When taking medication, less than one percent of the active ingredient reaches the actual site of the disease. Often, for example in chemotherapy, the whole body is affected, which can cause serious side effects. Anna C. Bakenecker is researching how drugs can be targeted to their sites of action, where they will only have a localised effect. To this end, she is developing tiny micro- and nanorobots loaded with medication, which in the future can also be guided through the body – for example to a tumour, an area of inflammation, or a vasoconstriction.

Bakenecker uses biomaterials that enable triggered drug release and guides the micro- and nanorobots with magnetic fields. In addition to guidance, precise tracking of the tiny robots is essential for safe use in patients. To this end, the medical physics expert and her team are researching a new type of tomographic imaging modality: magnetic particle imaging. This field of research has great potential for nanomedicine, as it allows regions of the body that are difficult to access to be reached, and drugs to be targeted to their sites of action.

‘The associated progress for patients cannot be overestimated,’ said Hessian Minister of Science Timon Gremmels. ‘I am very pleased that we have succeeded in bringing Dr Bakenecker to Hesse with the LOEWE funding, thereby further expanding our still young focus area in medical physics.’

LOEWE Start Professorships are aimed at excellent researchers at an early stage of their careers, who are recruited or kept in Hesse as a centre of scientific research, with funding of up to two million euros for a period of six years. Other funding lines are LOEWE Top Professorships, through which excellent, internationally recognised researchers can receive between 1.5 and 3 million euros for five years to endow their professorship, and LOEWE Transfer Professorships. These are currently in the pilot phase and support researchers in further developing application-oriented results in dialogue with partners from industry and business. The funding amounts to up to one million euros to endow a professorship for five years.