Cameron Kim Receives Competitive Research Education Program Grant

Cameron Kim, an assistant professor of the practice in biomedical engineering (BME) at Duke University, was awarded an R25 Grant from the National Institutes of Health’s Research Education Program. Intended to aid education programs that help students understand the clinical and industrial impacts of their research, the R25 grant will support the expansion of Duke BME’s Biotech Design Capstone course.

The R25 grant will provide Kim and his team with $100,000 in funding for five years. To further support their work, the Pratt School of Engineering and Duke BME will additionally provide $50,000 and $25,000, respectively.

As students advance through Duke BME, they have numerous opportunities to take lab-based courses, like BME305L: Molecular Engineering and BME306L: Cellular Engineering, where they learn how to study mammalian cell behavior and proliferation, how to perform common-end point assays, or how to use algorithms and screening methods to identify and design proteins for specific purposes. Capstone courses, like Biotech Design, challenge students to apply these skills to more advanced projects.

Kim and other faculty want to teach students how these projects and skills can translate into clinical and commercial environments, something that isn’t always possible within the existing curriculum.

“One of the challenges our students face as researchers is that their work is often only seen through an academic lens,” said Kim. “Out lessons help them better understand the world around them, but the work is often so specific and insular that they don’t see the bigger picture for how it could be applied.”

Thanks to the R25 grant, Kim aims to change that with a revamped Biotech Capstone program.

During the first semester of the pilot program, which launched in the fall of 2024, Kim challenged his students to build an independent gene therapy using adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors, which can effectively deliver therapeutic genetic material into the targeted tissue. The larger change to the curriculum will come in the spring, when Kim hopes to partner with industry professionals to learn how therapeutic tools like AAV can be effectively scaled up to treat a wider population.

“AAV is an important research tool, but it’s also been shown to be an effective therapeutic tool, and we are already seeing a bigger push to increase the use of AAVs and other genome therapies to treat specific diseases,” said Kim. “But we make AAVs in a 15 cm petri dish, while industry professionals make them in containers that can hold 15,000 liters. That’s a massive scale up.”

Although Kim hopes to coordinate advisors from biotech companies across the ever-growing Research Triangle Park, he’s also partnering with organizations across Duke, like the Marcus Center for Cellular Cures and the Robertson GMP Laboratory, to help students learn how research is translated into a clinical setting. Beyond the technical considerations, Kim also hopes that the expanded curriculum will give students more opportunities to consider the ethical implications of their work.

“When you’re scaling your work up, you have to think about how you can make your therapies as equitable as possible to ensure that you’re helping the greatest number of people you can,” Kim said. “Biotechnology is expensive, and if you want your work to make an impact, you can’t ignore the connection between our academic work and the clinical and industry side.”

For Kim and other faculty including Emma Chory, an assistant professor in the department who will teach the course in the spring, this expansion is a natural evolution of Duke BME’s wet lab curriculum––one they hope will help students seamlessly transition into careers in industry or medicine.

“Our students want their work to make a difference. We know we’re giving them valuable skills and hands-on experience in the lab, and I’m grateful that the R25 gives us the support we need to take that next step and help our students find success,” said Kim.