KC Mei
Assistant Professor of Molecular Pharmaceutics
mRNA therapeutics; lipid nanoparticles (LNPs); liposomes, RNA delivery; cancer immunotherapy; immune tolerance; dendritic cells; macrophages, hepatocytes, immunometabolism; gene delivery; nanomedicine; CAR T cell therapy; AAV immunogenicity; immunoengineering; tolerogenic vaccines
Biological Chemistry Program
Education
B.Sc. Taipei Medical University
Ph.D. University of London
Research
Dr. Mei’s laboratory focuses on the development of lipid nanoparticle (LNP)-based gene delivery systems for RNA therapeutics, with applications in both immunostimulation (e.g., cancer preventive and therapeutic vaccines) and immunomodulation (e.g., inducing immune tolerance to therapeutic viral vectors, autoantigens, allergens, therapeutic transgenes, and proteins). His research integrates molecular pharmaceutics, immunoengineering, and translational pharmaceutical sciences to enable novel chemoimmunotherapy, gene therapy, and cell therapy approaches.
Additionally, his lab investigates how immunometabolic cues, such as IFN-γ and amino acid deprivation, influence mRNA delivery and translation, and the downstream impact on innate and adaptive immunity. A combination of chemical synthesis, formulation development, high-throughput screening, and in vitro-in vivo disease modeling is used to advance next-generation precision immunotherapies. Current projects include:
- Immunogenic mRNA-LNP platform for cancer immunotherapy using syngeneic tumor models.
- Tolerogenic mRNA-LNP platform to overcome pre-existing and treatment-emergent anti-AAV/transgene immunity.
- Investigating the IFN-γ–IDO1–tryptophan axis in RNA-based immunotherapy.
- Programmable lipid platform design via chemical synthesis for RNA and drug delivery.
References
Selected Publications
- Ma, Z.; Jatyan, R.; Crowley, N.; Girardi, C.; Khan. M.; Smith, A.; Wei, P.-S.; Tsai, Y.-H,; Mei, K.-C. Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics. Under review. Pre-print: bioRxiv 2025.07.10.664160; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.07.10.664160
- Wei, P.-S.; Thota, N.; John, G.; Chang, E.; Lee, S.; Wang, Y.; Ma, Z.; Tsai, Y.-H.; Mei, K.-C. Enhancing RNA-lipid nanoparticle delivery: organ- and cell-specificity and barcoding strategies, Journal of Controlled Release, 2024, 375, 366-388, doi: 10.1016/j.jconrel.2024.08.030
- Mei, K.-C.; Liao, Y.-P.; Jiang, J.; Chiang, M.; Khazaieli, M.; Liu, X.; Wang, X.; Liu, Q.; Chang, C. H.; Zhang, X.; Li, J.; Ji, Y.; Melano, B.; Telesca, D.; Xia, T.; Meng, H.; Nel, A. E. Liposomal delivery of mitoxantrone and a cholesteryl indoximod prodrug provides effective chemo-immunotherapy in multiple solid tumors. ACS Nano, 2020, 14(10), 13343-13366, doi: 10.1021/acsnano.0c05194
- Mei, K.-C.; Stiepel R. T.; Bonacquisti, E. E.; Jasiewicz, N. E.; Chaudhari, A. P.; Tiwade, P. B.; Bachelder, E. M.; Ainslie, K. M.; Fenton, O. S.; Nguyen J. Single-tailed heterocyclic carboxamide lipids for macrophage immune-modulation. Biomaterials Science (RSC), 2023, 11(8), 2693-2698, doi:10.1039/D2BM01804G