Creation of a 3-way RNA Junction for Therapeutic Application

In my internship site, we are focused primarily on the synthesis and therapeutic application of one type of artificial nucleic acid molecules – the mirror-image DNA and RNA molecules. These structures are created by using organic chemistry and solid-phase synthesis by DNA/RNA synthesizer. The practical application of these molecules deals with using the mirror-image RNA to build a nanoparticle that can circulate in a living organism in a stable state with low toxicity. This would be used as a gene therapy to specifically target and deliver a drug into breast cancer cells in an effort to see suppression of the cancer cells in the body.

Supervisor: Wen Zhang, Ph.D 
Department: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology