1. 2/4/09Stanford iGEM 2009 Meeting #4 by Robert Ovadia Robert Ovadia’s 5x5 Engineering Viruses

2. 2/4/09Stanford iGEM 2009 Meeting #4 by Robert Ovadia The Problem 2 Cancer Too many cancers: lung, liver, stomach, skin… the list goes on Brain Tumors Over 200,000 people are diagnosed yearly (Central Brain Tumor Reg. of the US 2005) Current therapy is costly and not effective

3. 2/4/09Stanford iGEM 2009 Meeting #4 by Robert Ovadia The Solution 3 Brain Tumors The brain is isolated from the immune system (Blood brain barrier) If we engineered a microbe, could it really survive? Probably not… Most living organisms (except our cells) couldn’t survive in the brain, and if it did, it would be damaging to us.

4. 2/4/09Stanford iGEM 2009 Meeting #4 by Robert Ovadia The Solution 4 Brain Tumors Engineer a virus Viruses are an ideal in targeting cells and delivering a gene EX: Genentech’s Pulmozyme ® EX: Vesicular Stomach Virus (VSV) by Dr. Van de pol of Yale

5. 2/4/09Stanford iGEM 2009 Meeting #4 by Robert Ovadia The Solution 5 Brain Tumor - 5 Projects 1.Target brain tumors 2.Regulation 3.Delivery 4.Marker 5.______ NOTE: The idea of engineering viruses is open to ALL ideas! We don’t have to do cancer.