Jessica Oakes was honored at the International Society for Aerosol Medicine for researching how inhaled particles travel in the lungs and affect health.
Northeastern University bioengineering professor Jessica Oakes was a graduate student working with a professor studying particle behavior in lungs affected by emphysema and other conditions when she became interested in respiratory diseases.
She was personally familiar with pulmonary disease — her grandparents developed health problems after years of exposure to air pollutants at General Motors factories and heavy smoking.
She continued studying inhaled substances during her doctoral work.
Throughout her studies, Oakes says, she met great mentors who supported her along the way. She also tirelessly applied for grants and fellowships to fund her early research.
At Northeastern, Oakes’ lab studies how inhaled particles travel in the lungs, how to improve drug delivery as well as the effects of toxic substances such as e-cigarette smoke, fire smoke and environmental pollutants on lung health. Her team uses both experimental and computational models in their research.
“I’m thankful to Northeastern for giving me a shot and giving me startup funds and the support,” says Oakes, an associate professor of bioengineering.
In recognition of her work, Oakes was recently honored with the 2025 Young Investigator Award from the International Society for Aerosol Medicine for her significant contributions to medical aerosol research.
“It was a great moment to be recognized,” she says.
Her expertise in biofluids, she says, along with her perseverance made a strong impression on the Northeastern hiring committee.
She also credits two senior colleagues — Abraham Joy, professor and chair of the bioengineering department, and Sandra Shefelbine, associate dean of space and special initiatives and professor of mechanical and industrial engineering and professor of bioengineering — for their mentorship.
Oakes is currently working on three major research projects.
The first, funded by the Gates Foundation, seeks to improve the delivery of surfactant, a substance that coats the inside of the lungs, in babies born prematurely.
The surfactant, a complex mixture of lipids and proteins, reduces surface tension, preventing the alveoli, or tiny air sacs in the lungs, from collapsing during exhalation and facilitating gas exchange.
“With babies that are born very young, they don’t have the surfactant in their lungs and so it’s very hard for them to breathe,” Oakes says. “Without delivering surfactant they will die.”
In the U.S., infants born prematurely are typically treated through intubation and mechanical ventilation. That treatment, which is invasive and expensive, is much less available in low- and medium-income countries, Oakes says, leading to high mortality rates.
Her team is working on the physical properties of possible synthetic surfactant substitutes, studying the optimal size and density of particles and the way they flow in the air at inhalation.
Her second project is a collaboration with Chiara Bellini, an associate professor of bioengineering at Northeastern, whose research focuses on cardiovascular disease. Together they are studying the cardiovascular and the respiratory impacts of wildfire smoke inhalation and potential therapeutic mechanisms that could be used in the future.
They have been focusing on occupational exposure of professional firefighters and more recently on residents exposure to fire smoke in situations like the recent wildfires in Los Angeles.
“All those people were exposed to fire smoke not only [from] vegetation, but burning houses and structures, oil, rubber, plastics and all those things that are really harmful,” Oakes says. “We really want to understand the potential diseases, and how it exacerbates current diseases like asthma and cardiovascular disease.”
Oakes says she and Bellini complement each other well and make a good team, which’s been helpful in building a successful research program.
“We both started [at Northeastern] on the same day,” she says. “So we could bounce ideas off each other and give each other the push to write those first grants.”
Their third focus area is the health impact of e-cigarettes, especially nicotine salts, which are easier to inhale and deliver higher concentrations of nicotine to the lungs than older devices.
“The number of people smoking has decreased significantly, but now the numbers of e-cigarette users are significantly increasing. So we’re really concerned,” she says. “You can get some of the flavors that have chemicals in them that cause what we call popcorn lung.”
Oakes finds her work deeply rewarding.
“We can see the impact that we can have, which is really important to help the community, help society,” she says.