Leena Kontturi

Tutkimuksen ja opetuksen kuvaus

My research interests include different advanced drug delivery systems, especially nanoscale systems enabling intracellular delivery of drugs. I am currently working in a project on stimuli-responsive drug delivery vehicles. These lipid nanoparticle carriers, liposomes, can be induced to release the drug with exposition to light and change in pH after cell uptake. These light triggerable and pH-sensitive liposomes would enable time- and site-controlled drug delivery, thus allowing refined treatment regimens and reducing drug exposition of non-target cells. Drug delivery via these stimuli-responsive liposomes would provide improved delivery methods for the treatment of, for instance, diseases of the posterior eye (such as age-related macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy) that currently need to be treated with frequent, invasive intravitreal injections.