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Mentor: Eric Appel, Materials Science & Engineering

Dr. Appel’s research group integrates chemistry, materials science, and biology to study advanced materials and their biomedical applications, specifically Polymer-Nanoparticle (PNP) hydrogels. Victoria is using these PNP hydrogels as a depot for subunit vaccine components. Normally, vaccines require repeated exposures and may cause adverse symptoms as a response. Subunit vaccines in PNP hydrogels only utilize a small portion of the antigen, which is released over an extended time period, to produce the same immune defense. Subunit vaccines in PNP hydrogels can be applied either to pathogenic diseases or as a therapeutic cancer treatment.