Andrew M. Smith

About

Andrew M. Smith is a Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, holding the Donald Biggar Willett Faculty Scholar title. He earned his B.S. in Chemistry and Ph.D. in Bioengineering from Georgia Institute of Technology in 2002 and 2008, respectively. His research focuses on bio-micro and nanotechnology, with primary interests in cancer biology, intravital microscopy, live-cell imaging, nanomaterials, nanoparticle bioimaging probes, quantum dots, and single-molecule imaging. Smith has contributed to chapters in books on nanomedicine and nanotheranostics, and has published extensively in scientific journals on topics such as quantum dot synthesis, nanoparticle imaging, and targeted therapeutics. He is involved in multiple research initiatives related to cancer biology, molecular diagnostics, and targeted therapeutics, and holds faculty positions in the divisions of Nutritional Sciences, Medicine, and Technology Entrepreneurship at UIUC. His work emphasizes the development of advanced imaging techniques and nanomaterials for biomedical applications, particularly in cancer research and molecular diagnostics.

Research topics

• Materials science
• Optics
• Chemistry
• Optoelectronics
• Physics
• Computer Science
• Biology
• Biophysics
• Nanotechnology
• Biochemistry

Selected publications

• Macrophage-specific inhibition of the histone demethylase JMJD3 decreases STING and pathologic inflammation in diabetic wound repair

  Cellular and Molecular Immunology · 2022-09-20 · 137 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Macrophage plasticity is critical for normal tissue repair following injury. In pathologic states such as diabetes, macrophage plasticity is impaired, and macrophages remain in a persistent proinflammatory state; however, the reasons for this are unknown. Here, using single-cell RNA sequencing of human diabetic wounds, we identified increased JMJD3 in diabetic wound macrophages, resulting in increased inflammatory gene expression. Mechanistically, we report that in wound healing, JMJD3…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Photonic crystal enhanced fluorescence emission and blinking suppression for single quantum dot digital resolution biosensing

  Nature Communications · 2022 · 131 citations

  While nanoscale quantum emitters are effective tags for measuring biomolecular interactions, their utilities for applications that demand single-unit observations are limited by the requirements for large numerical aperture (NA) objectives, fluorescence intermittency, and poor photon collection efficiency resulted from omnidirectional emission. Here, we report a nearly 3000-fold signal enhancement achieved through multiplicative effects of enhanced excitation, highly directional extraction, quan…

  DOI

• Epigenetic regulation of the PGE2 pathway modulates macrophage phenotype in normal and pathologic wound repair

  JCI Insight · 2020-09-02 · 79 citations

  articleOpen access

  Macrophages are a primary immune cell involved in inflammation, and their cell plasticity allows for transition from an inflammatory to a reparative phenotype and is critical for normal tissue repair following injury. Evidence suggests that epigenetic alterations play a critical role in establishing macrophage phenotype and function during normal and pathologic wound repair. Here, we find in human and murine wound macrophages that cyclooxygenase 2/prostaglandin E2 (COX-2/PGE2) is elevated in dia…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Acid-degradable lipid nanoparticles enhance the delivery of mRNA

  Nature Nanotechnology · 2024-08-23 · 77 citations

  articleOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Short-Wave Infrared Quantum Dots with Compact Sizes as Molecular Probes for Fluorescence Microscopy

  Journal of the American Chemical Society · 2020 · 48 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  S shells with a small band gap. By tuning alloy composition alone, the emission can be shifted across the visible-to-SWIR (VIR) spectra while maintaining a small and equal size, allowing direct comparisons of molecular labeling performance across a broad range of wavelength. After coating with click-functional multidentate polymers, the VIR-QD spectral series has high quantum yield in the SWIR (14-33%), compact size (13 nm hydrodynamic diameter), and long-term stability in aqueous media during c…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Daily Quantification of Cancer-Associated Exosomal miRNA in Patient Blood by Photonic Crystal-Enhanced Quantum Dot Emission

  NIH · $1.0M · 2018–2024

• Hyperplexed Quantum Dots for Multidimensional Cell Classification in Intact Tissue

  NIH · $2.3M · 2021–2026

• I-Corps: Fluorescent Probes for Molecular Diagnostics

  NSF · $50k · 2017–2019

Frequent coauthors

• Shuming Nie

  University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

  99 shared

• T. P. Stecher

  76 shared

• R. C. Bohlin

  Space Telescope Science Institute

  70 shared

• R. W. O’Connell

  62 shared

• R. H. Cornett

  RTX (United States)

  33 shared

• M. S. Roberts

  Eureka Scientific

  32 shared

• Morton S. Roberts

  U.S. National Science Foundation

  31 shared

• S. G. Neff

  30 shared

Labs

• Smith LabPI

Education

• Ph.D., Biomedical Engineering

  Georgia Institute of Technology

  2008

• B.S., Chemistry

  Georgia Institute of Technology

  2002

Awards & honors

• Donald Biggar Willett Faculty Fellow (2020-Present)

Similar researchers at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

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• Stephen Bopparth-98