Satish N. Nadig, M.D., Ph.D.

Associate Professor
Department: Surgery
Department: Microbiology & Immunology
Programs: Cell Injury, Inflammation, End Organ Disease

 

 

Research Interests:

Immunosuppressant medications carry with them a host of harmful side effects and globally suppress the immune system. Indeed, the systemic consequences of certain drugs are powerful enough to render them underutilized in the perioperative period. However, there is emerging evidence that certain immunosuppressants, such as rapamycin, may be beneficial when delivered directly to a liver allograft. It is postulated that direct graft delivery would attenuate the trafficking ability of passenger leukocytes - and thereby reduce hepatic inflammation. The concept of targeted drug delivery has been the focus of investigative strategies in the oncologic literature; however, immunologists have yet to investigate focused targeted strategies for conventional immunosuppressive agents. Thus, as Director of the Lee Patterson Allen Transplant Immunobiology Laboratory, Dr. Nadig investigates novel innovations to induce tolerance in liver transplantation.

Immunotherapeutics encapsulated in a biologically inert nanoparticle and delivered in a focused manner to an allograft in vivo represents the future of personalized drug delivery in transplantation. The long-term goal of Dr. Nadig’s laboratory is to develop a clinically translatable therapy of targeted drug delivery in the setting of liver transplantation. The objective of this therapy would be to minimize harmful systemic side effects of traditional pharmacotherapies, allowing for the development of a tolerogenic phenotype in solid organ transplant recipients, which may obviate the need for long-term immunosuppression. For instance, the encapsulation of rapamycin in micelle nanoparticles, for the purpose of drug delivery to tumors and lymph nodes in various mouse models, has recently been published as a proof-of-concept. Rapamycin is a hydrophobic compound and an FDA approved immunosuppressant; while rapamycin has a significant side effect profile, particularly in the immediate perioperative period, it is able to confer tolerogenic phenotypes by allowing for the expansion of regulatory T cells in various in vitro and in vivo experimental models.

Publications:

PubMed Collection