UW News

October 14, 2010

Tissue engineer Robert Langer to give Hoffman Lecture Oct. 22

Renowned tissue engineer and drug delivery expert Robert S. Langer will give the Fourth Annual Hoffman Lecture.



He will speak on “Biomaterials and biotechnology: Angiogenesis Inhibitors to the Development of Controlled Drug Delivery and the Foundation of Tissue Engineering” at 3:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 33, in Foege Auditorium, Room S-060, UW Foege Building. A reception will follow.


Langer is the David H. Koch Institute Professor and a professor of chemical engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).


He has pioneered many new biomedical technologies, including transdermal delivery systems, which allow the administration of drugs or extraction of analytes from the body through the skin without needles or other invasive methods.


Langer won the Millennium Technology Prize, the world’s largest award for technology innovation, for inventing and developing innovative biomaterials for controlled drug release and tissue regeneration. His discoveries have saved and improved the lives of millions of people.


At age 43, he became the youngest person in history to be elected to all three American science academies: the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine.


He has served as member and as chair of the United States Food and Drug Administration’s SCIENCE Board, the FDA’s highest advisory board.


Both Forbes and Bio World have named Langer one of the 25 most important individuals in biotechnology in the world.


The Hoffman Lecture honors Dr. Allan Hoffman, UW professor of bioengineering and chemical engineering. Hoffman is now in his 52nd year as a researcher. A member of the UW faculty since 1970, Hoffman is a leading authority on biomaterials and drug delivery. He was among the first to combine drugs, enzymes, and antibodies with thermally reversible polymers and hydrogels. With Dr. Buddy Ratner, Hoffman co-edited Textbook of Biomaterials Science, adopted for use worldwide


For more information, call Shirley Nollette, 206-685-2002.