I am an assistant professor at the department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. My scientific interest is at the interface of nanotechnology, material science, engineering, applied immunology and medicine to develop prophylactic and therapeutic nucleic acid-based delivery platforms and optimize their manufacturing. My research program focuses on the design, study, and modelling of Structure-Activity Relationships (SAR) for improved delivery systems, nucleic acid-based therapeutics, and vaccines. My team aim to develop therapeutics and vaccines for unmet needs, low and middle income countries (LMICs), and develop a highly interdisciplinary, and collaborative environment that encompasses both fundamental and application-oriented projects.

• Development of second generation, and PanCoV, mRNA based vaccines against Sars-CoV-2• Development of novel lipid based adjuvants for Sars-CoV-2 vaccines• Leads the in vitro transcribed mRNA production and purification team; the team produces IVT mRNA for more than 150 national and international collaborators (i.e. academic, and industrial partners).

Lecturer, 2014-2018Course Title: Regenerative Medicine and Nanomedicine (GBM8605, 3 credits).Level: Graduate studies, Biomedical Engineering. Winter semester.Responsibilities: Designing and Preparing course material, teaching (5h/week; 7 weeks), and grading a group of 14-20 students.Head teaching assistant, 2012-2017Course Title: Cell and Molecular Biology Laboratory (GBM3610, 3 credits).Level: Undergraduate, Biomedical Engineering, Core 3rd year, Fall semester. Responsibilities: Teaching, supervising and grading a group of 40-50 students for topics 3 and 4 of the laboratory (8h/week; 2 weeks).Teaching assistant, 2011-2013Course Title: Biomolecular Interactions and Immunity (GBM3620, 3 credits)Level: Undergraduate, Biomedical Engineering, Core 3rd year, Fall semesterResponsibilities: Teaching (2h/week; 13 weeks) and grading of a group of 30-40 students.

• Managed a team of 4 employees, 3 graduate students and multiple interns.• Designed, planned, executed and supervised in vivo experiments as per IHC guidelines (S1A-S1C, S2, S3A-S3B, S4 and S6).• Reviewed, directed and supervised study protocols, reports, data and standard operating procedures.• Decided on research projects and budgets.• Planned short, intermediate and long-term strategic goals along project team.• Managed and supervised the implementation of a project Management tool and databases for animal studies/procurement.• Designed and wrote Institutional Ethic comity protocols. • Wrote grant applications.• Initiated a collaboration with Vanderbilt University to study the incorporation of PPAA in or on chitosan-mRNA nanoparticles.

Project Title: Gene silencing using chitosan based siRNA delivery systems • Elucidated the effect of polymer charge density, molecular weight, polymer to nucleic acid ratio on in vitro transfection efficiency. • Elucidated and modeled the effect of serum protein, ionic strength, and pH on the physicochemical characteristics of chitosan-siRNA nanoparticle. • Correlated the effect of charge density,Mn, polymer to nucleic acid ratio, presence of serum and pH with nanoparticle internalization and subsequent knockdown. • Characterized in vitro toxicity and genotoxicity of polymer and lipid-based systems. • Designed and tested small interfering RNA and short hairpin RNA vectors. • Elucidated different parametric requirements for the delivery of plasmid DNA/mRNA (long) and siRNA (short) molecules using chitosan. • Demonstrated high knockdown efficiency using multiple techniques. • Established MIQE compliant qPCR protocols and standard operating procedures in the work environment and demonstrated the effect of chitosan on reference gene stability. • Designed, supervised and established a relational database for the management of in vivo studies. • Designed and executed biodistribution, single ascending dose toxicity and efficacy studying in mice as per ICH guidelines. • Demonstrated kidney accumulation of chitosan-siRNA, PEGylated chitosan, and hyaluronic acid coated chitosan nanoparticles using live whole animal imaging (Balb/c nude mice; 30). • Demonstrated in vivo and ex-vivo safety of uncoated, Hyaluronic acid coated and PEGylated chitosan-siRNA nanoparticles (ICR mice, 150).• Demonstrated functional gene knockdown in kidney cortices following I.V. administration of uncoated chitosan-siRNA nanoparticles (Balb/c mice; 80). • Automated histological image analysis of EGFP knockdown in C57BL/6-Tg(CAG-EGFP)1Osb/J transgenic mice (N=10). • Established protocols to isolate, enrich, characterize and culture proximal epithelial tubular cells.

Protein purification of recombinant leptins expressed in bacterial systems for a biopharmaceutical client in Canada. • Purified 10 batches – 5L/each – of recombinant proteins using the AKTA Explorer™100 system followed by successful renaturation of the recombinant protein product for preclinical studies. • Performed quality control, quantification, and testing of the material.In-house cell line engineering for the production of recombinant monoclonal antibodies. • Contributed to rational design and development of expression CHO Du44 platforms and processes for the production of recombinant monoclonal antibodies. • Developed and optimized cell sorting protocols for clonal selection leading to cell lines producing up to 2g/L in spinner flasks. • Supervised Standard Operation Procedure implementation and instrument validation.• Reviewed ICH and 21CFR guidances in context with the project and presented an action plan to address design and future contractual challenges. • Project management- process design, Work breakdown structures and resource allocation, budget, follow up on task and milestones, leading internal discussion during weekly meetings, reporting to the customer development team and wrote final reports submitted to clients.

Teaching assistant, 2009-2009Course Title: Molecular biology Laboratory-A project-based approach (BIO3102, 3 credits)Level: Undergraduate, Biological Sciences, Core 3rd year, Fall semester. Responsibilities: Teaching, supervising and grading a group of 30 students during the 45 hours of laboratory work.

Rotated in different departments such as Hematology, Serology, Bacteriology and endocrinology. Applied different techniques of diagnostic bacteriology for the identification and characterization of pathogenic bacterial strains. Techniques included BioMerieux's API® and regular selective/differential characterization of bacterial strains (i.e. Pseudomonas, Mycobacteria, Klesbiella, Legionella ...).