Researcher

Professor Laura Poole-Warren

My Expertise

Biomaterial / host interactions; infection of medical implants; conducting polymers; neural interfacing materials; percutaneous access catheters; vascular grafts; regulatory requirements of medical technology; hydrogel drug delivery; biomaterials for wound healing; tissue engineering

Fields of Research (FoR)

Biomaterials, Polymers and Plastics, Regenerative Medicine (incl. Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering)

Biography

Professor Poole-Warren leads a research group focussed on design and development of novel materials for neural electrodes and other soft-tissue interfaces, and on 3D engineered neural tissue models. A key theme of her work is on design of new biosynthetic materials and understanding of  material and device interactions with cells and tissues. Throughout her career, she has worked in academia, industry, and government bodies. She was a research...view more

Professor Poole-Warren leads a research group focussed on design and development of novel materials for neural electrodes and other soft-tissue interfaces, and on 3D engineered neural tissue models. A key theme of her work is on design of new biosynthetic materials and understanding of  material and device interactions with cells and tissues. Throughout her career, she has worked in academia, industry, and government bodies. She was a research professor at the New Jersey Centre for Biomaterials based at Rutgers University in the USA and a preclinical scientist in the biomedical industry working on development of wound dressings and embolic agents for cancer treatment from 1999 to 2001. She also served from 2003 to 2013 as a member of the Australian Government Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) statutory expert committee on the safety of medical devices. Between 2005 and 2018, Laura held various leadership appointments at UNSW including Faculty of Engineering Associate Dean Research, Pro Vice-Chancellor, Dean of Graduate Research and Chair of the inaugural Athena SWAN self assessement team (SAT). She was the inaugural Chair of the Australian Council for Graduate Research (ACGR), as well as being the Australian representative on the International Union of Societies of Biomaterials Science and Engineering. Laura was awarded honours in January 2020 as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for service to Biomedical Engineering and education, is a Fellow of four academies, ATSE, AIMBE, IUSBSE and the Royal Society of NSW. She is an Associate Editor of Biomaterials, and on the editorial board of the Journal of Neural Engineering.


My Research Supervision


Areas of supervision

Polymeric Biomaterials for soft tissue interfaces, particularly neural (including sensory), cardiovascular and skin

Conducting polymers for increased flexibility and improved mechanical matching with soft tissues

Biosynthetic polymers for encapsulating living cells and supporting their function to form 3D tissue mimics

Understanding and evaluating biological performance of materials and medical devices (biocompatibility)


Currently supervising

Dhyey Shah

Reem Almasri

Shuqian Wan

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Location

Samuels Building

Contact

+61-2-9385 3905