Bowen LI

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Bowen LI

Bowen LI

@BowenLi_Lab

Asst. Prof. @UofT | Canada Research Chair in RNA Vaccines & Therapeutics | GlaxoSmithKline Chair in Drug Delivery & Pharmaceutics

Beigetreten Ekim 2012
176 Folgt863 Follower
Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
We did test repeated dosing with three administrations over days 0-7, showing excellent epithelial selectivity with minimal off-target effects in immune and endothelial cells, which is a significant advantage over systemically dosed LNP approaches. The strong targeting of basal cells (44% in proximal airways), the epithelial progenitor pool, provides a biological basis for durable correction through successive waves of airway renewal. We haven't pursued long-term functional persistence studies because the G542X CF mouse model has severe gastrointestinal dysfunction that limits lifespan to weeks (lung-specific base editing cannot address this systemic phenotype).
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Wei Zhao
Wei Zhao@zhaoweiasu·
@BowenLi_Lab @NatureMaterials Very cool study of inhalable LNP delivered ABE8e to correct the G542X mutation in CF mice. Is this approach redosable? And how about the distributions in lungs and durability?
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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
Excited to share our latest work just published in @NatureMaterials on inhaled base editing for cystic fibrosis (CF).🫁 Read the full paper here: lnkd.in/eZbwT9eJ While CRISPR-based therapies hold immense potential, delivering these large molecular machineries to the lung has remained a significant challenge due to the complex airway mucus barrier and the need for high-efficiency transfection in target epithelial cells. To address this, we developed a modular platform to rapidly synthesize chemically diverse ionizable lipids. It allows us to incorporate both proteinogenic and non-proteinogenic alpha-amino acids, thereby creating biodegradable lipids with high structural diversity. 🔬 Key Highlights from the Study: 1. Lead Candidate CHCha-10: Through high-throughput screening, we identified CHCha-10, a cyclohexyl amino acid-derived lipid that forms nanoparticles with superior mucus penetration and epithelial-specific transfection. 2. Validation in Ferret Models: Beyond mouse studies, we evaluated CHCha-10 LNPs in juvenile ferrets, a gold-standard model for human lung disease. Our platform achieved robust, widespread editing in the airway epithelium and critical submucosal glands, which are essential sites for CFTR production. 3. Restoring Function in CF: By delivering adenine base editor (ABE) mRNA via inhalation to target the CFTR G542X mutation, we achieved over 12% on-target editing in CF mice. This led to a significant increase in CFTR protein expression and restored chloride channel function in patient-derived HBE cells and intestinal organoids. 4. Safety and Specificity: CHCha-10 LNPs demonstrated an improved biocompatibility profile with minimal off-target delivery to immune or endothelial cells compared to existing benchmarks. This work establishes a translatable, non-viral platform for RNA-based pulmonary gene correction, moving us a step closer to precise, durable treatments for genetic respiratory disorders. Huge thanks to my incredible co-authors and collaborators at the University of Toronto, SickKids, University of Iowa, Case Western, and across the network for their dedication to this project, and for the support from @CF_Foundation @CIHR_IRSC @NSERC_CRSNG @NIH @CFCanada @UofTPharmacy @UofTPRiME @UHN
Princess Margaret Cancer Centre Research@PMResearch_UHN

Our scientists developed an amino acid–based lipid nanoparticle, inhalable to deliver mRNA into the lung, which corrected cystic fibrosis mutations in preclinical models, opening ways to treat genetic lung diseases. Led by @BowenLi_Lab @UHN @UofTPharmacy nature.com/articles/s4156…

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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
Congratulations #TeamUHN Thanks for your great leadership! @bradwouters @KevinSmithUHN
Bo Wang@BoWang87

🚨 Historic moment for Canadian healthcare 🚨 University Health Network (@UHN ) just reached a new global milestone! According to Newsweek’s World’s Best Hospitals 2026 ranking: 🏥 Toronto General Hospital — #2 in the world (highest ever for a Canadian hospital) 🎗 Princess Margaret Cancer Centre — #1 oncology program in Canada 🏥 Toronto Western Hospital — Top 10 in Canada ♿ Toronto Rehab & West Park Healthcare Centre — Canada’s largest rehabilitation & complex care network 🎓 Michener Institute of Education — Canada’s only dedicated applied health sciences university What makes UHN special isn’t a single hospital — it’s the integrated model: Care + research + education, operating as one system. Bench to bedside. Innovation to deployment. Over the past six years, as Chief AI scientist of UHN, I’ve had a front-row seat to how this system works from the inside — clinicians, scientists, trainees, and staff moving together with a shared mission. This ranking reflects something real: World-class medicine is happening in Toronto. At scale. For everyone. Congratulations #TeamUHN 🇨🇦🏆 @KevinSmithUHN @bradwouters

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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
LUMI-lab is out today in @CellCellPress! 🚀We built a self-driving lab that closes the loop between an AI foundation model + robotics to accelerate lipid nanoparticle (LNP) discovery for mRNA delivery. Free access to the manuscript: authors.elsevier.com/a/1mg4aL7PXy21V Code available on GitHub: github.com/bowenli-lab/LU… Check the video here: youtube.com/watch?v=POOgIi… LUMI-lab (Large-scale Unsupervised Modeling followed by Iterative experiments) is a self-driving laboratory that tightly closes the loop between an AI foundation model and automated robotics to accelerate LNP discovery for mRNA delivery. To tackle data scarcity in emerging mRNA delivery domains, we pretrained the model on 28M+ molecular structures, then iteratively improved it with closed-loop experimental data. This is the kind of workflow we believe can meaningfully expand the accessible chemical space for next-generation RNA medicines. In this work, across ten active-learning cycles, LUMI-lab synthesized and evaluated 1,700+ new LNPs and unexpectedly identified a new design feature for efficient delivery: brominated lipid tails. These brominated-tail ionizable lipids delivered mRNA into human lung cells more efficiently than approved benchmarks, despite representing only a small fraction of the initial chemical space explored. Huge thanks to our team @YueXu1995, @HAOTIANCUI1, Kuan Pang, Reagan Li, and collaborator @BoWang87 at @UofT and @PMResearch_UHN, and to @acceleration_c @CIHR_IRSC @NSERC_CRSNG @InnovationCA @GSK for supporting this platform. #mRNA #LNP #AI #SelfDrivingLab @bradwouters @EricTopol @elonmusk
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Princess Margaret Cancer Centre Research@PMResearch_UHN

Our researchers @UHN & @UofTPharmacy have developed a platform called LUMI-lab, driven by AI and robotics, to automate and accelerate the design and evaluation of lipid nanoparticles, for delivering mRNA medicine into human cells. @BowenLi_Lab @BoWang87 cell.com/cell/fulltext/…

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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
Our @NatureNano paper is out! 📄 rdcu.be/eNf4e We built a programmable mRNA 🧬 platform that can be customized to induce tumor-selective immunogenic cell death with minimal toxicity, turning cold tumors hot and sensitizing them to immunotherapy. 🎯@UofTNews @UHN
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Bo Wang
Bo Wang@BoWang87·
How can generative AI and Robotics help advance drug discovery？ 🚀 Excited to introduce LUMI-lab! A foundation model-driven Self-Driving Lab (SDL) for autonomous ionizable lipid discovery in mRNA delivery 🤖🔍 🔬 What is LUMI-lab? LUMI-lab integrates molecular foundation models with autonomous robotic experiments to efficiently explore new LNPs (lipid nanoparticles, mRNA delivery vehicles) with minimal wet-lab data. 🔥 Key Highlights: - 🧠 Foundation model trained on 28M molecules using a three-step strategy: - Unsupervised pretraining to capture broad molecular knowledge - Continual pretraining to specialize in lipid-like molecules - Active learning fine-tuning within a closed-loop experimental system - 🤖 1,700+ new LNPs synthesized & tested across 10 iterative cycles - 🧪 Brominated lipids autonomously identified as a novel structural feature that enhances mRNA transfection—an insight previously unrecognized in LNP design - 🏆 20.3% in vivo CRISPR gene editing efficiency in lung epithelial cells—the highest reported for inhaled LNPs 🚀 Why it matters? LNPs are the backbone of mRNA therapeutics, yet discovery has been slow due to data scarcity. LUMI-lab shows that AI-powered autonomous labs can accelerate mRNA delivery innovation🚀💡 🌐 Beyond mRNA drugs, LUMI-lab exemplifies a scalable framework for AI-driven molecular discovery, pushing boundaries in material science & drug delivery. 📜 Read the preprint: 🔗 biorxiv.org/content/10.110… 💻 Code available on GitHub: 🔗 github.com/bowenli-lab/LU… #AI #DrugDiscovery #mRNA #LNP #SyntheticBiology 🙏 A huge team effort behind this work, with special appreciation to @BowenLi_Lab for driving the project. Kudos to @HAOTIANCUI1, @YueXu1995, @KKuanPang, @Gen_Li_Reagan, and @GongFangli36418!
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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
Whenever work feels overwhelming, reading a sweet comment from a student on a course evaluation instantly brightens my day. 😇
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Wei Tao
Wei Tao@WeiTaoLab·
Thankful to @LEOFondet for funding us on scarless wound healing with mRNA nanomedicine. @BrighamResearch @harvardmed My postdocs Soohwan and Qimanguli led this proposal. We will also have postdoc position openings in the coming months. Please keep an eye on it if interested!
LEO Foundation - LEO Fondet@LEOFondet

The LEO Foundation awards DKK 44 million to 12 pioneering skin research projects. Dive into the projects of three of our grantees – @Ole_B_Pedersen, Rebecca Deprez-Poulain and @WeiTaoLab – and get an overview of all 12 projects 👉 leo-foundation.org/en/2024/08/22/…

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Suman Bose
Suman Bose@_SumanB·
Grateful to receive the #R35 #MIRA Award from @NIGMS, which will support our work on developing safer and more effective cell therapies at @MayoClinic. If you are excited about cell therapies, biomaterials, or bioelectronic implants, take a look at our lab and consider applying!
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Peter Liu MD
Peter Liu MD@PeterPLiu_MD·
Honoured to received the 2024 Canadian Chinese Legends Award, together with luminaries like Adrienne Clarkson (@APClarkson), 26th Governor General of Canada (@GGCanada), a "true legend and trailblazer". Award recognizes transformation of challenges into achievements for Canada.
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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
Excited to share that our lab has been awarded an R01 grant to develop pulmonary gene editing systems. Thanks @NIH for funding our work @UofTPharmacy @UofT @UHN_Research. We have multiple postdoc positions open. Interested candidates can email me at bw.li@utoronto.ca
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Bowen LI
Bowen LI@BowenLi_Lab·
Our 1st-gen AI-guided LNP engineering platform (AGILE) for mRNA delivery is online @NatureComms now. The 2nd-gen platform will come out soon. Stay tuned! @UofTPharmacy @UofT_TCAIREM @UofTPRiME @UHN_Research @PMResearch_UHN @UofT
Bo Wang@BoWang87

Thrilled to announce that our AGILE framework, an AI-guided LNP development for mRNA delivery, is now published in @NatureComms! 🎉 This is a collaborative work with @BowenLi_lab. (Re-)Introducing the AGILE Platform: A Deep Learning-Powered Approach to Accelerate LNP Development for mRNA Delivery! This groundbreaking platform is revolutionizing mRNA therapy with #AI and combinatorial chemistry. **Highlights:** 1. Synthesized a huge chemical diversity of ionizable lipids using the Ugi three-component reaction, enabling unprecedented molecular variety. ⚛️ 2. Utilized self-supervised learning on a vast virtual library of 60k lipids to equip the AGILE model with a broad understanding of lipid characteristics, followed by supervised fine-tuning on 1.2k experimental data points from @BowenLi_lab, refining the model's capability to pinpoint high-potential candidates. This approach combines the best of computational and experimental insights. 🧪 3. Performed comprehensive in silico lipid screening with the AGILE model, allowing for precise and efficient identification of optimal lipid candidates. 🧠 4. Adaptable to various cell lines, ensuring broad applicability across different therapeutic contexts. This versatility makes AGILE a powerful tool for a wide range of mRNA delivery applications. 🧬 AGILE dramatically accelerates the development process, reducing timelines from months or even years to mere weeks! ⏱️ This rapid advancement opens up new possibilities for mRNA-based therapies, potentially leading to quicker responses to emerging health challenges. 📚 Access the paper on Nature Comm: nature.com/articles/s4146… Code: github.com/bowang-lab/AGI… This breakthrough exemplifies the platform's potential to drive innovation and enhance the efficacy of mRNA delivery systems. Shoutout to the three amazing students York (@YueXu1995), Rex (@RexMa9) and Haotian (@HAOTIANCUI1 ) who co-lead this project!🧑‍🎓 Join us in celebrating this leap forward in mRNA delivery technology! The future of medicine is here, and it’s powered by cutting-edge AI and pioneering scientific collaboration. #mRNA #LNP #AI #CombinatorialChemistry #Biotechnology @UHN_Research @researchuoft @VectorInst @PMResearch_UHN @UHNAIHUB

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Guizhi (Julian) Zhu
Guizhi (Julian) Zhu@gzzhujoy·
Glad to share another R01 to develop/study circRNA for cancer immunotherapy. Calling for postdoc applications from background in RNA/DNA chemistry/engineering/biology/therapeutics. Appreciate so much support for our team from @nci @UMichPharmacy @UMRogelCancer @UMBiointerfaces
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@NatureMaterials @CF_Foundation @CIHR_IRSC @NSERC_CRSNG @NIH @CFCanada @UofTPharmacy @UofTPRiME