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Luís A. Nunes Amaral

HHMI Early Career Scientist
Professor of Chemical & Biological Eng.
Professor of Medicine

Email: amaral@northwestern.edu

Chemical & Biological Engineering
2145 Sheridan Road (Room E136)
Evanston, IL 60208, US
Phone: (847) 491-7850

Bio

Professor Amaral, a native of Portugal, conducts and directs research that provides insight into the emergence, evolution, and stability of complex social and biological systems. His research aims to address some of the most pressing challenges facing human societies and the world’s ecosystems, including the mitigation of errors in healthcare settings, the characterization of the conditions fostering innovation and creativity, or the growth limits imposed by sustainability.

Recently, Amaral proposed the development of cartographic methods for the representation of complex biological networks. These methods will enable researchers to accomplish something similar to what travelers now can easily accomplish with, for example, Google Maps, that is, to glean the important information on a given system at the scale of interest to the researcher. These tools hold the promise to enable biomedical researcher to design or re-engineer biological systems for therapeutic purposes.

Professor Amaral has published over a hundred scientific peer-reviewed papers in leading scientific journals. Those papers have been cited in excess of 7 thousand times; ten having accumulated more than 200 citations each. His research has been featured in numerous media sources, both in the US and abroad. Professor Amaral has received a CAREER award from the National Institutes of Health in 2003, was named to the 2006 class of Distinguished Young Scholars in Medical Research by the W. M. Keck Foundation, and has been selected as an Earlier Career Scientist by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Education

  • Ph. D. Physics (Advisor: H. Eugene Stanley), Boston University (1996)
  • Masters Physics (Advisor: B. J. Costa Cabral), Universidade de Lisboa (1992)
  • B. Sc. Physics, Universidade de Lisboa (1990)

Appointments

  • Professor, Feinberg, Northwestern University (2011-2015)
  • Professor, McCormick, Northwestern University (2009-2029)
  • Early Career Scientist, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (2009-2015)
  • Associate Professor, Feinberg, Northwestern University (2009-2011)
  • Associate Professor, McCormick, Northwestern University (2002-2009)
  • Research Associate, Boston University and Harvard Medical School (2000-2002)
  • Postdoctoral Fellow, Boston University and Harvard Medical School (1999-2000)
  • Postdoctoral Fellow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1997-1998)
  • Postdoctoral Fellow, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Germany (1995-1996)

Awards and honors

  • Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (2012)
  • Invited Participant in NAE Japan-American Frontiers of Engineerium Symposium, National Academy of Engineering (2009)
  • Early Career Scientist, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (2009)
  • Member of Advisory Board on "Complex Systems", James S. McDonnell Foundation (2009)
  • Invited Participant, NA-Keck Futures Initiative on Complex Systems, National Academies and W. M. Keck Foundation (2008)
  • Distinguished Young Scholar in Medical Research, W. M. Keck Foundation (2006)
  • Invited Participant on Workshop on Transformative Research, National Science Board (2005)
  • Invited speaker at German-American Frontiers of Science Symposium, National Academy of Sciences and Humboldt Foundation (2005)
  • Organizer, 11th Annual Frontiers of Engineering Symposium, National Academy of Engineering (2005)
  • Invited participant in 10th Annual Frontiers of Engineering Symposium, National Academy of Engineering (2004)
  • K-25 Career Award, NIGMS/NIH (2004)
  • Invited participant in 9th Annual Frontiers of Engineering Symposium, National Academy of Engineering (2003)
  • Searle Leadership Fund Award, Northwestern University (2002)
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship (2 years), Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia, Portugal (1997)
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship (15 months), DFG, Germany (1995)
  • Pre-doctoral Fellowship (3 years), JNICT, Portugal (1992)
  • Pre-doctoral Masters Fellowship (2 years), JNICT, Portugal (1990)
  • Scholarship (10 years), Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Portugal (1981)