Pitt Names prominent BioEngineer for Bayer distinguished Lectureship 2000

PITTSBURGH, Feb. 17 -- The University of Pittsburgh's Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering has announced that the 2000 Bayer Distinguished Lecturer will be Nicholas Peppas, the Showalter Distinguished Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering at Purdue University.

Peppas will deliver two lectures on molecular engineering, on Thursday, February 24 and Friday, February 25. Both are free and open to the public.

On Thursday, Peppas will address "Molecular Chemical Engineering: The Contributions of Chemical Engineers to Biomaterials and Pharmaceutical Engineering," at 5 p.m., in the Frick Fine Arts Auditorium. The lecture will be followed by a reception for Peppas.

On Friday, Peppas will speak on "Poly (Ethylene Glycol)-Based Hydrogels for Protein Delivery and Molecular Imprinting," at 10 a.m., in room 1175 of Benedum Engineering Hall.

Peppas, whose expertise is in polymers and biomedical engineering, has authored

650 publications, 250 proceedings papers and preprints, and 12 patents, and is the coauthor or coeditor of 24 books. Peppas has been the editor of the periodical Biomaterials since 1982, and sits on the editorial boards of 10 other journals.

He is a director of American Institute of Chemical Engineering, and has received numerous awards for his research and teaching, including the 1999 Distinguished Research in Pharmaceutical Technology Award of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS). He is a founding fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering, and a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Society for Biomaterials, and the AAPS.

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