Tom de Greef is Professor of Synthetic Biology in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Eindhoven University of Technology as well as in Biophysical Chemistry at Radboud University. He is a member of the Eindhoven Young Academy of Engineering and De Jonge Akademie. His research focuses on engineering basic cellular functions from well-characterized biological components and developing novel biological computing devices to enhance the signal-processing capabilities of natural and synthetic cells. This involves designing and constructing integrated genetic or protein-based circuits capable of autonomously performing useful functions. Advances in synthetic biology will allow the development of functional living and hybrid technologies such as biological robots, synthetic cells or augmented natural cells, that can be interfaced with the human body to detect disease biomarkers and allow autonomous, closed-loop therapeutic functions.
Tom de Greef received his PhD (2009) from the Eindhoven University of Technology in the area of organic chemistry under the supervision of Prof. E.W. Meijer and Prof. R. Sijbesma. In 2013 he was a visiting scholar in the group of Prof. D. Weitz (Harvard). He has received ERC Starting (2016) and Consolidator grant (2020) and an NWO Veni and VIDI grant to set up his independent research.