People
Jake Brenner, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor and Attending Physician
Pulmonary, Allergy, & Critical Care Division, and
Systems Pharmacology & Translational Therapeutics Department
University of Pennsylvania
I spend 20% of my time attending in the ICU, and 80% developing medical technologies.
Laura Ferguson, MD, MSE, MSTR
Postdoc & Attending Physician, Penn Pulmonary Division
Laura is a pulmonologist with a background in bioengineering. In lab she works on next-generation RBC-hitchhiking of nanocarriers, ex vivo human lung studies of nanocarriers, and development of nanomedicine for interstitital lung disease, her clinical sub-specialty.
Emma Ma
Lab technician / Research Specialist
Emma did her undergraduate at the University of Michigan. She currently works on targeted drug delivery for acute lung diseases, including acute exacerbation of IPF.
Serena Omo-Lamai
PhD Student, Penn Bioengineering
Serena is developing nano-scale drug carriers to deliver small molecule drugs and RNA to the brain, for stroke, traumatic brain injury, and hopefully more.
Manny Patel
Co-op student, Drexel Chemical Engineering
Manny is an undergrad majoring in Chemical Engineering at Drexel. He is doing a 6-month co-op, working full-time in our lab. He will then continue his undergrad research in the lab.
Sahiley Reyes-Esteves, MD, PhD
Resident, Penn Neurology
Sahily is primarily doing clinical work, but is also working on developing targeted nanocarriers for treating acute ischemic stroke.
Kate Rubey, MD
Postdoc & Attending Physician, CHOP Neonatology
Kate is a neonatologist at CHOP, working in the neonatal ICU (NICU), taking care of critically ill infants. In lab she works on nanomedicine for severe infections, especially pneumonia, and the mechanisms by which neutrophils recognize nanoparticles.
Zhicheng Wang, PhD
Postdoc
Zhicheng works on the biophysics of how nanoparticles interact with the blood, and how we can use these principles to engineer better nano-scale therapeutics.
Jichuan Wu, MD, PhD
Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the lab
Jichuan trained in China as a neonatologist (critical care for infants), then worked at Temple University for 15+ years on animal models of acute critical illnesses (ACIs), focused mostly on ARDS and traumatic brain injury. He joined the Brenner Bioengineering Lab in the summer of 2019, and directs animal experiments on ACIs.
Mike Zaleski
PhD Student, Penn Pharmacology
Mike leads a project in collaboration with a pharmaceutical company to create a nanomedicine-based therapeutic for ARDS (acute respiratory distress syndrome).
Marco Zamora
PhD student, Drexel Bioengineering
Marco is working on two projects. The first is the development of a nanomedicine-based therapeutic for ARDS using RNA delivery. The second project involves how the innate immune system interacts with nanocarriers.