Designing a transdermal microprojection array for allergic immunotherapy
Allergic Immunotherapy has been successfully implemented for over 100 years now and yet patient compliance is significantly low. This is due to the lengthy 3-5 year protocol currently used consisting of up to 100 subcutaneous injections or expensive sublingual tablets that need to be taken daily. Additionally, subcutaneous therapy is risky and could cause a deadly anaphylactic shock.
To combat these unappealing, expensive and dangerous aspects of allergy immunotherapy my research aims to develop a microprojection array patch to replace current administration routes. My hypothesis states that delivering allergen therapy to the epidermis of the skin using a microprojection array will require less dose and fewer administrations. This is supported by the known population of Langerhans cells and regulatory T cells found in the epidermal/dermal skin layers. Both cells have been shown to amount a tolerogenic response to allergen, ideal for successful therapy. My current results with a 2 minute microprojection array show promise for dose reduction and fewer applications using a ovalbumin based mouse model.
Nicole completed her BSc in Biochemistry and Genetics at the University of Queensland in 2010. She was then awarded a first class honors in Neuroscience by the Queensland Brain Institute in 2011. Afterwards, Nicole worked for three years in a start up company, Vaxxas, as a Biological Scientist. Since then she has been completing her PhD at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology.