Professor Thomas Webster Elected to College of Fellows of AIMBE

Thomas Webster, associate professor at the School of Engineering and the Department of Orthopaedics at Brown University, has been elected to the College of Fellows of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE). Located in Washington D.C., AIMBE is the leading advocacy group for medical and biological engineering and is comprised of some of the most important leaders in science and engineering, the top 2% of medical and biological engineers.

The College of Fellows of AIMBE is comprised of an exemplary group of approximately 900 medical and biological engineers. Founded in 1991, AIMBE has earned a reputation as a prestigious public policy leader on issues impacting the medical and biological community and is regarded as the preeminent voice in the field.

Webster received his bachelor of science degree in chemical engineering from the University of Pittsburgh, and his master’s degree and and Ph.D. in biomedical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Professor Webster directs the Nanomedicine Laboratory which designs, synthesizes, and evaluates nanophase materials for various implant applications. Nanophase materials are central to the field of nanotechnology and are materials with one dimension less than 100 nm. Materials investigates to date include nanophase ceramics, metals, polymers, carbon fibers, and composites. Organ systems evaluated to date include orthopedic, cartilage, vascular, bladder, and the central and peripheral nervous systems.

His lab group has generated four books, 33 book chapters, 85 invited presentations (including tutorials), 215 literature articles and/or conference proceeding, and 245 conference presentations. Professor Webster has been awarded 11 full patents plus four provisional patents in his 11 years in academics (five years at Brown and six years at Purdue). His technology has resulted in one start-up company. He is the founding editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Nanomedicine and is on the editorial board of ten other journals. He has organized over 25 symposia at academic conferences. Dr. Webster was the 2002 recipient of the Biomedical Engineering Society Rita Schaffer Young Investigator Award, the 2004 recipient of the Outstanding Young Investigator Award for the Schools of Engineering at Purdue University, the 2004 finalist for the Young Investigator Award of the American Society for Nanomedicine, and the 2005 recipient of the Wallace Coulter Foundation Early Career Award.