Santanu Bhattacharya, Ph.D.

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SUMMARY

Santanu Bhattacharya, Ph.D., has multidisciplinary training and research expertise in nanotechnology, biophysics and cancer biology. Nanotechnology and the use of nanostructures have enormous promise in biomedical applications. Interests and investments in the application of nanotechnology in medicine are growing and progressing at a rapid pace, bringing a new field of research — nanomedicine.

Focus areas

• Tumor-specific targeted drug delivery. This area shows promise to override the challenges with chemotherapeutics and improve therapeutic outcomes. Dr. Bhattacharya is engineering novel, bio-friendly nanomaterials to deliver chemotherapeutics to pancreatic and other cancers.
• Nanotheranostic platforms. A lack of tools for real-time assessment during and after treatment of complicated diseases such as cancer leads to poor mortality and morbidity rates. Dr. Bhattacharya is developing nanotheranostic platforms to facilitate targeted drug delivery and monitor real-time disease progression during and after treatment.
• Molecular signatures of disease. Dr. Bhattacharya is involved in the understanding of biophysical properties such as stiffness, molecular signature and molecular structure in regard to complex disease processes.

Significance to patient care

Dr. Bhattacharya's research in nanomedicine offers promise for real-time disease detection with sensitivity many times higher than traditional therapies, and targeted drug delivery with significantly reduced toxicity and increased efficacy. The advancement of research in this field has established that nanomaterials are often superior in function compared with the conventional tools used for the detection, diagnosis and prognosis of diseases.