An iCONM researcher, Dr. West Paraiso received a Gold Medal for his poster presentation at the Material Research Meeting (MRM) 2021 held in Yokohama, Japan, Dec. 13-16 last year. This award is given to the posters with the best content, and only two posters out of 880 presentations were selected to receive it this time. The title of the presentation was "A Novel Neomycin-Based Polymer for siRNA Delivery”. Neomycin is an antibacterial agent classified as aminoglycoside antibiotics that inhibit protein synthesis by interacting with nucleobase pairs in DNA or RNA. This study was to utilize this specific and stable binding ability of neomycin to nucleobase pairs to deliver siRNA with neomycin immobilized on polymers. siRNA is a small double-stranded RNA that can destroy specific mRNAs to be used as an antimicrobial agent to inhibit the protein expression. There are many known diseases caused by the overexpression of certain proteins. siRNA is now an attractive substance because it is possible to treat such diseases if the mRNA involved in the synthesis of the protein can be targeted and destroyed. However, siRNA is very unstable, so the challenge is how to stabilize it in the body and deliver it to the affected area. The results of Dr. Paraiso's research are expected to lead to a solution to this issue.