2024 Materials for Medical Devices workshop

Dr. Luisa A. DiPietro is Professor of Periodontics and Director of the UIC Center for Wound Healing and Tissue Regeneration. Dr. DiPietro received both her DDS and PhD in immunology from the University of Illinois Chicago, and completed a residency in hospital dentistry at Michael Reese Hospital in Chicago. Dr. DiPietro’s research focuses on wound healing, and she has been the recipient of more than $19 million in extramural research grants and contracts. Her work has been cited more than 27,000 times. Her honors and awards include the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Wound Healing Society, the Mentor of the Year Award from the American Association for Dental Research Student Research Group, and the University of Illinois - University Scholar Award. Dr. DiPietro is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the National Advisory Dental and Craniofacial Research Council for the National Institutes of Health.

Tatiana Segura received her B.S. from the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), her doctorate from Northwestern University, and her postdoctorate at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. She began her independent career at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) reaching the title of Professor of Chemical Engineering. At UCLA she participated actively in service culminating with her election as department Vice Chair and running the Graduate Program. At Duke she has continued to be heavily involved in service at the department, school, and university level. She is currently Co-director of the Center for Biotechnology and Tissue Engineering and serves as MPI of a T32 Biotechnology Training grant. Professor Segura has received numerous awards and distinctions during her career, including being named a Senior Member of the National Academy of Inventors, receiving the Acta Biomaterialia Silver Medal, a CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation, and an Outstanding Young Investigator Award from the American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy. She was also named a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineers (AIMBE). Professor Segura has published over 100 peer-reviewed papers and reviews and has over 10,000 citations.

Professor Cynthia Whitchurch FAA is a Group Leader in the Quadram Institute Bioscience in Norwich, UK. She obtained her BSc (Hons I) in 1989 and her PhD in 1994 from the University of Queensland.  Her research focusses on understanding alternate bacterial lifestyles including how bacteria survive antibiotic treatment through cell wall deficiency, how bacteria build biofilms, and how they co-ordinate collective behaviours. The outstanding quality of her research has been recognised through prestigious fellowships and awards including the 2016 David Syme Research Prize for best original research in biology in Australia. In 2019 she was elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science for her discoveries of novel roles for extracellular DNA in biofilms.

Prof. Latour (Emeritus Professor, Department of Bioengineering, Clemson University, Clemson, SC USA) obtained his B.S. degree in chemical engineering from the University of Virginia in 1979 following which he worked as an oil-refinery operations engineer for Amoco Oil Company for five years. He then enrolled in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania, where he earned his M.S. (1986) and Ph.D. (1989) degrees in bioengineering with an emphasis in biomaterials.  He then accepted a faculty position in the Department of Bioengineering at Clemson University, Clemson, SC, USA, where he finally served in an endowed position as the McQueen-Quattlebaum Professor of Bioengineering as well as the director of the Biomaterials Engineering and Testing (BET) Core for the NIH COBRE SC BioCRAFT Center.  Prof. Latour’s research has primarily focused on the study of the interactions between proteins and surfaces, with a specific focus on the development of both experimental and molecular simulation methods to characterize adsorbed protein orientation and conformation, and how adsorbed protein conformation influences platelet response to biomaterial surfaces used in cardiovascular applications.  Prof. Latour has published over a 125 journal articles and book chapters and presented over 90 invited lectures in the field of biomaterials over the course of his career, as well as serving on the editorial board of the journals Biointerphases, Biofouling, and The Journal of Biomedical Materials Research, Part B: Applied Biomaterials.  After 34 years in academia, Prof. Latour has recently retired, although he is currently still involved with several research projects.

Aurélie Carlier is associate professor at the MERLN Institute for Technology-Inspired Regenerative Medicine, Maastricht University. She received her PhD degree (2014) in Biomedical Engineering at the KU Leuven, Belgium. Her research interests encompass the computational modelling of biological processes, with a particular focus on bone tissue engineering and cell-biomaterial interactions, using a range of data-driven to mechanistic modelling approaches. Her research achievements have been awarded with a number of distinctions, including three doctoral thesis awards (ESMTB, 2015; ESB, 2015; KUL, 2016). She was also New Scientist Wetenschapstalent 2021 finalist and received a prestigious VENI career development grant (€0.25 M) from the Dutch Science Foundation. She is currently the chair of the Dutch Society for Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering as well as board member of the European Society of Biomechanics where she serves as chair of the student and education committee. Besides her research, Aurélie is co

David Winkler is Professor of Biochemistry and Chemistry at La Trobe University, Professor of Pharmacy at the University of Nottingham, and Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at Monash University. He applies computational chemistry, AI, and machine learning to the design of drugs, agrochemicals, electrooptic materials, nanomaterials, green corrosion inhibitors, catalysts, and biomaterials. His is a recipient of an ACS Skolnik award, a Royal Australian Chemical Institute Distinguished Fellowship, and the AMMA Medal. He has written >300 journal articles and book chapters (5 ISI Highly Cited) and is an inventor on 25 patents.

Yves Bayon, PhD & MBA, is an employee of Medtronic – Sofradim Production as a Chief Scientist with +20 years of experience of Medical Devices development. He has since carried out various assignments, including the establishment of the porcine collagen production line, and the development of collagen-based medical devices for the repair or regeneration of soft tissues (i.e., Parietex™ Composite mesh and its derivatives with cumulative sales of over €1 billion). Since 2015, his missions have expanded with cross-functional activities across Medtronic's multiple divisions (e.g., cardiovascular, neurovascular, spine, ENT) and with activities going beyond biomaterials, in connection with the digitization of medical devices (e.g., AI-based solutions, e-health application). He is also part of the Research and Innovation committee and the Circular Economy working group of Medtech Europe and is a mentor of EIT Health.

Dr. Omid Veiseh, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor and CPRIT Scholar in Cancer Research in the Department of Bioengineering at Rice University. He leads an interdisciplinary translational research program to engineer and commercialize next-generation cell-based therapeutics for various human diseases. His team leverages the latest techniques in synthetic biology, immunoengineering, and materials science to develop innovative cell-based platforms for real-time and feedback-regulated production of biologics. Over the course of his career, he has authored or co-authored more than 75 peer-reviewed publications, including those in Nature, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Materials, Nature Medicine, and Nature Biomedical Engineering, and is an inventor on more than 40 pending or awarded patents. He is also a serial entrepreneur who has co-founded Sigilon Therapeutics (Nasdaq: SGTX), Avenge Bio, Sentinel Bio, and Curada Bio. These companies collectively have attracted ~ $500M in private and public investment capital. In September of 2023, he was named the Director of Rice University's Biotech Launch Pad, a new initiative with a mission to accelerate the translation of Rice University discoveries and technologies into clinical practice to provide rapid patient access to leading-edge therapeutic products.