Engineering foe into friend
What if a centuries-old foe could become a workhorse for drug delivery in the future? Jacquin Niles, an associate professor of biological engineering at MIT, sees potential for such a transformation in what others might consider an unlikely subject: the malaria parasite. Niles’ lab works mainly on eliminating malaria as a disease, but he is taking a radically different approach to the parasite with his project to re-engineer the organism as a vehicle for drug delivery. The project is funded by an Amar G. Bose Grant, which supports high-risk, high-reward research. “It’s the kind of proposal I like,” Niles says. “It lets you be creative, imaginative, and free in your thinking without the constraint of whether a reviewer would consider this too risky or impossible.” Biochemistry and tropical diseases Niles was born in the U.S. Virgin Islands and grew up in the British territory of Anguilla. In high school, he was fascinated by biology,...