Lead Scientist, Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine

Responsible for building next generation induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPSC) platform and the development of stem cell-based therapies. Lead the development of new processes and methods for iPSC/regenerative medicine, evaluated new technologies, established flow cytometry, single cell sorting, single cell cloning, 3D culture, high content imaging, genome editing, iPSC line development and high dimensional analysis.

Process Development and Bioanalytical Methods Optimization• Leading process development of stem cells derived tissue-engineered medical products, scaling up and closing the process for the production of therapeutic cells/tissues.• Leading the development and optimization of bioanalytical methods to QC cells/tissue process development in different ARMI’ projects.• Leading integration of non-destructive technologies/biosensors into developed processes to enable real-time collection of information of the cultured cell/tissue and its environment.

Development of Programmable iPSC-Derived 3D Liver Organoids for Drug Testing, Toxicology Studies, Disease Modeling and Novel Medicine for Liver Rare Diseases (Stem Cell Therapy).

Developing synthetic biology-based applications for cancer-specific immunotherapy.

Investigated the proteasomal degradation of human innate immunity APOBEC3 proteins by HIV viral infectivity factor (Vif) toward the goal of identifying new targets and discovering novel inhibitors of Vif-APOBEC3G (A3G) interaction. As part of this work, I identified a novel motif in HIV Vif protein that is important for binding and neutralization of A3G, and engineered recombinant proteins for a robust TR-FRET-based high throughput biochemical assay, which I used to screen for small molecule inhibitors of Vif-A3G interaction. I also developed a functional fluorescence cell-based assays to identify hits that inhibit Vif-dependent degradation of YFP-APOBEC3G fusion protein as well as assays for lead molecules profiling in T cells. I discovered that inhibition of de novo pyrimidine synthesis metabolic pathway augments APOBEC3G expression and antiviral activity against HIV. This study led to the identification of 2 lead molecules, which are highly potent against HIV replication in T cells and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (published in 4 peer reviewed journals).

Exploring the interactions between the HIV-1 virus and the host restriction factor TRIM5 and generate novel strategies for better understanding of HIV/AIDS disease. Identified an important genetic determinant of susceptibility to HIV-1 in pigtail macaques.

Studying TMF/ARA160 protein and it’s role in the regulation of cell proliferation and differentiation. I discovered a novel cellular pathway demonstrating that the Golgi apparatus harbors a novel BC-box containing protein that can direct the oncogene Stat3 under defined cellular conditions to proteasomal degradation. I also found that the level of TMF/ARA160 was significantly decreased in malignant brain tumors which implied a suppressive role of TMF/ARA160 in tumor progression.