BME Seminar Series: Dr. Heather Sheardown, McMaster University

Heather Sheardown PhD, PEng, FCAE
Professor and Canada Research Chair in Ophthalmic Biomaterials
Associate Director, Fraunhofer Project Centre for Biomedical Engineering and Advanced Manufacturing
Department of Chemical Engineering
McMaster University
 

Abstract: 

​"Changing the paradigms of ophthalmic drug delivery"

As the population, the incidence of ocular conditions including age related macular degeneration and glaucoma is increasing. Meanwhile, with higher numbers of patients suffering from diabetes, so too is the incidence of diabetic ocular complications.  Many of these patients require ongoing treatment to control the disease.  In the case of glaucoma for example, this involves daily instillation of eyedrops into the eye.  Yet current methods of delivering drugs to the eye, including eyedrops and injections into the back of the eye, in addition to being onerous for the patient, are time consuming for the physician, and are extremely efficient.  Therefore, to better treat ocular diseases, new methods of delivering drugs to the eye are necessary. The talk will describe new polymeric drug delivery devices that are designed around the currently accepted methods of delivering drugs to the eye, but with a goal of prolonging the duration between drug instillations.  New eyedrop formulations for front of the eye delivery as well as injectable polymer systems for delivery to the back of the eye will be described.

Bio:

Heather Sheardown is a Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering with a cross appointment to the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine and an adjunct appointment with the School of Optometry at the University of Waterloo.  She holds a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Ophthalmic Biomaterials and Drug Delivery and has published more than 140 peer reviewed papers on this subject.  She is currently the Scientific Director of C20/20, an ORF funded incubator aimed at the commercialization of ophthalmic biotechnologies. Sheardown was previously the Scientific Director of the 20/20 NSERC Ophthalmic Materials Research Network which brought together 12 researchers and more than 10 companies aimed at the early stage development of novel materials based treatments for ophthalmic conditions.  Sheardown is the Associate Director of Biomedical Engineering and Advanced Manufacturing (BEAM), a McMaster partnership with the Fraunhofer IZI which partners with companies for incubation and commercialization of cell based therapies, diagnostics and biomaterials.  She holds 18 patents or provisional patents and is currently the Chief Scientific Officer of 20/20 OptimEyes, a McMaster based spin out focused on developing and commercializing a micelle based technology developed in her laboratory.  She runs a large and vibrant research group with more than 10 post doctoral fellows, and graduate students.