Ron Weiss

Dr. Ron Weiss is Professor of Biological Engineering and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT, where he serves as Director of the Synthetic Biology Center and Principal Investigator of the MIT Center for Integrative Synthetic Biology. After earning his Ph.D. from MIT in 2001, he began his academic career at Princeton University before returning to MIT in 2009. As one of synthetic biology's earliest pioneers since 1996, he established the first wet lab in MIT's Electrical Engineering department, bridging the gap between computer science and biology. His groundbreaking research focuses on programming cell behavior through biochemical and cellular computing systems, constructing gene networks for in vivo analog and digital logic computation. His laboratory develops methods to control cell behavior using synthetic biology and neuromorphic circuits, successfully creating vascularized liver organoids and working on programmable stem cells for tissue engineering. His innovations have earned numerous accolades, including MIT's TR100 Award, recognition in MIT Technology Review's "10 emerging technologies that will change your world," and his research has been cited over 25,000 times. Currently, his work spans from basic cellular computing to potential applications in cancer biology, autoimmune treatments, drug testing, and tissue engineering.