Rate My Professor Anna Blakney

Dr. Anna Blakney is an Assistant Professor in the Michael Smith Laboratories and the School of Biomedical Engineering at the University of British Columbia. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Chemical and Biological Engineering from the University of Colorado at Boulder and her PhD in Bioengineering from the University of Washington, where her graduate research focused on developing small molecule drug-eluting fibers for HIV and pregnancy prevention, including six months studying BCG vaccine effects on HIV susceptibility at the University of Cape Town. Following her doctorate, she completed a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship at Imperial College London in the laboratories of Professors Robin Shattock and Molly Stevens, advancing molecular and biomaterial engineering strategies for self-amplifying RNA delivery. She joined UBC in January 2021 as a joint faculty member. Blakney holds a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Nucleic Acid Bioengineering and has received the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research Scholar Award in 2021, providing $90,000 annually for five years to support her work on antibody therapies encoded in self-amplifying RNA. Additional honors include the MIT Technology Review 35 Innovators Under 35 award in 2023 for her biotechnology contributions and the UBC President’s Award for Public Education Through Media in 2022 for her social media outreach on vaccines and mRNA technologies.

Blakney's research integrates bioengineering, molecular biology, and immunology to develop next-generation RNA vaccines and therapies, with a focus on gene delivery, nucleic acid formulations, biomaterials, and interactions with the immune system. Her lab optimizes molecular design and formulation for clinically translational RNA medicines, employing biochemical assays, nanoparticle characterization, imaging, and animal models. Key contributions include the first self-amplifying RNA vaccine published in Nature Communications in 2020, saRNA vaccines incorporating interferon-inhibiting proteins for enhanced expression and immune responses in Molecular Therapy in 2021, and a method to quantify saRNA copies in Scientific Reports in 2023. She leads a team spanning chemical engineering to immunology and has secured an $8.4 million USD grant in 2026 for immune cell engineering in partnership with STRM.BIO and Ginkgo Bioworks. As a dedicated science communicator, Blakney maintains a TikTok channel with 250,000 followers and 18 million views educating the public on RNA biotechnology, participates in Team Halo for vaccine confidence, and engages in public lectures and media.