Abstract: Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are a promising new modality for drug delivery. However, designer EVs must be engineered to broaden applications and improve efficacy. My lab optimizes methods rooted in synthetic biology to genetically engineer EVs in S. cerevisiae, a yeast commonly used to manufacture biological drugs. Our platform includes semi-automated workflows to build designer EVs for therapeutic applications, and to develop new strains and processes to scale up EV biomanufacturing.

Bio: Dr. Christopher Brett is a Professor of Biology at Concordia University in Montreal. He earned a BSc an MSc in Physiology at UBC, and PhD in Cellular and Molecular Medicine at Johns Hopkins Medical Institute. After postdoctoral studies in Biochemistry at the University of Washington, he was recruited as a Canada Research Chair to Concordia where his group discovered an ESCRT-independent intralumenal vesicle biogenesis pathway that may produce EV precursors. This led him to pivot towards extracellular vesicle research and his lab is now using Concordia’s Genome Foundry and Bioprocessing Facility to develop new EV-based biotechnologies and to biomanufacture EVs using S. cerevisiae and other yeasts as chassis organisms.

Zoom Meeting: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83969554409?pwd=GHennIeLb3HO52k39s422Z1lwO5nWe.1
Meeting ID: 839 6955 4409
Passcode: 188511