Professor Abhay Pandit, Director of the SFI Research Centre, CÚRAM, has been awarded the prestigious George Winter Award 2022 from the European Society for Biomaterials (ESB). The award was bestowed during the ESB 2022 conference in Bordeaux, France this week.

The George Winter award was established to recognise, encourage and stimulate outstanding research contributions to the field of biomaterials. Professor Pandit receives this top honour in recognition of his significant contribution to the knowledge in the field of biomaterials through basic, experimental and clinical research.

Professor Abhay Pandit is an Established Professor in Biomaterials at the University of Galway, Ireland. He obtained a PhD from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where his postgraduate work focused on the modification of a fibrin scaffold to deliver a therapeutic biomolecule and resulted in a clinical trial at the Burn Centre.

On receiving the award, Professor Pandit said “I am honoured to accept this prestigious award with sincere gratitude to the European Society for Biomaterials. I accept this award with thanks to the peers, colleagues, collaborators who have enriched my research career, especially the researchers who worked in my group. I am also grateful to the funders who have trusted in funding our science.”

Professor Abhay Pandit has over twenty-five years of experience in the field of biomaterials. After a seven-year stint in industry he has worked in academia for the last twelve years. His research has been funded by Science Foundation Ireland, the EU Framework programme, Enterprise Ireland, Health Research Board, the AO Foundation and industry sources, and in excess of €170 million. He is the author of 4 patents and has licensed three technologies to medical device companies. He has published more than 328  manuscripts in high-impact publications.

Prof. Pandit was elected to the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) College of Fellows to recognise his outstanding contributions in creating a national centre to develop innovative device-based solutions to treat global chronic diseases. He is the first Irish academic to earn this distinction. He was inducted as an International Fellow in Biomaterials Science and Engineering by the International Union of Societies for Biomaterials Science and Engineering (IUSBSE), and  Fellow of the Tissue Engineering Regenerative Medicine International Society. Prof Pandit is the first Irish academic to receive this honours. He was also inducted as Fellow of the Irish Academy of Engineering.

He is currently Chair of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine and the International Society and has served as a Council Member of the European Society for Biomaterials for eight years.