Kimberly A. Kelly

Bio

"We find biomarkers and molecularly targeted probes, both as imaging agents for the detection of cancer, and as vehicles for targeted drug delivery."

Kimberly A. Kelly, Professor of Biomedical Engineering

Kimberly Kelly develops phage-based nanoparticle techniques for diagnostic imaging, drug target identification, and drug delivery in the setting of pancreatic cancer.  Dr. Kelly received her Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Hamilton College in upstate NY, and her PhD from the University of Utah under the guidance of Dr. David Jones, PhD. Her thesis was using genomics and proteomics-based approaches to develop diagnostic reagents for colon cancer. After obtaining her PhD, Dr. Kelly took a postdoctoral fellowship position at the Center for Molecular Imaging Research at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), directed by Ralph Weissleder, under the guidance of Jennifer Allport Anderson. Under Dr. Allport Anderson’s guidance, Kim developed a VCAM-1 targeted imaging agent and was able to monitor VCAM-1 expression in mouse models of atherosclerosis. Further, she described a new interaction between VCAM-1 and SPARC that facilitates efficient leukocyte trafficking. In 2004, she was promoted to instructor of Radiology, and in 2008 to Assistant Professor of Radiology at MGH. In September of 2008, Dr. Kelly joined the Biomedical Engineering faculty at the University of Virginia as an Assistant Professor and was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure. Dr. Kelly is a member of SNM, the American Pancreatic Association, and the AACR. She was named a William Guy Forbeck Scholar in 2005 and awarded an AACR-Pancreatic Cancer Action Network Career Development award in 2007.

Dr. Kelly’s research interests include the identification of biomarkers and development of molecularly targeted probes, both as imaging agents for the detection of various cancer disease processes and as vehicles for targeted drug delivery. For example, through phage display screening, Dr. Kelly identified and validated plectin-1 as a novel biomarker for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma, a disease with less than a five percent 5-year survival rate. Further, she has developed a clinically-relevant SPECT based imaging agent that will hopefully allow the detection of both primary and metastatic pancreatic cancer. She has over 30 peer-reviewed and invited publications and has served as a reviewer for numerous journals.