Robert Langer

MIT Institute Professor
MIT

Robert Langer is an American engineer and the David H. Koch Institute Professor at MIT. He was formerly the Germeshausen Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, maintaining activity in the department of chemical engineering and the department of biological engineering at MIT. Langer is widely regarded for his contributions to medicine and the emerging fields of biotechnology. He is considered a pioneer of many new technologies, including transdermal delivery systems, allowing the administration of drugs or extraction of analytes from the body through the skin without needles or other invasive methods. He and his lab have also made advances in tissue engineering, such as the creation of engineered blood vessels and vascularized engineered muscle tissue. Langer is a prolific inventor and holds more than 760 granted or pending patents He has authored over 1,100 scientific papers and has participated in the founding of multiple technology companies. He has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of Science, the 10th Annual Heinz Award in the category of Technology, the Economy and Employment, the Charles Stark Draper Prize, the Lemelson-MIT Prize, the Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine and Biomedical Research and the Millennium Technology Prize in 2008. Langer is also the youngest person in history (at 43) to be elected to all three American science academies: the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine. Langer received his bachelor's degree from Cornell University in chemical engineering, and his Sc.D. in chemical engineering from MIT.