Rate My Professor Mikhail Shapiro

The Shapiro Lab engineers molecular technologies for noninvasive imaging and control of cellular function deep in living tissues, exploiting unique interactions of biomolecules with acoustic waves and magnetic fields. Efforts center on bioacoustics for ultrasound-based imaging and manipulation, biomagnetism for MRI advancements, biophysics of ultrasound neuromodulation, and biochemistry for precise neural control. Biological applications target synthetic biology, neuroscience, cancer, immunology, and the microbiome. Seminal works include gas vesicle-based ultrasonic reporters, acoustic reporter genes enabling gene expression imaging, and ultrasound-responsive therapeutics like engineered bacteria for cancer immunotherapy. Key publications feature "Ultrasound imaging of gene expression in mammalian cells" (Science, 2019), "Biogenic Gas Nanostructures as Ultrasonic Molecular Reporters" (Nature Nanotechnology, 2014), "Acoustic reporter genes for noninvasive imaging of microbes and mammalian cells" (Nature Methods, 2018), "Genomically mined acoustic reporter genes for real-time in vivo monitoring of tumors and tumor-homing bacteria" (Nature Biotechnology, 2023), and "Biomolecular actuators for genetically selective acoustic manipulation of cells" (Science Advances, 2023). His innovations have profoundly influenced noninvasive cellular imaging and control in biomedical research.