Nicholas Peppas, professor of biomedical engineering, chemical engineering, pediatrics, surgery and pharmacy at The University of Texas at Austin and an expert in biomaterials and drug delivery systems, has been elected as a foreign member of the Canadian Academy of Engineering.
The Canadian Academy of Engineering is the national institution through which Canada’s most distinguished and experienced engineers provide strategic advice on matters of critical importance to Canada. Peppas is one of 55 new members elected in 2019 and one of only five elected internationally.
Peppas, who holds the Cockrell Family Regents Chair in Engineering #6 at UT Austin, was elected for his lifetime achievements in the areas of biomaterials, drug delivery and chemical engineering. He is recognized for his work on the preparation, characterization and evaluation of biopolymers and hydrogels, used as biomaterials in artificial organs and in devices for the delivery of drugs, peptides and proteins.
“Nicholas is world renowned in oral drug delivery systems, and this honor further demonstrates the impact that his discoveries and advances have had on society,” said Sharon L. Wood, dean of the Cockrell School of Engineering. “We are extremely proud of the work that Nicholas continues to do to improve lives around the world.”
Peppas has been an accomplished professor, researcher and entrepreneur throughout his distinguished career. He has eight honorary doctorates from Italy, Greece, Slovenia and Spain, 45 U.S. patents pending or issued, three companies founded and more than 1,650 papers published with 126,000 citations. He joined the UT Austin faculty in December 2002 and served as chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering from 2009 to 2015.
Among his accolades, Peppas has received the Founders Award from the National Academy of Engineering and the Yarmolinsky Award from the National Academy of Medicine; the Acta Biomaterialia Gold Medal; the Giulio Natta Award from Italy, the Founders Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the Society for Biomaterials and the Controlled Release Society; and the Benjamin Garver Lamme Excellence in Engineering Education Award from the American Society for Engineering Education. He is the recipient of the Robert A. Pritzker Distinguished Lecture Award from the Biomedical Engineering Society and the Pierre Galetti Award from the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering. He was recognized by the American Institute for Chemical Engineers as one of the “100 Chemical Engineers of the Modern Era” and with a symposium honoring his “40 Years of Impact at the Frontiers of Science and Engineering.” He is Deputy Editor of Science Advances, and he is a member of the National Academy of Medicine, the National Academy of Engineering, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Inventors, the National Royal Academy of Spain, the National Academy of France, the Academy of Athens (Greece), the Chinese Academy of Engineering and The Academy of Medicine, Engineering and Sciences of Texas (TAMEST).
Fellows of the Canadian Academy of Engineering are nominated and elected by their peers in view of their distinguished achievements and career-long service to the engineering profession.
The new class of fellows will be inducted at the academy’s 2019 Annual General Meeting and Symposium on June 21, 2019, in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.
