting major clinical challenges in pancreatic cancer treatment.” Mubin Tarannum, Juan L Vivero-Escoto* Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews (2022), 187, 114357.

Collaborators: Dr. Pinku Mukherjee (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Biological Sciences); Dr. Shan Yan (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Biological Sciences); Dr. Didier Dréau (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Biological Sciences); Dr. Jen Jen Yeh (UNC-Chapel Hill, School of Medicine); Dr. Mubin Tarannum (Dana-Farber Cancer Institute)

Title: “Hybrid-Silica Nanoparticles to treat triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC)”

TNBC is characterized by the lack of targetable markers, intratumor heterogeneity, high proliferative activity, poor prognosis, high risk of relapse, and metastasis to the lungs and brain. Therefore, there is an urgent clinical need to expand the current therapeutic options for eliminating primary tumors and preventing recurrence and metastasis to improve the clinical outcome of this deadly disease. My group has developed silica-based platforms (MSNs, PSilQ NPs and POSS) to target TNBC through combination therapies, which is the use of two or more therapies to synergistically treat the disease. Our group has focused its efforts in combining three main clinical options: chemo, photodynamic and gene therapy. We have shown that MSNs and PSilQ NPs are excellent delivery systems for combination therapy (chemo+PDT+siRNA or chemo+siRNA) of TNBC in vitro (Ref #1&2). Moreover, our PSilQ platform efficiently reduced tumor growth in a TNBC mouse model (Ref #3). My group has also modified POSS to carry porphyrin-based photosensitizers for the PDT treatment of TNBC (Ref #4). The next steps in this research area are to evaluate these platforms in preclinical models.

Publications:

“Combination of Nucleic Acid and Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles: Optimization and Therapeutic Performance In Vitro.” Ridhima Juneja, Hemapriyadarshini Vadarevu, Justin Halman, Mubin Tarannum, Lauren Rackley, Jacob Dobbs, Jose Marquez, Morgan Chandler, Kirill A. Afonin*, Juan Vivero-Escoto* ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces (2020), 12 (35), 38873–38886.
“Multimodal Polysilsesquioxane Nanoparticles for Combinatorial Therapy and Gene Delivery in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer.” Ridhima Juneja, Zachary Lyles, Hemapriyadarshini Vadarevu, Kirill A. Afonin, Juan Vivero-Escoto* ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces (2019), 11 (13), 12308–12320.
“Biodegradable Polysilsesquioxane Nanoparticles to Improve the Treatment of Breast Cancer Using Photodynamic Therapy In Vitro and In Vivo.” Zachary Lyles; Mubin Tarannum; Cayli Mena; Vanderlei Bagnato and Juan L. Vivero-Escoto* Advanced Therapeutics (2020), 3(7), 202000022.
“Evaluation of Polyhedral Oligomeric Silsesquioxane Porphyrin Derivatives on Photodynamic Therapy.” Paolo Siano, Alexis Johnston, Paula Loman-Cortes, Zaneta Zhin, Juan Vivero-Escoto* Molecules (2020), 25(21), 4965.

Collaborators: Dr. Kirill Afonin (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Chemistry); Dr. Pinku Mukherjee (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Biological Sciences); Dr. Didier Dréau (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Biological Sciences); Dr. Vanderlei Bagnato and Dr. Natalia Inada (CEPOF, Physics Institute Sao Carlos, University of Sao Paulo)

Title: “Light-Activated Hybrid Nanoparticles to eliminate antibiotic resistant bacteria (ARB) and biofilms”

The rising ability of bacteria to evade the effects of antibiotics is becoming one of the most important health crises in modern medicine. Traditionally antibiotics have been isolated from microbes, found in nature, that have evolved methods to combat other organisms for specific niches in the environment. However, there are major challenges in finding new antibiotic agents that can target bacteria. Improved strategies for the development of novel alternatives are desperately needed. Recently, the use of nanomaterials with antimicrobial activity has been explored as a new alternative against antibiotic resistant bacteria (ARB). Moreover, another method that has gained a great deal of interest in recent years to eliminate ARB relies on photodynamic inactivation (PDI). My group is developing photo-active molecules and nanoparticles to improve the antimicrobial effect against antibiotic resistant bacteria (ARB). We have synthesized silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) that are further functionalized with a photosensitizer. We hypothesize that by combining the advantages of AgNPs and PDI as antimicrobial agents in the same platform a synergistic effect can be achieved to successfully eliminate ARB. We envision that this strategy can be expanded to other nanoparticles with antimicrobial properties.

Publications:

“Influence of Cationic meso-Substituted Porphyrins on the Antimicrobial Photodynamic Efficacy and Cell Membrane Interaction in Escherichia coli.” Alexandra Hurst, Beth Scarbrough, Roa Saleh, Jessica Hovey, Farideh Ari, Shreya Goyald, Richard Chi, Jerry Troutman*, Juan Vivero-Escoto* International Journal of Molecular Sciences (2019), 20(1), 134.

Collaborators: Dr. Jerry Troutman (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Chemistry); Dr. Mariya Munir (UNC-Charlotte, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering)

Research Funding

Support for our research is kindly provided: