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Chris Toumazou

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Christofer Toumazou
Born (1961-07-05) 5 July 1961 (age 63)
NationalityBritish
Alma materOxford Brookes University
Scientific career
FieldsElectronic Engineering/Medical Technology
InstitutionsImperial College London
ThesisUniversal current-mode analogue amplifiers (1986)
Doctoral advisorFrancis John Lidgey

Christofer "Chris" Toumazou, FRS, FREng, FMedSci, FIET, FIEEE, FCGI, FRSM, CEng (Template:Lang-el, born 5 July 1969) is a British Cypriot electronic engineer.

In 2013 he became London’s first Regius Professor of Engineering conferred to Imperial College London during the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Toumazou is also Chief Scientist of the Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Professor of Circuit Design at Imperial; founder of Toumaz Holdings Ltd, chairman and founder of DNA Electronics Ltd. and Chief Scientific Advisor to GENEU.

He has been involved in developing new technologies, mainly in medical field, creating a research institute and a number of commercial ventures to commercialize his research. In particular Toumazou invented and licensed Portable and Rapid Semiconductor Genome Sequencing which has now become a multibillion-dollar industry. One of his motivators was the diagnosis of his 13-year-old son with end stage kidney failure through a rare genetic mutation.[1]

He has published over 50 research papers and holds 50 patents in the field of semiconductors and healthcare. Toumazou's career began with the invention and development of entirely novel concept of current-mode analogue circuitry for ultra-low-power electronic devices.

He has worked on applying silicon chip technology to biomedical and life-science applications, most recently to DNA analysis. Amongst his key inventions was that of semiconductor based DNA sequencing. For his inventions on semiconductor based genetic testing he won the Gabor Medal of the Royal Society (2013) and European Inventor Award (2014). He is the first British winner of the prize in this contest since 2008.[2]

Biography

Academic career

Toumazou obtained both his undergraduate degree and doctorate at the then Oxford Polytechnic (now Oxford Brookes University).[3] He moved to Imperial College London in 1986 as a Research Fellow in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering becoming the youngest professor at Imperial in 1994 at the age of 33. He was appointed Head of the Circuits and Systems Group in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and then Head of the Department of Bioengineering in 2001.

In 2003 he raised a total of £22m to create the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at Imperial College London, a multidisciplinary research institute focusing on personalised medicine and bionanotechnology.[4] He became its first Director and Chief Scientist. His own specialism is in the field of personalised healthcare, providing worn or implantable devices for early diagnosis and detection of disease.

His research and entrepreneurial actions have shown how natural analogue physics of silicon semiconductor technology can be used to mimic and replace biological functions. Examples of this include cochlear implants for born-deaf children, an artificial pancreas for type 1 diabetics, wireless heart monitors for personalized ambulatory health monitoring pre- and post- operatively, inventing semiconductor-based DNA sequencing and inventing an intelligent neural stimulator as a drug alternative for obesity.

He has given numerous public lectures and keynote addresses at a national and international level. In 2011 he was invited to speak at the TEDMED conference in San Diego. His lecture was entitled 'When Will Wireless Medicine Change Healthcare'.[5] Other notable lectures include the G8 Summit (2013) and Royal Society public talk (2011).

He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society (2008), Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (2008) and Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (2013), making him one of a handful in the UK who are fellows of all three premier societies.

Regius Professorship

Toumazou was awarded a prestigious Regius professorship, recognising the highest standard of research and teaching in the Faculty of Engineering. Announced on 29 January 2013, the honour was granted by the Queen as part of her 60th anniversary celebrations. A Regius Professorship is a rare privilege, with only two created in the past century. It is a reflection of the exceptionally high quality of teaching and research at an institution. David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Science, said: "I was incredibly impressed by the quality and range of the applications received and am delighted that twelve new Regius Professorships are to be created. Together, the successful applications demonstrated an exceptionally high level of achievement in both teaching and research [1]

Commercial career

He has been involved with a number of commercial ventures, including the invention and development of the world's first analogue and digital mobile phone for the largest mobile phone cellular operator in Thailand – this received approval and entered mass production in 2001. Since then, his commercial focus has been applied to a range of innovative electronic devices which harness semiconductor chip technology to provide significant improvements in health and patient care.

He has co-founded technology-based companies using silicon technology for early detection and management of chronic disease: Toumaz Technology Ltd and DNA Electronics Ltd. Products being commercialised include the Toumaz Sensium Ultra-Low Power Wireless Body Monitoring System which gives physicians constant access to vital signs including ECG, body temperature, respiration and physical activity of patients with chronic illnesses using an intelligent chip-enhanced bandaid and the DNA Electronics Genalysis platform for rapid, portable genetic tests outside a lab environment. These companies are good examples of the successful translation of innovative inter-disciplinary research into disruptive market-driven products with practical benefits for patients.[6]

Toumaz Ltd has developed the Sensium Ultra-Low Power Wireless Body Monitoring System which gives physicians constant access to vital signs. Developments guided by Chris in ultra low power silicon chip technology at Imperial College London utilise Advanced Mixed Signal(AMxTM)enabled ultra low power techniques in signal processing and wireless systems to produce chips consuming up to 100 times less power than other state-of-the-art devices. The resulting SensiumTM Chip is an ultra low power SoC sensor transceiver platform for use in a wide range of applications in the 'Human Space'. Use of such technology in patient surveillance systems can capture and record sensor data such as heart rate, respiratory rate and temperature with the potential for capturing other biological signals. This data can be wirelessly transmitted via low power radio to receivers in the vicinity for onward transmission to central stations to accelerate clinical response. This technology for remote, real time monitoring in the hospital and home, has been granted US FDA approval and is already deployed in hospitals in the USA.

In 2005 he founded DNA Electronics Ltd; he recognized that by merging microchip technology with genetic chemistry and DNA sequencing he was able to invent, develop and commercialize a new revolution in genetic point-of-care diagnostics and DNA sequencing. The technology launched in 2010 as "ion semiconductor sequencing" and has been licensed to Thermo Fisher Scientific. DNA Electronics Ltd, is developing rapid near-patient live diagnostics providing actionable information to clinicians. DNAe’s priority focus is a test for blood stream infections for use in the management and prevention of sepsis.

Other activities

He has served as a member of several Government committees including the Foresight Committee on Infectious Diseases and the MOD Defence Strategic Advisory Committee on Critical Technologies. He is Editor-in-Chief for the IET's Electronics letters, Senior Advisor to the Board of Grace Semiconductor in Taiwan and International Advisor for Singaporean Government in medical devices.

Honours and awards

References

  1. ^ "CNN,Chris Toumazou and Genalysis® on CNN Make Create Innovate".
  2. ^ "Technology for the common man' Financial Times, Engineering the future, 18 June 2014".
  3. ^ McKie, Robin (15 June 2014). "Newly crowned: Europe's top inventor". The Guardian. Retrieved 18 June 2014.
  4. ^ "Bio-Inspired Technologies" (PDF). Ingenia Issue 37 December 2008. Royal Academy of Engineering.
  5. ^ "When Will Wireless Medicine Change Healthcare?". TEDMED talk. TEDMED 2011.
  6. ^ Interview with Clive Cookson Financial Times
  7. ^ "Theo Murphy Blue Skies awards". Our work: Funding research. The Royal Society. Retrieved July 23, 2009.
  8. ^ "Technology Transfer Challenge Committee". Wellcome Trust. Retrieved July 23, 2009.
  9. ^ "Invention: Microchip for quick DNA testing". {{cite web}}: |first1= missing |last1= (help); External link in |ref= (help)
  10. ^ "Gabor Medal". Royal Society. Retrieved 12 September 2013.
  11. ^ "Imperial College London has been awarded a prestigious Regius professorship, recognising the highest standard of research and teaching in the Faculty of Engineering". Imperial. 2013-01-30. Retrieved 2013-03-09.
  12. ^ "Toumaz's Professor Chris Toumazou Elected to Prestigious Fellowship of the Royal Society". PRLog. 2008-05-19. Retrieved 2009-07-23.
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