Research
Vision
My vision is to transform immune cells into intelligent, living therapies. Cells that don’t just react, but can interpret their environment and adapt their actions in real time. Imagine treatments for cancer that can detect when to attack a tumor, or therapies for autoimmunity that know when to calm the immune system instead of fueling it. I imagine medicine not as a fixed prescription, but as a living system that keeps us in balance.
Current Research
At MIT, I’m exploring how to program immune cells with new rules of decision-making, drawing inspiration from synthetic biology and neuroscience. My PhD bridges gene circuit design in the Weiss Lab with immune engineering in the Birnbaum Lab, aiming to open new possibilities for how immune therapies can be designed and applied.
Link to Previous Research
Before MIT, I worked at UCSF in the Roybal Lab, where I helped develop synthetic receptors (SNIPRs) that gave immune cells new ways to sense soluble cues and communicate. That work showed me the power of reprogramming immune cells to recognize and respond to their environment. My current research builds on that foundation, shifting from designing how immune cells sense signals to programming how they decide and act.
Relevant Publications
Engineered receptors for soluble cellular communication and disease sensing
Nature · Nov 14, 2024
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We developed a synthetic intramembrane proteolysis receptor (SNIPR) platform that allows engineered cells to sense soluble ligands, addressing a key limitation in mammalian synthetic biology where most receptors only target cell-surface antigens. We demonstrate that SNIPRs can localize CAR T cell activity to solid tumors, and enable synthetic cell-to-cell communication networks orthogonal to natural pathways.
Designed endocytosis-inducing proteins degrade targets and amplify signals
Nature · Sep 25, 2024
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EndoTags are computationally designed proteins that trigger receptor-mediated endocytosis and lysosomal trafficking. Unlike native ligand–based approaches (e.g., LYTACs, KineTACs), EndoTags are modular, genetically encodable, and avoid competition with natural ligands.
Patents
Alternative Coffee Beverages
WO 2023/028616 A1 · Issued Mar 2, 2023