The fundamental question addressed in my laboratory is how to achieve
facile control over biological processes in vivo. The focus of our research
projects is a forward engineering approach to cancer drug discovery and
development. Cancer results after many genetic and epigenetic changes in
the cell, and multiple activated oncogenes are often required to maintain
the oncogenic status and viability of cancer cells. We seek to identify
and to validate combinations of drug targets by modulating the function of
many gene products in different pathways with temporal and spatial control
in tissue culture cells or animals. One set of tools that is being
developed and applied is RNA-based reagents and aptamers, from which,
self-assembled supramolecular aggregates and synthetic gene circuits are
created according to quantitative models, and used to probe and control
protein functions in a scale-free regulatory network. Besides target
validation,such “genetic applets” can be utilized directly as
therapeutic agents. In a separate but related area of interest, we are
also developing novel anti-viral strategies using a similar approach.