David Putnam, Ph.D., Samuel B. Eckert Professor in Engineering at Cornell University College of Engineering, will deliver the 2025 Theodore, Mary, and Sara Kraut Lecture in Chemical Engineering on translating fundamental research to the commercial sector. In the talk, which is supported by the Chemical Engineering Department of the Albert Nerken School of Engineering, Professor Putnam will share three moments from his experience where basic research resulted in the creation of new companies. These examples include the design of new vaccines, which led to his co-founding Versatope Therapeutics, Inc.; the design of degradable biomaterials, which led to ProVis Medical, Inc.; and the design of functional biomaterial lubricants, which led to the founding of Pleryon Therapeutics, Ltd. 

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David Putnam, Ph.D., has been at Cornell University College of Engineering in a variety of roles for more than 20 years. Prior to being named as Samuel B. Eckert Professor in Engineering, he served as Associate Dean, Innovation & Entrepreneurship from 2021-2024. His academic research focuses on the design and synthesis of functional biomaterials with applications in drug delivery, osteoarthritis, and infectious disease. A fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, the Controlled Release Society, AIMBE, and the Coulter Foundation, Professor Putnam has served as a member of several editorial advisory boards including Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews, Pharmaceutical Research, and ACS Biomaterial Science & Engineering, among others. Prior to joining the engineering faculty at Cornell, Professor Putnam served as an National Institutes of Health postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Chemical Engineering at MIT. He received his doctorate in pharmaceutical chemistry at the University of Utah. Beyond academics, he leads two non-profit efforts, one focused on building affordable housing for the rural poor in Upstate New York, and the other focused on building energy-efficient water desalination systems for the developing world.