Speaker: Simon Friedman, Ph.D., Curator’s Distinguished Professor, Pharmacy, University of Missouri-Kansas City
Date: Tuesday, April 9, 2024, noon-1 p.m.
Location: Live presentation at Health Sciences Building, Room 5309, University of Missouri-Kansas City campus; live audience at Roy Blunt NextGen Precision Health Building, Atkins Family Seminar Room; and virtual option available
*Zoom option available
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Description
So much of biology and medicine hinges on the timing and spacing of events: The development of an organism is emblematic of this. The patterning of body shape depends on the spacing, timing and amount of gene expression. We have developed chemical tools that allow for us to control the spacing, timing and degree of gene expression using light. Light is a particularly appealing tool, because it is easy to manipulate, and once you link a process to it, it is relatively straightforward to control when the process happens, where it happens and to what degree it happens. We also have applied this idea of light control of biological processes to the challenge of therapeutic protein delivery. Some therapeutics require dosing that varies continuously throughout the day (e.g. insulin). The classic ways of enabling this variability, namely a pump and canula inserted into a patient, are beset by a wide range of problems (infections, occlusions and variability). Instead, we are developing tools to use light to control the release of therapeutics, which then allows continuous variability with minimal invasiveness. All of this work leverages the power of chemistry and applies it at the interface of chemistry, biology and medicine to answer critical questions and address important therapeutic needs.
About the Speaker
Simon Friedman is an interfacial scientist, writer and artist. He trained in chemistry at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (S.B.), University of California, San Francisco (Ph.D.) and California Institute of Technology (National Institutes of Health, or NIH, postdoctoral fellowship). He is currently a Curators Distinguished Professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and heads an NIH supported laboratory focused on biomedical problems at the interface of chemistry and biology. His work has been described in the pages of The Economist, The New York Times and on NPR. He is the winner of Science Magazine’s “Visions of the Future” essay contest, a featured writer for Nature Chemistry’s “In Your Element” series and featured in multiple films in the New York City Food Film Festivals, including a selection as “Best of the Decade” in 2016. He has also won the University of Missouri’s highest award for teaching, the Governor’s Award. In addition to speaking internationally on his research, he has given talks on “Tradition” to the Creative Mornings Community and “The Role of Immigrants in American Science” to TEDx.