I am a physician-scientist with a research interest in engineering advanced small interfering RNA (siRNA) therapeutics for oncology applications and a clinical interest in management of GI cancers, particularly hepatobiliary malignancies. As an Instructor in Hematology/Oncology, the impetus for my research path has arisen from repeated patient encounters where chemotherapy or small molecule therapeutics caused significant adverse effects or failed to produce a durable treatment response in the course of treating advanced cholangiocarcinoma. My background in biomedical engineering has enabled me to use specialized siRNA delivery technologies to solve problems related to tumor targeting and penetration, starting from the design, synthesis, and characterization of tailor-made materials and progressing to pre-clinical animal studies. I conducted my graduate research in the lab of Prof. Sangeeta Bhatia, where my main thesis work involved development of tumor-penetrating peptide-siRNA nanocomplexes for effective delivery of oncogene-targeted siRNA to pancreatic cancer. I additionally worked on several “smart” nanosystems, in which engineered signaling schemes and interaction with the host environment enabled sophisticated behaviors to assist with accumulation of therapeutic at the tumor site or to restore homeostatic regulation of the clotting cascade. My current research in conjunction with the lab of Dr. Craig Duvall brings together my clinical interest in difficult-to-treat biliary tract cancers and research interest in designing the next generation of carrier-free nucleic acid therapeutics, capitalizing on the capabilities of siRNA-lipid conjugates to deliver modular combinations of oncogene-targeted therapeutics. This multidisciplinary and cross-departmental research bridges molecular biology, chemical biology, and biomedical engineering in order to develop and characterize combination siRNA therapeutics for KRAS-mutant biliary tract cancers.