Rustem Ismagilov's Biography

Rustem Ismagilov, Ethel Wilson Bowles and Robert Bowles Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, California Institute of Technology

Rustem Ismagilov was born in Ufa, Russia. He graduated from the Higher Chemical College of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow (1994), before coming to the US to complete his PhD in physical organic chemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1998). He conducted his postdoctoral work at Harvard University and began his independent research career in 2001, as an Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago, Department of Chemistry. In 2011, he joined the Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at the California Institute of Technology and in 2013 he became the Ethel Wilson Bowles and Robert Bowles Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering. He also serves as the director of the Jacobs Institute for Molecular Engineering for Medicine at Caltech. His lab has developed new approaches to studies of complex chemical and biological networks, and pioneered microfluidic technologies (including droplet-based microfluidics and SlipChip microfluidics) and diagnostic technologies. Current work in the lab includes studies of the impact of the gut microbiome on its host, and development of technologies for rapid diagnosis of antimicrobial susceptibility of pathogens. The work by his research group has been recognized by a number of awards, including the Cozzarelli Prize from the National Academy of Sciences (2007), the NIH Director’s Pioneer Award (2007) and the ACS Award in Pure Chemistry (2008). He was elected a fellow of the American Academy for the Advancement of Science (2010), and was awarded a Burroughs Wellcome Fund fellowship in Innovation in Regulatory Science Award (IRSA) (2015) and a Kenneth Rainin Innovator Award (2018).