Our work is at the interface of biotechnology and materials science. A major focus is the study and development of polymers to deliver drugs, particularly genetically engineered proteins and DNA, continuously at controlled rates for prolonged periods of time.
Work is in progress in the following areas:
Our interest in drug delivery systems has extended to situations where drugs may serve a potentially useful purpose and then cause toxicity. In such cases, it would be useful to have a selective drug or substance removal system. Examples include removal of heparin, bilirubin, and cholesterol. All of these studies involve reactor design, understanding biomaterials with respect to blood interactions, and modeling of in vivo situations.
In addition, we are developing drugs that specifically inhibit the process of neovascularization without interfering with existing blood vessels. Neovascularization is critical to the progression of several diseases, including cancer and many diseases that cause blindness. The projects involve biochemical purification and tissue culture studies.
Finally, we have been involved in creating approaches to engineer new tissues. In particular, we are synthesizing new biodegradable polymer systems to be used in mammalian cell transplants to create liver, cartilage, and nerves, and are developing bioreactors for these purposes.
Langer, R., Perspectives: Drug delivery – Drugs on target, Science, 293: 58-59, 2001.
Lendlein, A. and Langer, R., Biodegradable, elastic thermoplastic shape memory polymers with adjustable properties for potential biomedical applications, Science, 296: 1673 - 1676, 2002.
Lahann, J., Mitragotri, S., Tran, T., Kaido, H., Sundaran, J., Hoffer, S., Somorjai, G. A. and Langer, R., Reversible switching of surfaces, Science, 299: 371-374, 2003.
Anderson, D., Burdick, J. and Langer, R., Smart biomaterials, Science, 305: 1923-1924, 2004.
Lendlein, A., Jiang, H., Junger, O. and Langer, R., Light-induced shape memory polymers, Nature, 434: 879-882, 2005.
Levenberg, S., Rouwkema, J., Macdonald, M., Garfein, E., Kohane, D., Darland, D., Marini, R., Mulligan, R., D’Amore, P. and Langer, R., Engineering vascularized skeletal muscle tissue, Nature Biotechnology, 23: 879-884, 2005.
Shmulewitz, A. and Langer, R., The ascendance of combination products, Nature Biotechnology, 24: 277-280, 2006.
Yin, Y., Henzl, M, Lorber, B., Nakazawa, T., Thomas, T., Jiang, F., Langer, R. and Benowitz, L., Oncomodulin is a macrophage-derived signal for axon regeneration in retinal ganglion cells, Nature Neuroscience, 9: 843-852, 2006.
John, M., Constien, R., Akinc, A., Goldberg, M., Moon, Y., Spranger, M., Hadwiger, P., Soutschek, J., Vornlocher, H., Manoharan, M., Stoffel, M., Langer, R., Anderson, D., Horton, J., Koteliansky, V., Bumcrot, D., Effective RNAi-mediated gene silencing without interruption of the endogenous microRNA pathway, Nature, 449: 740-744, 2007.
Peer, D., Karp, J., Hong, S., Farokhzad, O., Margalit, R., Langer, R., Nanocarriers: Emerging platforms for cancer therapy, Nature Nanotechnology, 2: 751-760, 2007.
Guerrini, M., Beccati, D., Shriver, Z., Naggi, A., Viswanathan, K., Bisio, A., Capila,I., Lansig, J., Guglieri, S., Fraser, B., Al-Hakim, A., Gunay, N., Zhang, Z., Robinson, L., Buhse, L., Nasr, M., Woodock, J., Langer, R., Venkataraman, G., Linhardt, R., Casu, B., Torri, G., Sasisekharan, R., Oversulfated chondroitin sulfate is a contaminant in heparin associated with adverse clinical events, Nature Biotechnology, 26: 669-675, 2008.
Akinc, A., Zumbuehl, A., Goldberg, M., Leshchiner, E., Busini, V., Hossain, N., Bacallado, S., Nguyen, D., Fuller, J., Alvarez, R., Borodovsky, A. Borland, T., Constein, R., de Fougerolles, A., Dorkin, J., Jayaprakash, K., Jayaraman, M., John, M., Kotelianski, V., Manoharan, M., Nechev, L., Qin, J., Racie, T., Raitcheva, D., Rajeev, K., Sah, D., Soutschek, J., Toudjarska, I, Vornlocher, H.P., Zimmermann, T., Langer, R. and Anderson, D., A combinatorial library of lipid-like materials for delivery of RNAi therapeutics, Nature Biotechnology, 26: 561-569, 2008.
Prausnitz, M. and Langer, R., Transdermal drug delivery, Nature Biotechnology, 26: 1261-1268, 2008.
Engelmayr, G., Cheng, M., Bettinger, C., Borenstein, J. Langer, R. and Freed, L., Accordian like honeycombs for tissue engineering cardiac anisotropy, Nature Materials, 7: 1003-1010, 2008.
Prausnitz, M. and Langer, R., Transdermal drug delivery, Nature Biotechnology, 26: 1261-1268, 2008.
Whitehead, K., Langer, R. and Anderson, D., Knocking down barriers: Advances in siRNA delivery, Nature Reviews: Drug Discovery, 8: 129-138, 2009.
room E25-342
phone (617) 253-3107
email rlanger@mit.edu
phone (617) 253-3123
fax (617) 258-8827
Bethany Day
phone (617) 253-3123
email bday@mit.edu
