Dr. Charlotte A. E. Hauser, professor of bioscience at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), has been elected to the rank of NAI Fellow by the National Academy of Inventors (NAI). The 2015 Fellows Selection Committee has officially recognized Hauser for her “highly prolific spirit of innovation in creating or facilitating outstanding inventions that have made a tangible impact on quality of life, economic development and the welfare of society.”

Hauser, along with Dr. Jean M.J. Fréchet, KAUST vice president for research, will represent the University as NAI inductees this year. Hauser and Fréchet join an impressive list of Nobel Laureates, presidents and senior leadership of research universities, inductees of the National Inventors Hall of Fame, recipients of the U.S. National Medal of Technology and Innovation, recipients of the U.S. National Medal of Science, Lemelson-MIT prize recipients, AAAS Fellows and IEEE Fellows.

Professor Charlotte Hauser

Hauser’s research interests lie at the interfaces of chemistry, biomedicine, bioengineering and nanotechnology. Her focus is on the development of platform technologies using smart nanomaterials for regenerative biomedical and environmental applications.

Hauser is currently working on the rational molecular design, synthesis and mechanistic understanding of novel supramolecular structures. She investigates peptide-based nanostructures with an innate propensity to self-assemble as well as biomimetic architectures applicable for biomedical applications such as cell substrates, sensors and 3-D tissue scaffolds for regenerative medicine.

Hauser seeks to use 3-D bioprinting with supramolecular organotypic constructs to fabricate high-throughput platforms for drug screening, pathogen detection and other diagnostic purposes and synthetic biology approaches for the generation of functional biomaterial.

The NAI annual meeting

The NAI annual meeting will take place during the NAI Fifth Annual Conference on April 14 and 15, 2016 at the Grand Hyatt in Washington, D.C. The meeting will be held at the Smithsonian National American History Museum, with keynote addresses from Cristin A. Dorgelo, chief of staff of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy; Victor J. Dzau, current NAI fellow and president, National Academy of Medicine; and Andrew H. Hirshfeld, United States commissioner for patents.

Hauser and Fréchet have been invited to attend the NAI Fellows Induction Ceremony to be held on April 15, 2016 at the United States Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria, Virginia. They will also be featured in the 2015 NAI Fellows Book prior to the annual meeting.

- By Nicholas G. Demille, KAUST News