Robert Samuel Langer Jr. FREng [2] (born August 29, 1948) is an American biotechnologist, businessman, chemical engineer, chemist, and inventor. He is one of the nine Institute Professors at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. [3]
He was formerly the Germeshausen Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering and maintains activity in the Department of Chemical Engineering and the Department of Biological Engineering at MIT. He is also a faculty member of the Harvard–MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology and the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research.
Langer holds over 1,400 granted or pending patents. [4] He is one of the world's most highly cited researchers and his h-index is now (according to Google Scholar, 2023-09-16) 323 with currently over 427,000 citations. [5] He is a widely recognized and cited researcher in biotechnology, especially in the fields of drug delivery systems and tissue engineering. [4] [6] [7]
He is the most cited engineer in history [8] and one of the 10 most cited individuals in any field, [9] having authored over 1,500 scientific papers. Langer is also a prolific businessman, having been behind the participation in the founding of over 40 biotechnology companies including the well-known American pharmaceutical company, Moderna.
Langer's research laboratory at MIT is the largest biomedical engineering lab in the world; maintaining over $10 million in annual grants and over 100 researchers. [10] [11] He has been awarded numerous leading prizes in recognition of his work.
Langer was born August 29, 1948, in Albany, New York. [12]
He is an alumnus of The Milne School and received his bachelor's degree from Cornell University in chemical engineering. [13] He earned his Sc.D. in chemical engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1974. [14] His dissertation was entitled "Enzymatic regeneration of ATP" and completed under the direction of Clark K. Colton. [15] From 1974–1977 he worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Children's Hospital Boston and at Harvard Medical School under Judah Folkman. [16] [17]
Langer is widely regarded for his contributions to medicine and biotechnology. [18] He is considered a pioneer of many new technologies, including controlled release systems and 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. [19] [20] [21]
Langer worked with Judah Folkman at Boston Children's Hospital to isolate the first angiogenesis inhibitor, a macromolecule to block the spread of blood vessels in tumors. [18] [22] Macromolecules tend to be broken down by digestion and blocked by body tissues if they are injected or inhaled, so finding a delivery system for them is difficult. Langer's idea was to encapsulate the angiogenesis inhibitor in a noninflammatory synthetic polymer system that could be implanted in the tumor and control the release of the inhibitor. He eventually invented polymer systems that would work. This discovery is considered to lay the foundation for much of today's drug delivery technology. [18] [23]
Langer also worked with Henry Brem of the Johns Hopkins University Medical School on a drug-delivery system for the treatment of brain cancer, to deliver chemotherapy directly to a tumor site. The wafer implants that he and his teams have designed have become increasingly more sophisticated, and can now deliver multiple drugs, and respond to stimuli. [24] In 2019, he and his team developed and patented a technique whereby microneedle tattoo patches could be used to label people with invisible ink to store medical information subcutaneously. This was presented as a boon to "developing nations" where lack of infrastructure means an absence of medical records. [25] [26] The technology uses a "quantum dot dye that is delivered, along with a vaccine, by a microneedle patch." [25]
Langer is regarded as the founder of tissue engineering in regenerative medicine. [27] He and the researchers in his lab have made advances in tissue engineering, such as the creation of engineered blood vessels and vascularized engineered muscle tissue. [28] [29] Bioengineered synthetic polymers provide a scaffolding on which new skin, muscle, bone, and entire organs can be grown. With such a substrate in place, victims of serious accidents or birth defects could more easily grow missing tissue. [24] [30] Such polymers can be biocompatible and biodegradable. [31]
Langer is involved in several projects related to diabetes. [32] Alongside Daniel G. Anderson, he has contributed bioengineering work to a project involving teams from MIT, Harvard University and other institutions, to produce an implantable device to treat type 1 diabetes by shielding insulin-producing beta cells from immune system attacks. [33] [34] He is also part of a team at MIT that have developed a drug capsule that could be used to deliver oral doses of insulin to people with type 1 diabetes. [35]
At 43 years old, Langer was 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 National Academy of Medicine. He was also elected as a charter member of National Academy of Inventors. [36] He was elected as an International Fellow [2] of the Royal Academy of Engineering [2] in 2010.
Langer has received more than 220 major awards. He is one of three living individuals to have received both the U.S. National Medal of Science and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation. [37]
He has received numerous other awards, including the 10th Annual Heinz Award in the category of Technology, the Economy and Employment (2003), [43] [80] In 2013 he was awarded the IRI Medal alongside long-time friend George M. Whitesides for outstanding accomplishments in technological innovation that have contributed broadly to the development of industry and the benefit of society. [81] [82] He also received the Rusnano prize that year. [83]
Langer has honorary degrees from 42 universities from around the world including Harvard, Yale, and Columbia University. [84]
Langer has been involved in the founding of many companies, [85] more than twenty in partnership with the venture capital firm Polaris Partners. [1] Success of these companies and Langer's contribution has been detailed by Harvard Business Review: [86]
Langer is a member of the Advisory Board of Patient Innovation, a nonprofit, international, multilingual, free venue for patients and caregivers of any disease to share their innovations. [94] He is also a member of the Xconomists, an ad hoc team of editorial advisors for the tech news and media company, Xconomy. [95]
George McClelland Whitesides is an American chemist and professor of chemistry at Harvard University. He is best known for his work in the areas of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, organometallic chemistry, molecular self-assembly, soft lithography, microfabrication, microfluidics, and nanotechnology. A prolific author and patent holder who has received many awards, he received the highest Hirsch index rating of all living chemists in 2011.
Carolyn Ruth Bertozzi is an American chemist and Nobel laureate, known for her wide-ranging work spanning both chemistry and biology. She coined the term "bioorthogonal chemistry" for chemical reactions compatible with living systems. Her recent efforts include synthesis of chemical tools to study cell surface sugars called glycans and how they affect diseases such as cancer, inflammation, and viral infections like COVID-19. At Stanford University, she holds the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professorship in the School of Humanities and Sciences. Bertozzi is also an Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) and is the former director of the Molecular Foundry, a nanoscience research center at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Cato T. Laurencin FREng SLMH is an American engineer, physician, scientist, innovator and a University Professor of the University of Connecticut.
Nicholas (Nikolaos) A. Peppas is a chemical and biomedical engineer whose leadership in biomaterials science and engineering, drug delivery, bionanotechnology, pharmaceutical sciences, chemical and polymer engineering has provided seminal foundations based on the physics and mathematical theories of nanoscale, macromolecular processes and drug/protein transport and has led to numerous biomedical products or devices.
Kristi S. Anseth is the Tisone Distinguished Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, an Associate Professor of Surgery, and a Howard Hughes Medical Investigator at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her main research interests are the design of synthetic biomaterials using hydrogels, tissue engineering, and regenerative medicine.
Gordana Vunjak-NovakovicFRSC is a Serbian American biomedical engineer and university professor. She is a University Professor at Columbia University, as well as the Mikati Foundation Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medical Sciences. She also heads the laboratory for Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering at Columbia University. She is part of the faculty at the Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Center for Human Development, both found at Columbia University. She is also an honorary professor at the Faculty of Technology and Metallurgy at the University of Belgrade, an honorary professor at the University of Novi Sad, and an adjunct professor at the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Tufts University.
Samir Mitragotri is an Indian American professor at Harvard University, an inventor, an entrepreneur, and a researcher in the fields of drug delivery and biomaterials. He is currently the Hiller Professor of Bioengineering and Hansjörg Wyss Professor of Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. Prior to 2017, he was the Duncan and Suzanne Mellichamp Chair Professor at University of California, Santa Barbara.
Jeffrey Karp is a Canadian biomedical engineer working as a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and the principal faculty at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and Affiliate Faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology through the Harvard–MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. He is also an affiliate faculty at the Broad Institute.
Paula Therese Hammond is an Institute Professor and the Vice Provost for Faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). She was the first woman and person of color appointed as head of the Chemical Engineering department. Her laboratory designs polymers and nanoparticles for drug delivery and energy-related applications including batteries and fuel cells.
Martina Heide Stenzel is a Professor in the Department of Chemistry at the University of New South Wales (UNSW). She is also a Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI) University Ambassador. She became editor for the Australian Journal of Chemistry in 2008 and has served as Scientific Editor and as of 2021, as Editorial Board Chair of RSC Materials Horizons.
Molly S. Shoichet, is a Canadian science professor, specializing in chemistry, biomaterials and biomedical engineering. She was Ontario's first Chief Scientist. Shoichet is a biomedical engineer known for her work in tissue engineering, and is the only person to be a fellow of the three National Academies in Canada.
William Mark Saltzman was named the Goizueta Foundation Professor of Biomedical and Chemical Engineering at Yale University on July 1, 2002 and became the founding chair of Yale's Department of Biomedical Engineering in 2003. Saltzman's research aims to promote new methods for drug delivery and develop new biotechnologies to combat human disease. A pioneer in the fields of biomaterials, nanobiotechnology, and tissue engineering, Saltzman has contributed to the design and implementation of a number of clinical technologies that have become essential to medical practice today. His popular course Frontiers of Biomedical Engineering is available to everyone through Open Yale Courses.
Elazer R. Edelman is an American engineer, scientist and cardiologist. He is the Edward J. Poitras Professor in Medical Engineering and Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), and a practicing cardiologist at BWH. He is the director of the MIT Center for Clinical and Translational Research (CCTR), the Harvard-MIT Biomedical Engineering Center, and was previously director of the Institute for Medical Engineering and Science (IMES) at MIT. He is also the Program Director of the MIT Graduate Education in Medical Sciences program within the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology.
Joseph Kost is an Israeli academic, currently holder of The Abraham and Bessie Zacks Chair in Biomedical Engineering and the past Dean of the Faculty of Engineering Sciences at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
Klavs Flemming Jensen is a chemical engineer who is currently the Warren K. Lewis Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Erin Baker Lavik is an American bioengineer serving as the deputy director and chief technology officer of the National Cancer Institute's Division of Cancer Prevention (DCP) since 2023. She was previously a professor of chemical, biochemical, and environmental engineering at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Lavik develops polymers and nanoparticles that can protect the nervous system. She is a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.
Milica Radisic is a Serbian Canadian tissue engineer, academic and researcher. She is a professor at the University of Toronto’s Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, and the Department of Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry. She co-founded TARA Biosystems and is a senior scientist at the Toronto General Hospital Research Institute.
Mark Robert Prausnitz is an American chemical engineer, currently Regents’ Professor and J. Erskine Love, Jr. Chair in Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He also serves as adjunct professor of biomedical engineering at Emory University and Adjunct Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. He is known for pioneering microneedle technology for minimally invasive drug and vaccine administration, which has found applications in transdermal, ocular, oral, and sustained release delivery systems.
Liangfang Zhang is a Chinese-American nanoengineer. He is the Chancellor Professor of Nanoengineering and Bioengineering and Director of Chemical Engineering at the University of California, San Diego. Zhang is a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the National Academy of Inventors.
Christopher A. Alabi is an American chemist and associate professor of chemistry at Cornell University. His research considers the design of sustainable materials and biomolecular therapeutics. He was elected to the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering in 2023.
A chemical engineer by training, Dr. Langer has helped start 25 companies and has 811 patents, issued or pending, to his name. ...