Engineering Christina
Photo: Linda A. Cicero / Stanford News Service
Tackling Biomedical Problems with Interdisciplinary Vigor
Christina Smolke in her bioengineering laboratory at Stanford University.
Christina Smolke’s (BSCHe ’97) interest in biological engineering has made her work more timely than ever. Deciding early on in her education that her goal was to change the world by designing and constructing useful objects, Smolke focused her eyes on USC’s engineering school as a multidisciplinary platform that married chemical engineering with a biology emphasis. Her father, an electrical engineer and a major continuing influence in her life, counseled her as she narrowed the choices: Chemical engineering, she decided, was an expanding field, particularly biotechnology. “There’s a lot of new research, and a lot of new technology,” she says. Where to study turned out to be a relatively easy decision, as she wanted to stay in Southern California where she grew up. Her then advisor and now Viterbi Dean Yannis C. Yortsos had recruited her to USC with a Trustee Scholarship. “The value of recruiting engineering talent such as Christina is an essential
element of our educational philosophy here at USC,” says Yortsos, who followed up with Smolke repeatedly and emphasized the research she could be involved in as an undergraduate. After earning her bachelor’s in chemical engineering with a minor in biology, Smolke went on to pursue her Ph.D in chemical engineering from the University of California at Berkeley. From there she became an assistant professor at the California Institute of Technology, and later moved to Stanford University to seize an opportunity to shape a new bioengineering program and access what she calls best-in-class for translating technology from clinic to industry. At Stanford, Smolke runs a research laboratory of approximately 16 full-time researchers and a handful of undergraduates who deal with programming cellular behavior, from the development of microbial drug factories to next-generation therapeutic platforms. In particular, Smolke examines the development of new technologies that
will transform how we engineer and manipulate biological systems. One lab research program deals with the design of RNA molecules that regulate cell behavior, and may have the potential to result in safer and more effective strategies for diagnosing and treating diseases such as cancer. Yortsos notes that Smolke’s interdisciplinary approach to the engineering practice is a shining example of the Viterbi School’s engineering philosophy. Aside from her research, Smolke teaches both undergraduates and graduate students, and has authored more than 30 research papers, publications and books. Major recognitions include being named to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Review’s Top 35 Innovators Under 35 List in 2004 and winning the World Technology Network Award in Biotechnology. Smolke and her husband—also a bioengineering professor at Stanford— live in Menlo Park, California. //
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