Welcome to L.B.N.
Research Fileds
Recreating Biochemistry
Recreating Biochemistry
Over the last million years, Nature has found many powerful solutions to medical diagnostic, targeted drug delivery, and green chemistry. It did so by evolving molecular machines that perform these tasks efficiently, using minimal energy and generating environmentally benign waste products. The LBN’s main task is to recreate mimics of these complex molecular machines using “simple” biopolymer such as DNA. This allows us to uncover the design principles of natural nanomachines that perform, for example, molecular diagnostic and targeted drug delivery in living organisms.
Medical diagnostics
Medical diagnostics
“Medical diagnostics is a $42 billion industry with 85% of testing performed in centralized lab facilities. This industry is beginning to shift towards a more distributed model that allows doctors to test their patients at the point-of-care and have immediate access to their health information in a more clinically relevant time frame. Inspired by natural nanomachines that perform many sensing functions in living organisms, the LBN is now developing new powerful, inexpensive and easy-to-use medical diagnostic devices that will greatly impact Global Health. Examples include, fluorescent probes for cancer imaging and bio-electrochemical devices for the rapid and easy detection of disease markers directly in whole blood.”
Drug delivery
Drug delivery
The cost for discovering, developing and launching a new drug is being estimated to nearly $1.7 billion (www.phrma.org -2003). For many observers, however, the most promising route to achieve major advances in drug development is not through the design of new more efficient drugs but rather to come up with strategies to deliver them at specific tissue locations (for example, at a tumor site). The LBN’s main task is to develop new powerful and inexpensive nanomachines “inspired by Nature” that will deliver drug at defined tissue locations and thus greatly optimize the benefits of current therapies while minimizing their toxic effects.
Green chemistry
Green chemistry
Our laboratory is developing a new generation of smart catalysts “inspired by nature” that are self-regulated by temperature and that can be activated and inhibited via the addition of simple and inexpensive molecules such as DNA.
Recreating Biochemistry
Recreating Biochemistry
Over the last million years, Nature has found many powerful solutions to medical diagnostic, targeted drug delivery, and green chemistry. It did so by evolving molecular machines that perform these tasks efficiently, using minimal energy and generating environmentally benign waste products. The LBN’s main task is to recreate mimics of these complex molecular machines using “simple” biopolymer such as DNA. This allows us to uncover the design principles of natural nanomachines that perform, for example, molecular diagnostic and targeted drug delivery in living organisms.
Medical diagnostics
Medical diagnostics
“Medical diagnostics is a $42 billion industry with 85% of testing performed in centralized lab facilities. This industry is beginning to shift towards a more distributed model that allows doctors to test their patients at the point-of-care and have immediate access to their health information in a more clinically relevant time frame. Inspired by natural nanomachines that perform many sensing functions in living organisms, the LBN is now developing new powerful, inexpensive and easy-to-use medical diagnostic devices that will greatly impact Global Health. Examples include, fluorescent probes for cancer imaging and bio-electrochemical devices for the rapid and easy detection of disease markers directly in whole blood.”
Drug delivery
Drug delivery
The cost for discovering, developing and launching a new drug is being estimated to nearly $1.7 billion (www.phrma.org -2003). For many observers, however, the most promising route to achieve major advances in drug development is not through the design of new more efficient drugs but rather to come up with strategies to deliver them at specific tissue locations (for example, at a tumor site). The LBN’s main task is to develop new powerful and inexpensive nanomachines “inspired by Nature” that will deliver drug at defined tissue locations and thus greatly optimize the benefits of current therapies while minimizing their toxic effects.
Green chemistry
Green chemistry
Our laboratory is developing a new generation of smart catalysts “inspired by nature” that are self-regulated by temperature and that can be activated and inhibited via the addition of simple and inexpensive molecules such as DNA.
Summer 2020
Current Lab Members
Prof. Alexis Vallée-Bélisle
Principal investigator
Associate Professor
Department of Chemistry / Université de Montréal
Dominic Lauzon – Research Associate
Thibaut Babin – Postdoctoral fellow
Xiaomeng Wang – Ph.D. student
Simon Diallo-Blais – M.Sc. student
Yasmine Nicole – M.Sc. student
Ly-Ann Morville – M.Sc. student
Achille Vigneault – M.Sc. student