Thomas Werfel

Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering

Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering

Joint Associate Professor of BioMolecular Sciences

 

Education:

Postdoctoral Fellow, Vanderbilt School of Medicine, 2017-2018

Ph.D. Biomedical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, 2017

M.S. Biomedical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, 2015

B.S. Physics, Murray State University, 2013

 

Biosketch:

Thomas Werfel is Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Joint Assistant Professor of BioMolecular Sciences, and Affiliate Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering at The University of Mississippi (UM). Dr. Werfel received his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Vanderbilt University in 2017, after which he worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Cell and Developmental Biology at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. In 2018, he joined the Biomedical Engineering Program at the University of Mississippi and is an inaugural faculty member of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at UM – founded in 2019. As a graduate student, Dr. Werfel was awarded the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) Fellowship. His tenure as a postdoctoral researcher was supported by the NIH F32 Postdoctoral Fellowship. His research has been published in cross-disciplinary journals from Biomaterials and Advanced Materials to PNAS and Cancer Research. He was recently recognized as a Biomaterials Science Emerging Investigator, an Emerging Scholar in Biomaterials by the Society for Biomaterials, and an NSF CAREER award recipient. His research group at UM is actively investigating: 1) “smart” glycopolymers as tools for targeted drug delivery to the immune system, 2) multimodal materials for interval and sequential drug delivery, and 3) engineered protein coronas to improve nanoparticle delivery. We are passionate about applying these technologies to improve treatment in the areas of Cancer, Mental Health, and Women’s Health.