Professor Alicia El Haj

Professor Alicia El Haj, FREng, FRSB, FEAMBES, Interdisciplinary Professor of Cell Engineering, joined the Healthcare Technology Institute in the Institute of Translational Medicine at Birmingham University, UK in September 2018. She is a leading figure in Bioengineering and Regenerative Medicine and has been involved in bringing together interdisciplinary groups within biomedicine, maths, physical sciences and engineering interested in aspects of cell and tissue engineering and regenerative medicine to move innovative new cell based therapies to the clinic. Working with the Waters group during a Visiting Fellowship at the Mathematical Institute in Oxford, she has been involved in cross disciplinary experimental and theoretical modelling of tissue engineering protocols in vitro within bioreactor growth environments and in vivo during cell delivery and repair. She has published over 200 publications with funding from EPSRC, MRC, BBSRC, Versus Arthritis, EU Commission and an ERC Advanced Award in 2018. She is also Director of a spin out company MICA Biosystems , Ltd involved in translating innovative in vitro pharma screening tools and stem cell control systems into clinical use.

She is currently Deputy Director of the MRC UKRMP Regen Med Hub and a partner in the Versus Arthritis Centre in Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine as well as multiple EU programmes. She has been a Research Director of an EPSRC Doctoral Training Centre in Regenerative Medicine, and a co-director of the EPSRC Centre for Innovative Manufacturing Centre in Regenerative Medicine. Prof. El Haj is ex-Chair of the European Council for the Tissue Engineering & Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS). She was awarded with a Royal Society Merit Award in 2014 and is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in the UK. In March 2015, she was awarded the MRC Suffrage Award for her role in leading women in STEM. Alicia actively engages in public events having presented ‘Remote Control Healing’ at the Café Scientifique in Royal Society London and at the ‘Next Big Thing’ at the Hay Festival 2017. In 2020, she was awarded the IOM3 Chapman medal for her major contribution towards translation of biomedical materials into healthcare.