News

Hammond to Head School of Engineering

MIT News

December 5, 2025

The KI proudly shares the announcement of Institute Professor Paula Hammond, ’84, PhD ’93 as MIT’s new Dean of Engineering. A pioneering researcher, dedicated mentor, and highly effective leader, Paula is known for her creative, collaborative, and grounded approaches. She previously served as department head, vice provost for faculty and executive vice provost.  

New immunotherapeutic targets for glioblastoma

MIT Koch Institute

November 26, 2025

Immunotherapies have not proven effective in glioblastoma, a common form of brain tumor that is unusually resistant to infiltration and attack by T cells. Glioblastoma tumors recruit and transform another immune cell, macrophages, to keep T cells at bay. Researchers led by Forest White mapped antigen profiles of macrophages and glioblastoma cells in co-culture, discovering that both types of cells evolved when grown together and identifying several new targets for immunotherapies. The team, which included Stefani Spranger and former KI member Darrell Irvine, developed immunostimulatory therapies to test six candidate target, finding that mouse models of glioblastoma showed significantly slowed tumor growth overall and, in a few cases, tumors were completely eradicated.  The study, published in Cancer Research,  was funded in part by the MIT Center for Precision Cancer Medicine.

Introducing the 2025 Karches Prize winners

November 25, 2025

Congratulations to the winners of the 2025 Peter Karches Mentorship Prize: Fangtao Chi, Emma Dawson, Amy Lee, and Richard Van. The Peter Karches Mentorship Prize is awarded annually to up to four Koch Institute postdocs, graduate students or research technicians who demonstrate exemplary mentorship of undergraduate researchers or high school students in their labs. The prize allows the Koch Institute community to celebrate and recognize the critical role that mentors play, both personally and professionally, in the early stages of a scientist’s career.

Accelerated FDA approval for kidney drug

Endpoints News

November 25, 2025

Congratulations to Ram Sasisekharan on the accelerated FDA approval of the drug sibeprenlimab for treating IgA nephropathy (IgAN), a disease where the build-up of abnormal antibodies impedes the kidney’s ability to filter wastes and often leads to kidney damage and failure. Based on work in the Sasisekharan lab and developed by MIT spin-out Visterra (later acquired by the pharmaceutical company Otsuka), the new drug halves the amount of protein present in urine by targeting a ligand known as APRIL. Continued approval depends on trial data confirming the drug slows the decline of kidney function, due in early 2026.

Alice Hall Named Rhodes Scholar

MIT News

November 17, 2025

Congratulations to Alice Hall on being named a 2026 Rhodes Scholar! A senior majoring in chemical engineering, Hall (pictured, second from left) worked in the Langer Lab to improve lung viability for transplantation by investigating alveolar-capillary barrier function. At Oxford, she will pursue graduate work advancing sustainable heating and cooling technologies

Ankyra doses first patient

Business Wire

November 17, 2025

Ankyra has begun trials of its lead candidate, ANK-101, an anchored IL-12 drug conjugate initially engineered in the Wittrup and former Irvine Labs with support from KI trainee fellowships and the Marble Center for Cancer Nanomedicine. Given in combination with checkpoint blockade immunotherapy, ANK-101 will be evaluated for treatment of patients with lung cancer. 

Predicting Better Lipids

Nature Biotechnology

November 13, 2025

Lipid nanoparticles are the leading delivery vehicle for mRNAs across biomedical applications, each requiring its own nanoparticle design and optimization. In a cover-winning Nature Biotechnology paper, the Anderson and Langer Labs used machine learning approaches to evaluate 1.6 million lipids in silico, to expedite successful designs for mRNA delivery to the lungs in animal models.

Inspired engineering  

MIT News

November 13, 2025

At MIT’s 2025 Nano Summit, KI faculty showcased drug delivery technologies that took design cues from unexpected places to address what MIT HEALS faculty director Angela Koehler calls "some of the most transformative problems in human health." Ana Jaklenec explained how she borrowed techniques from the microelectronics and semiconductor industries to fabricate single-injection, multi-dose vaccine microparticles. Giovanni Traverso highlighted ingestible drug delivery systems inspired by squid and remora.

Near-Perfect Response for Elicio’s Vaccine

Investing.com

November 7, 2025

Elicio Therapeutics’ cancer vaccine—designed to train the immune system to attack KRAS-mutated tumors—continues to show strong promise. In a Phase 2 trial, it induced immune responses in 99% of evaluable pancreatic cancer patients, with 88% responding to their own tumor-specific mutation.

Mini Brains, Major Insights  

MIT News

November 5, 2025

A study led by Robert Langer and Li-Huei Tsai of the Picower Institute, presents “miBrains,” a 3D human brain tissue platform designed for disease modeling and drug testing. Described in PNAS, the customizable, scalable models are cultured from donors’ induced pluripotent stem cells, and integrate all major brain cell types.