{"id":13194,"date":"2025-06-04T09:00:52","date_gmt":"2025-06-04T13:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=13194"},"modified":"2025-06-04T09:17:51","modified_gmt":"2025-06-04T13:17:51","slug":"as-good-as-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=13194","title":{"rendered":"As good as gold"},"content":{"rendered":"

An article in his mom\u2019s Time magazine about the \u201cboy in the bubble\u201d inspired Viraj Mane \u201900 <\/span>to become a scientist. Mane, a middle schooler in suburban New Jersey at the time, specifically recalls that the boy had a depressed immune system, forcing him to live his life in a sterile <\/span>plastic \u201cbubble.\u201d Mane was struck by the article\u2019s suggestion that emerging gene therapies promised to improve \u2014 if not save \u2014 the lives of immunodeficient patients. And he wanted to be a part of it. Following his parents\u2019 mantra to \u201calways do something to help,\u201d Mane set out on a path that led him to the formation of his brainchild, Lactiga, an award-winning company that <\/span>develops novel biologics to treat immune disorders.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere are a few things I\u2019m above average at, like just a short list,\u201d Mane jokes. \u201cBut one of them is curiosity. And that kind of mindset lends itself very clearly to the sciences.\u201d Drawn to TCNJ\u2019s undergraduate biology program and particularly inspired by the mentorship of Professor Steve Klug, Mane thrived in the School of Science. He then went on to earn a PhD in human genetics from Baylor College of Medicine and subsequently completed two postdoctoral fellowships at the Food and Drug Administration and the University of Maryland spanning immunology, virology, drug delivery, and nanotechnology. <\/span><\/p>\n

Despite his academic success, Mane says he wasn\u2019t built \u201cto do only one thing for 20 years.\u201d So he jumped at an opportunity in portfolio management for medical countermeasures, which gave him a taste of innovative startups and entrepreneurship. He built a skill that would prove crucial to forming his own business: how to identify a medical need in the marketplace. \u201cThat\u2019s where innovation lies,\u201d he says. <\/span><\/p>\n

Case in point: After becoming a father in 2012, Mane recognized the health benefits of breast milk, often referred to as liquid gold. Naturally packed with the immunological and nutritional components to help infants thrive, breast milk had long been recognized as an abundant source of antibodies that anecdotally were said to protect from or help heal conditions such as skin rashes to eye infections. Mane wondered, what if these antibodies could do more? \u201cI knew about all these conditions of people that don\u2019t have antibodies, like the boy in the bubble,\u201d Mane says. \u201cIf antibodies could be extracted from milk and then made into purified therapeutic compounds and then delivered to patients who can\u2019t make antibodies, could that correct the deficit?\u201d And that\u2019s when he combined his science background with his business acumen. <\/span><\/p>\n

For seven years, Mane has worked to develop breast milk-based biologics to help manage immunodeficiencies like the one the boy in the bubble had. Today, Lactiga\u2019s mucosaltargeted secretory IgA program, which focuses on enhancing immunity for immunodeficient patients through a novel nasal spray, has earned Orphan Drug and Rare Pediatric Disease designations from the FDA, and was awarded a highly competitive multiyear, multimillion-dollar grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. With the development of this nasal spray, Lactiga could potentially address the unmet needs of immunodeficient patients, and help save money for the health care system in the process. <\/span><\/p>\n

And while conditions like \u201cbubble boy disease\u201d are uncommon in the general <\/span>population, millions of people do have some type of immunodeficiency. Lactiga\u2019s goal is to use technology to reduce risk among a range of people who are immunocompromised, such as organ transplant recipients and people living with HIV\/AIDS. And perhaps it can help alleviate even common symptoms, such as those resulting from respiratory and gastrointestinal infections. \u201cIt could be a transformative paradigm shift for patients who have a very limited set of options,\u201d Mane says. \u201cAnd if this gives them hope, or if they have a new normal because of this, that, to me, is the North Star.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Looking back at his journey, Mane is hopeful for the future of science. \u201cKids who are currently in middle school will be the ones who do something truly disruptive and innovative,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd that\u2019s actually very encouraging to me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Photo: Peter Murphy<\/em><\/p>\n

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Viraj Mane\u2019s Lactiga innovates for immunity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":350,"featured_media":13200,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni-corner"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/350"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13194"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13303,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13194\/revisions\/13303"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}