Bruce Tromberg to lead NIH unit

I am delighted to announce that Bruce Tromberg, professor of surgery and biomedical engineering and director of the Beckman Laser Institute and Medical Clinic, has been selected as the next director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, part of the National Institutes of Health.

Professor Tromberg came to UCI in 1988 as a postdoctoral scholar and joined our faculty in 1990. His research spans the interdisciplinary fields of biophotonics and biomedical optics, with particular emphasis on the development of new technologies for medical imaging and therapy. His work includes more than 400 publications and 17 patents for various biophotonics technologies and their applications. He has received several awards, among them the R&D 100 Award, the OE Magazine Technology Innovator Award and the Michael S. Feld Biophotonics Award. He is a fellow of the International Society for Optical Engineering, the Optical Society and the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.

Professor Tromberg is widely considered a pioneer in biophotonics through the continuous development of advanced technologies in diffuse optical spectroscopy and multimodal imaging. His research addresses clinical problems in cancer, vascular disease, neuroscience and critical care. Under his leadership, the Beckman Laser Institute and Medical Clinic has become one of the world’s premier centers in marrying laser capabilities with clinical diagnostics and treatments. BLI technologies and discoveries have had a great impact on cutaneous disease and treatment, cellular micromanipulation, intraluminal endoscopic imaging, functional imaging of cells and thick tissues, targeted phototherapies and multimodality imaging. Applications of BLI technologies have touched on most major areas of biology and medicine.

In his new position, which he will assume early in 2019, Professor Tromberg will oversee an annual budget of $378 million, which supports 800 active grants awarded to universities around the nation and internationally, as well as NIBIB’s own research labs. He and his staff will conduct and support the research and development of biomedical imaging and bioengineering technologies and techniques to improve the detection, treatment and prevention of disease. NIBIB also sponsors multidisciplinary research in the physical, mathematical and computational sciences.

Professor Tromberg has played an essential role in the advancement of UCI as a healthcare research and delivery powerhouse, and he will be greatly missed. I know you all join me in wishing him well as he takes up his new responsibilities.