Ideas worth spreading

The tiny balls of fat that could revolutionize medicine

1,973,038 views |

Kathryn A. Whitehead |

TEDMonterey

• August 2021

What if you were holding life-saving medicine ... but had no way to administer it? Zoom down to the nano level with engineer Kathryn A. Whitehead as she gives a breakdown of the little fatty balls (called lipid nanoparticles) perfectly designed to ferry cutting-edge medicines into your body's cells. Learn how her work is already powering mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines and forging the path for future therapies that could treat Ebola, HIV and even cancer.

What if you were holding life-saving medicine ... but had no way to administer it? Zoom down to the nano level with engineer Kathryn A. Whitehead as she gives a breakdown of the little fatty balls (called lipid nanoparticles) perfectly designed to ferry cutting-edge medicines into your body's cells. Learn how her work is already powering mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines and forging the path for future therapies that could treat Ebola, HIV and even cancer.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

About the speaker

Kathryn A. Whitehead

Kathryn A. Whitehead

Engineer, teacher, innovator

See speaker profile

Kathryn A. "Katie" Whitehead's lab builds tiny packages that deliver medicine to the right places in the body with the goal of engineering safe and effective drug delivery systems. She's currently studying the lipid particles that deliver the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.