Inspired by the human immune system that is constantly developing antibodies to combat pathogens, University of Illinois researchers in the lab of chemistry professor Angad P. Mehta are using synthetic biology and synthetic immunology methods to develop new antibodies and medical treatments with the hope of combating viruses, drug-resistant bacteria, and cancer.
To support this work, the Ono Pharma Foundation has awarded Prof. Mehta just over $1 million in funding for three years from the Ono Pharma Breakthrough Science Initiative Awards Program. Mehta is one of three 2025 Ono Initiative award recipients, who now join the list of previous award recipients that began in 2017.
The Foundation supports academic research projects with the potential for significant impact on therapeutic approaches to disease and pain management. The Ono Initiative supports high-risk and high-reward science research projects that possess potential for new scientific discoveries and solutions, and ultimately, breakthrough treatments for patients.
Mehta is the T.M. Balthazor Faculty Scholar and an assistant professor of chemistry who uses synthetic biology and synthetic immunology for answering fundamental molecular questions in evolution and for developing novel therapeutic strategies. Mehta said antibodies have demonstrated remarkable potential as therapeutics, and one of the best-selling drugs in the last two years is an antibody, Keytruda, that is used for cancer treatments.
But there are many challenges in developing antibodies and biologics as human therapeutics, he explained.
To overcome several of the current challenges in developing antibodies and biologics for human drugs, the Mehta lab is using synthetic biology and synthetic immunology approaches to design new platforms for rapidly developing new therapeutic antibodies and biologics.
This new project funded by the Ono Pharma Foundation is built on the progress that the Mehta lab made as a part of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Emerging Pathogens Initiative project that was launched in the Mining for anti-infectious Molecules from Genomes theme at the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology under the leadership of Prof. Wilfred van der Donk, Mehta said.
“For the studies funded by Ono Pharma Foundation, we are developing in vitro immune-like systems that can rapidly evolve therapeutically relevant proteins like antibodies or antibody fragments. Particularly, we will engineer and fine tune human immune cells as chassis for continuous laboratory evolution and biologics development,” he said.
His lab will be combining this technology with single-cell/single-molecule sequencing and machine learning to accelerate the development of biologics. In addition to developing therapeutics, Mehta said their investigations will also provide a roadmap for using these technologies to develop biologics targeting emerging pathogens and human diseases like autoimmune diseases and cancers.