What do you get when you cross a mouse with a human liver? An award-winning college inventor.
Alice Chen, a biomedical engineer and graduate student in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences & Technology (HST) and Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), earned the prestigious $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize for her innovative applications of microtechnology to study human health and disease.
A fearless problem solver with a passion for mentorship, Chen is honored alongside three 2011 $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Collegiate Student Prize winners from across the nation.
Chen’s most recent inventive breakthrough – a humanized mouse with a tissue-engineered human liver – is intended to bridge a gap in the drug development pipeline between laboratory animal studies and clinical trials. In drug development, animal models are used as a surrogate to human patients to develop dosing regimens and identify potential dangers to the liver and other organs.
The mouse “becomes a miniature patient with a tissue-engineered liver that behaves like a human’s in many ways,” Chen says, including how the liver breaks down drugs and responds to toxic drug products. Chen’s hope is that her humanized mouse model will ultimately lead to a safer, less expensive and more efficient path for drug testing.
Chen and her colleagues have already begun to screen drug combinations in the mice and study the interactions of the human liver with pathogens such as Hepatitis C and malaria. Although there is a long road before market adoption, pharmaceutical companies are increasingly interested in Chen’s humanized mouse to complement existing drug screening platforms
“Alice Chen’s inventive accomplishments will impact the effectiveness of new therapies. Her passion to tackle problems and create solutions through collaboration and tenacity are qualities that must be celebrated at the collegiate level,” states Joshua Schuler, executive director of the Lemelson-MIT Program. “Much like this year’s winners from Caltech, RPI and UIUC, Alice’s approach to problem-solving proves that with hard work and creativity, it is possible to invent broadly and introduce innovations to the world.”
Chen holds five pending patents and, with her graduate advisor Dr. Sangeeta Bhatia, is also exploring avenues for commercializing her humanized mouse model through a start-up or industrial partnership.
Lemelson-MIT Collegiate Student Prizes
Other winners are:
- Lemelson-MIT Caltech Student Prize winner Guoan Zheng developed an on-chip, inexpensive microscopy imaging technology with many potential applications, including improved diagnostics for malaria and other blood-borne diseases in the developing world and rapid screening of new drugs.
- Lemelson-MIT Illinois Student Prize winner Scott Daigle developed a system that utilizes automatic gear shifting to reduce the efforts exerted by wheelchair operators. Daigle’s company, IntelliWheels, Inc., has an entire suite of products to improve the everyday actions of wheelchair users.
- Lemelson-MIT Rensselaer Student Prize winner Benjamin Clough has demonstrated a new technique that employs sound waves to boost the distance from which researchers can use terahertz spectroscopy to remotely detect hidden explosives, chemicals, and other dangerous materials.
ABOUT THE $30,000 LEMELSON-MIT STUDENT PRIZE
The $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize is awarded annually to an MIT senior or graduate student who has created or improved a product or process, applied a technology in a new way, redesigned a system, or demonstrated remarkable inventiveness in other ways. A distinguished panel of MIT alumni including scientists, technologists, engineers and entrepreneurs chooses the winner.
The Lemelson-MIT Program celebrates outstanding innovators and inspires young people to pursue creative lives and careers through invention.
To date The Lemelson Foundation has donated or committed more than U.S. $150 million in support of its mission. Visit http://web.mit.edu/invent/
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