Brendon Baker, PhD

Assistant Professor
Biomedical Engineering, University of Michigan

bambren (at) umich (dot) edu

Hometown: Bedford, Massachusetts

Education: BS in Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University;
PhD in Bioengineering, University of Pennsylvania

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Research interests: I'm fascinated with the complex interplay between a tissue's microenvironment and its constituent cells.  How do cells receive and interpret a wide array of dynamic external cues to make fundamental decisions to spread, migrate, divide, or make and remodel extracellular matrix?  Each of these actions changes the cell's future interpretation of its microenvironment. This reciprocal relationship is in part what makes this process both difficult and exciting to study.  My group develops novel biomaterials and in vitro microsystems to understand these interactions, with the belief that sufficient understanding ultimately will provide engineering control over cellular decision-making in disease or regenerative contexts.

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Outside of lab interests: When not working on a grant, I'm either playing squash, doting on my pesky cat, Darjun (aka. Mr. Cat), or cutting up the back roads of Ann Arbor on a CBR600RR.

Awards and honors:

2006-2007, Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need Fellowship in Bioengineering

2007-2010, National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship

2012-2014, Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award 

2015-2016, NIH Pathway to Independence Award 

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