University of Washington
Seattle, United States
For over 20 years, Dr. Stella have been studying the therapeutic value of small molecules for the treatment of various devastating diseases of the brain. To better understand the mechanism of action (MOA) of small molecules, their target and biological responses, his laboratory leverages pharmacological and genetics approaches applied at the molecular, cellular and in vivo (rodents) levels.
ST compounds were developed in my laboratory at the University of Washington and shown to exhibit promising therapeutic index for the treatment of select cancer indications, including glioblastomas. The labs recent publications enhanced our understanding of the MOA of this new series of compounds by showing that they modulate microtubule dynamics, pass the blood brain barrier and show significant efficacy in preclinical mouse models. Medicinal chemistry effort led to the development of several ST-compounds (including ST-401) that have nanomolar activity at microtubules and killing glioblastomas.
Over the years, Dr. Stella has developed scientific expertise in cancer biology and neuroscience, as well as in drug discovery, drug target identification and preclinical studies. My technical expertise spans from analytical chemistry (GC-MS and LC-MS), pharmacology (e.g. pharmacodynamics and target validation), biochemistry (e.g. signaling and enzymatic activities), molecular biology (forward and reverse genetics), cell biology (e.g. live cell imaging), semi-quantitative immunohistochemistry, molecular imaging, pharmacokinetics to experimental toxicology and behavior analysis.
Since starting his laboratory at the University of Washington in 1999, Dr. Stella has mentored 10 graduate students and 9 post-doctoral fellows. He held continuous NIH funding since 2000, published over 70 paper in journal such as Nature and Science, and has several issued patents. In 2019, Dr. Stella was elected member of the Washington State Academy of Sciences.