Four faculty members were recently awarded with endowed chairs in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering.

“This is one of the best roles in my job,” said Coulter BME Chair Alyssa Panitch, after sharing the news with the four: Jaydev Desai, Melissa Kemp, Gabe Kwong, and Johnna Temenoff. “We have such outstanding faculty. Our department’s success and great world-wide reputation is due in large part to their achievements as researchers and educators.”

Desai, appointed the Cardiovascular Biomedical Engineering Distinguished Chair, is a leader in medical robotics research, including pediatric and surgical robotics. In addition to his work as principal investigator in the Medical Robotics and Automation (RoboMed) Laboratory, Desai is director of the Georgia Center for Medical Robotics and serves as Coulter BME’s associate chair for undergraduate studies.

Kemp, who now holds the Carol Ann and David D. Flanagan Endowed Chair in Biomedical Engineering, leads the Redox Systems Biology Lab at Georgia Tech, where her research is focused on understanding how metabolism influences the decisions that cells make. She currently serves as the research director of the multi-site NSF Engineering Research Center for Cell Manufacturing Technologies (CMaT).

Kwong, awarded the Robert A. Milton Endowed Chair in Biomedical Engineering, is principal investigator of the Laboratory for Synthetic Immunity, where the interdisciplinary research program is focused on engineering immune-based medicines to intercept and treat human disease. Kwong is leading a $50 million “cancer moonshot” project that aims to develop a new generation of cancer tests capable of detecting multiple types of tumors earlier than ever.

Temenoff, now the Wallace H. Coulter Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Engineering, is director of both CMaT and the Marcus Center for Therapeutic Cell Characterization and Manufacturing. She is principal investigator of a lab that that designs biomaterials for orthopaedic applications, including regeneration of tendon/ligament, cartilage and bone.