RWTH: Professor Andreas Herrmann Awarded ERC Advanced Grant
The Scientific Director of the DWI – Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials is developing a new technology platform for controlling the activity of genes, proteins, and active pharmaceutical ingredients using biocompatible ultrasound. He already succeeded in acquiring an ERC Advanced Grant once before, in 2016.
Light is a widely used trigger to control the activity of drugs and the function of proteins. Combining optics with genetics or pharmacology has given rise to new branches of research and application: optogenetics and photopharmacology. Techniques from both research fields have led to promising new therapeutic options, elucidated brain functions, and granted a deeper understanding of neuronal diseases. However, this approach has some limitations that severely hamper significant progress in these areas: the light cannot penetrate into deeper layers of tissue to have an effect there.
This is where the ERC Advanced Grant-funded research by Professor Andreas Herrmann, Scientific Director of the DWI – Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials and holder of the Chair of Macromolecular Materials and Systems at RWTH Aachen University, will come in: In contrast to light or photons, ultrasound can penetrate deep into the tissue. With a resolution in the submillimeter range, this promises new application possibilities, and Andreas Herrmann has already demonstrated the potential of this field of research.
Together with his team, he now wants to develop new control systems for activating active ingredients based on nucleic acids, such as DNA, that can also be therapeutically active in deeper tissue layers of the body. The scientists will design specific DNA-based carrier systems so they can be enriched with bioactive ingredients and are sensitive to ultrasound. When exposed to ultrasound, the carriers will release the encapsulated bioactive compounds, and the drugs are activated, for example, to control cell functions. “We are talking here about ultrasound as it is used in a clinical environment, and that is not harmful to cells or tissue,” explains Andreas Herrmann. “Our aim is to utilize the technology in diabetes research, cancer immunotherapy, and tissue regeneration.”
Andreas Herrmann’s team will be able to focus on its research work for the next five years thanks to the
ERC funding. The European Research Council (ERC) is funding his project “Remote controlling biological systems by sonopharmacology and sonogenetics” (SONOPHARMAGEN) with 2.5 million euros as part of the ERC Advanced Grant. Andreas Herrmann has thus succeeded in acquiring his third ERC grant. He received his first ERC Advanced Grant in 2016 and an ERC Starting Grant in 2009. The ERC Advanced Grants are part of the EU’s Horizon Europe program and are aimed at established top researchers. The grant is among the most prestigious and competitive awards and tools of EU research funding available to researchers.
The basis of the new system for activating active ingredients was developed by Andreas Herrmann as lead scientist together with his colleague Robert Göstl. In 2021, they published their technology for the first time in the renowned journal Nature Chemistry. They have tested them on conventional antibiotics, cancer therapeutics, and blood clotting drugs, among other things. His motivation: Andreas Herrmann wants to make medical treatments as precise and controllable as possible to administer the active ingredients “where it all happens” in the body.
Many drugs such as antibiotics or cancer therapies are used systemically, often leading to severe undesirable side effects and harm to patients. With his research, Andreas Herrmann wants to revolutionize pharmacotherapy and help patients avoid systemic side effects. In addition, therapies can be optimized through specific spatiotemporal release and activation of the active ingredients. With his work, he wants to help establish and put the new research field of so-called “sonopharmacology” on the map.