Transporting, targeting, and communicating: Three essential tasks for modern cancer-fighting microrobots
Prof. Sylvain Martel
Dept. of Computer Engineering and Software Engineering
Polytechnique Montreal
Abstract: Compared to modern cancer therapies, medical microrobots can significantly improve transport and targeting of therapeutics in deeper and specific tumoral regions that can optimize the therapeutic outcomes while avoiding systemic toxicity. But to do so, a level of autonomy beyond technological feasibility at such a small scale must be embedded in each microrobot. One approach to implement such highly technological microrobots is to use self-propelled magneto-aerotactic bacteria operating under computer control. Beyond transporting therapeutic payloads closer to viable cancer cells, communications between such microrobots and certain immune cells prove to be essential to enhance further the resulting therapeutic outcomes. This talk will provide a brief introduction of the use of specific microbial cells and therapeutic molecules to trigger such communication to yield an increase of the therapeutic efficacy through a synergistic chemo-immunotherapeutic interaction.
Speaker’s Bio: Professor Sylvain Martel is Director of the Nanorobotics Laboratory and Professor in the Department of Computer and Software Engineering and the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at Polytechnique Montréal, Campus of the University of Montréal, as well as Adjunct Professor in the Department of Bioengineering at McGill University. He is Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering, Fellow Engineers Canada, as well as IEEE Fellow. He received many awards mostly in interdisciplinary research. While at the Department of Electrical Engineering and the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at McGill University and later in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) prior to join Polytechnique Montréal, he developed several biomedical technologies including platforms for remote surgeries, cardiac mapping systems, and new types of brain implants for decoding neuronal activities in the motor cortex. Dr. Martel’s interdisciplinary research group is credited for the first demonstration of the controlled navigation of an untethered object in the blood vessel of a living animal. Since 2001, Prof. Martel’s research aims at developing new technologies for cancer therapy that enable the delivery of therapeutics directly to active cancer cells to maximize the therapeutic outcomes while minimizing toxicity for the patients. Prof. Martel is recognized worldwide as a pioneered and leading authority in the development of navigable therapeutic agents and novel interventional platforms for cancer therapy.