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SUMMARY:Drug Delivery and Transport in the Human Brain - Professor Andreas
  Linninger\, Department of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering\, Unive
 rsity of Illinois
DTSTART:20070612T130000Z
DTEND:20070612T140000Z
UID:TALK7555@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Dr. Vassilis S. Vassiliadis
DESCRIPTION:Several treatment modalities for neuro-degenerative diseases o
 r tumors of the central nervous system involve invasive delivery of large 
 molecular weight drugs to the brain. Despite ample experimental efforts\, 
 accurate drug targeting for the human brain remains a challenge. Our inter
 disciplinary research aims at a systematic design process for the targeted
  delivery of therapeutic agents into specific regions of brain based on fi
 rst principles mathematical equations of drug transport and pharmaco-kinet
 ics in porous tissue. The proposed mathematical framework predicts achieva
 ble treatment volumes in the desired regions as a function of target anato
 my and infusion catheter positioning. \n\nWe tackle the three-dimensional 
 optimal catheter placement problem to determine optimal infusion and cathe
 ter design parameters that maximize drug penetration and volumes of distri
 bution in the target area\, while minimizing toxicity in non-targeted regi
 ons. A novel computational approach for determining unknown transport prop
 erties of therapeutic agents from in-vivo imaging data will also be introd
 uced. \n\nWe expect for the near future that rigorous computational approa
 ches like ours will enable physicians and scientists to design and optimiz
 e drug administration in a systematic fashion.
LOCATION:Lecture Theatre 1\, Department of Chemical Engineering
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