# Making Oligonucleotides Better Biopharmaceuticals by Steric Protection

> **NIH NIH R01** · NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY · 2020 · $127,559

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
 The goal of this instrument supplement application is to boost our productivity through the purchase of
a DNA synthesis and purification system. Our goal in the original application is to study a novel antisense
oligonucleotide platform in vitro and in vivo for potential therapeutic applications, which requires relatively
large amounts of the nucleic acid material (on the order of hundreds of milligrams per study). However,
our current setup only produces several milligrams (<10 mg) per synthesis. As such, our in vivo studies
must be carefully designed to minimize the usage of materials, and even so, 2-3 months are needed to
accumulate sufficient materials for a single study. The proposed DNA synthesizer/purification system will
be able to shorten the synthesis to one week, thereby freeing students/postdocs from the labor-intensive
work of sample preparation and allowing them to focus on studying the samples in biological systems. The
requested funds will be used to purchase the DNA synthesizer (GE Oligopilot 10), while Northeastern
University and the PI will contribute funds to purchase the accompanying purification system (GE AKTA
Pure 150). The pair of instruments will be purchased, installed, and fully operational as soon as funding
becomes available.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10134609
- **Project number:** 3R01GM121612-03S1
- **Recipient organization:** NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Ke Zhang
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $127,559
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2017-09-01 → 2022-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10134609

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10134609, Making Oligonucleotides Better Biopharmaceuticals by Steric Protection (3R01GM121612-03S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-26 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10134609. Licensed CC0.

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