Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Stephanie joined Drug Discovery News as an Assistant Editor in 2021. She earned her PhD from the University of California Los Angeles in 2019 and has written for Discover Magazine, Quanta Magazine, and the Los Angeles Times. As an assistant editor at DDN, she writes about how microbes influence health to how art can change the brain. When not writing, Stephanie enjoys tap dancing and perfecting her pasta carbonara recipe.

Articles by Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

A group of pink flamingos stand together in a lake.

Aug 07, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Metabolomics open a window into better cancer treatments

Chemical biologist Stefano Tiziani uses metabolomics to identify new combination cancer treatments and to predict which patients will respond best to chemotherapy.

Hundreds of antibodies swarm a virus as a part of the body’s immune response to infection.

Jul 26, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Predicting immune responses to vaccination

Armed with a machine learning and systems biology approach, John Tsang studies how past infections and vaccinations shape an individual’s immune response to future vaccines.

Three menstrual pads are shown against a pink background with three hands clasping the pads. A pink callout is shown coming from the pad on the left. Three drops of blood are shown on the center pad, and the pad on the right has a large red circle on it.

Jul 12, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Menstrual blood holds the key to better diagnostics

Usually thrown away as waste, menstrual blood may help clinicians non-invasively monitor and diagnose a multitude of health conditions from diabetes and endometriosis to cancer.

A model of the spikey-looking structure of nanosyringes released by the P. luteoviolacea species of bacteria.

Jul 07, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Bacterial nanosyringes are drug and delivery all in one

Nanosyringes produced by some bacterial species naturally inject proteins into eukaryotic cells, paving a new frontier for biologic drug delivery.

Nanoparticles are shown grouped together, holding genetic information to deliver into cells.

Jul 03, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Next-generation nanoparticle delivery

Nanoparticles fuse with cells to deliver their gene or RNA therapy cargo, but some are better shuttles than others. Now, scientists have developed a way to find the best nanoparticles for the job.

Anna Blakney pipets liquid into a tube in her laboratory at the University of British Columbia.

Jun 26, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Self-amplifying RNA may reduce side effects associated with RNA vaccines

Anna Blakney, an RNA bioengineer and TikTok science communicator, studies how self-amplifying RNA improves RNA vaccines and therapeutics.

Cartoon drawings of multiple birth control methods such as hormone pills, IUD, spermicide, the patch, condoms, vaginal ring, contraceptive injection, and diaphragms, among other methods, are shown over a dark blue background.

Jun 24, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

A “morning-of” pill for on-demand contraception

Researchers discovered that combining two FDA-approved drugs prevents ovulation over the entire fertile window, leading to a potential new option for on-demand birth control.

A drawing of a man pressing his fingers against his forehead is shown with viral particles behind him.

Jun 19, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

An infective spark for Alzheimer's disease

A once fringe theory that viral and bacterial infections trigger the neuroinflammation and cognitive decline associated with Alzheimer’s disease is gaining traction. If it proves true, available antimicrobials could be a long sought-after treatment for this neurodegenerative disease.

Nanoparticles shuttle gene therapies and RNA-based therapeutics into cells.

Jun 05, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Human-mouse hybrids accelerate nanoparticle discovery

Nanoparticles that successfully deliver drugs in mice often fail in humans. To understand how nanoparticles fare across different model species, scientists developed a high-throughput system to screen nanoparticles in mice with humanized livers with the hope of better predicting nanoparticles that work in humans.

A group of the human parasitic roundworms, Ascaris lumbricoides, sits in a petri dish.

Jun 01, 2022By Stephanie DeMarco, PhD

Gut microbes may predict the effectiveness of anthelminthic drugs

Pre-screening of the gut microbiome may lead to a more personalized approach to treating intestinal parasitic worm infections, leading to better treatment outcomes and a decreased risk for drug resistance.