Palmer named Ohio Eminent Scholar
Professor Andre F. Palmer, one of the world’s leading experts in blood substitute research and engineering, has been named a Fenburr Ohio Eminent Scholar (OES).
Palmer, who recently concluded a four-year term as department chair for the William G. Lowrie Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at The Ohio State University, was chosen for the prestigious state-wide endowed chair in recognition of his breakthrough research innovations.
Palmer’s research initiatives are of critical importance to human health, and could help save lives. For instance, with a looming threat of future red blood cell (RBC) shortages and increased demands posed by injuries, wars, natural disasters and routine surgery, he and his team are developing safe and efficacious RBC substitutes that could be used to sustain a patient who needs blood for up to 48 hours—enough time to get the patient to a hospital for a blood transfusion.
Palmer’s research in biomaterials for transfusion medicine and tissue engineering has attracted nearly $11 million in funding, including four RO1s from the National Institutes of Health and funding from the Department of Defense.
Funds from the OES will boost his program even further. “Support from the OES chair will give me the ability to work on high risk/high reward problems in transfusion medicine,” said Palmer, who in 2015 was inducted into the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), which comprises the top two percent of medical and biological engineers in the country.
Recently, Palmer and colleagues developed a treatment strategy for subarachnoid hemorrhage (J Clin Invest. 2019 Oct 22. pii: 130630. doi: 10.1172/JCI130630).
In addition, Palmer has developed a novel strategy to manufacture apohemoglobin, a protein with many potential biomedical applications (Biotechnol Bioeng. 2019 Oct 15. doi: 10.1002/bit.27193).
He obtained his Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University in 1998.
The OES program, administered by the Ohio Board of Regents, was created in 1983 to enhance the national prominence of distinguished scholars across Ohio.
