NIH MIRA R35 Award to Advance Living Cellular Probes for Ultrasound Imaging and Immunomodulation Technologies
BioE Assistant Professor Tao Sun was awarded a $1.99 million NIH R35 Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA) to develop ultrasound-controllable, multimodal imaging cellular probes and complementary ultrasound imaging technologies, enabling real-time tracking and modulation of inflammation dynamics and advancing precision medicine across a range of diseases.
Sun, who is an assistant professor of Bioengineering and a core faculty member of the Institute for Chemical Imaging of Living Systems, received the award under the Early-Stage Investigator (ESI) track. The MIRA-ESI program supports promising early-career scientists poised to lead innovative, impactful research in the biomedical sciences.
Sun’s award will support the development of a novel class of living, cell-based imaging probes that are ultrasound-controllable and multimodal-responsive. These engineered immune cell systems are designed to function as both biosensors and actuators—responding to focused ultrasound stimuli while dynamically reporting on their location and functional state through multiple imaging platforms. This approach promises to significantly enhance the precision, control, and real-time monitoring of immunotherapies and cell-based interventions across a wide range of diseases.
In parallel, the SUN Lab is also advancing the technical frontiers of ultrasound imaging, including novel device architectures and passive acoustic localization algorithms. These innovations have already led to patent filings and forthcoming publications, particularly in array signal processing and cavitation imaging. This complementary technical thrust strengthens the lab’s capacity to design, visualize, and interpret the behavior of engineered cellular probes in vivo—directly supporting the goals of the R35 project.
Receiving this award in 2025 is especially meaningful given the increasingly competitive federal funding climate. The R35-ESI mechanism provides stable, flexible support that enables early-stage investigators to pursue bold, interdisciplinary research directions with long-term impact.
“This support from NIH/NIGMS allows us to move boldly—engineering living systems that can interact with external energy and reveal their biology, while also building the devices and algorithms to see them clearly. It’s an exciting time to unify cellular engineering, imaging, and immunotherapy.”
BioE Assistant Professor Tao Sun
Sun was previously featured by Research at Northeastern for his work using focused ultrasound to overcome barriers to brain drug delivery.
To learn more about the SUN Lab’s research and team, visit: https://sunlab-ultrasound.github.io
This article originally appeared on Northeastern Global News. It was published by Kate Rix. Main photo: Switching macrophages to their inflammatory state creates a conducive one for treatment, says assistant professor of biological engineering Tao Sun. Photo by Matthew Modoono/Northeastern University.
Northeastern researchers unleash ultrasound waves on the brain in bid to battle tumors
Researchers at Northeastern University are using ultrasound to pair voracious debris-clearing blood cells with microscopic bubbles to control the immune system’s response to disease in the brain and beyond.
Focused on ultra-hungry white blood cells called macrophages, assistant professor of biological engineering Tao Sun is harnessing the macrophage’s appetite for cellular trash to find tumors and diseased cells in the body and, with help from tiny excited bubbles, alert other immune cells to the fight.
“Scientists like to use the word ‘plastic’ to describe macrophages,” says Sun. “They change their behaviors all the time. They can be big fighters. They can also be resting, doing nothing, like a couch potato.”
This very changeability, Sun says, makes macrophages potent tools in the fight against cancer and other inflammation associated diseases. Sun’s most recent work, funded with $1.99 million through a Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award from the National Institutes of Health, is studying ways to inject tiny bubbles into the bloodstream and, after the bubbles latch on to macrophages, use ultrasound waves to control the bubbles.
Since ultrasound waves create real-time images, scientists will be able to see what’s happening inside the macrophage — an imaging breakthrough — and remotely change macrophage behavior. They can also track the cells as they move through the body.
Read full story at Northeastern Global News