Nanocarriers: Proof of Concept Grant for Olivia Merkel

Olivia Merkel, Professor of Drug Delivery at LMU’s Department of Pharmacy has been awarded a Proof of Concept (PoC) Grant by the European Research Council. Her new project builds on insights from her ERC Consolidator Grant project. Through the PoC program, the European Research Council helps researchers translate their research findings into practice.

Olivia Merkel researches novel nanocarrier systems for the targeted local delivery of drugs. Her work focuses on the therapeutic use of RNA molecules that silence genes involved in disease pathogenesis in specific cell types or that can express therapeutic genes. Although these so-called RNA therapeutics hold enormous potential, their development is hindered by slow, expensive, Edisonian nanocarrier development approaches. Moreover, these processes often have poor transferability from in-vitro to in-vivo settings. Current strategies rely largely on trial and error in which only one factor is varied at a time. “This often leads to only marginal improvements and is therefore very time-consuming,” says Olivia Merkel. “In addition, it’s rarely possible to administer these therapeutics to organs beyond the liver, where the active agents often accumulate.”

Integrated platform combining machine learning and molecular dynamics

Her project ALINA – Active-Learning Inference for Nucleic Acid Delivery, which has been awarded an ERC Proof of Concept Grant, tests a new conceptual approach for an integrated platform combining machine learning and molecular dynamics. The goal is to accelerate the design and optimization of formulations for RNA-loaded lipid nanoparticles such that significantly fewer experiments will be required. Ultimately, the team will create an industry-relevant version of the ALINA platform that can demonstrate, based on quantitative reference values, that it works faster and with higher predictive accuracy than existing methods.

“ALINA will enable faster, more precise development of RNA therapeutics while using fewer resources, and will make it possible to target organs beyond the liver,” says Merkel. “The project could thus remove a key bottleneck in the sector.” At the same time, it will accelerate the broader adoption of data-driven nanocarrier development approaches in biotechnology and pharmaceutical research. This could benefit between two and four million patients annually.

Olivia Merkel studied pharmacy at Marburg University, where she also completed her doctorate. From 2009 to 2011, she worked as a postdoc in Marburg and then as a tenure-track professor at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. Since October 2015, she has been Professor of Drug Delivery at LMU’s Department of Pharmacy.