Professor J. Paul Santerre (BME) has been elected fellow of the U.S. National Academy of Inventors (NAI). The NAI fellows program honours the achievements of outstanding academic inventors who have successfully translated their research into tangible commercial technologies that significantly enhance society.  

Santerre is a professor in the Faculty of Dentistry and the Institute of Biomedical Engineering, and the Baxter Chair for Health Technology and Commercialization at the University Health Network. He is a listed inventor on 79 patents in the areas of medical polymers and drug delivery. Santerre’s research has led to five start-up ventures, most notably Interface Biologics Inc. (IBI), which he formed in 2001 to commercialize his Endexo™ technology, a unique compound of surface-modifying macro-molecules that are added to plastics during the manufacturing of medical devices. The special coating helps reduce clotting when the devices are used to treat patients, greatly reducing the risk of adverse reactions and potentially deadly complications.  

Santerre was the president of IBI from 2001-2004 and the chief scientific officer until earlier this year. Under his leadership, the company grew to more than 30 employees and annual revenues of more than $5M while developing an extensive international patent portfolio. IBI forged agreements with several global production partners and extended into access ports, dialysis catheters and central venous catheters. The technology was subsequently purchased by Evonik Inc., a multinational materials company.   

Currently, Santerre is director of the Health Innovation Hub (H2i), an accelerator for young entrepreneurs at the Temerty Faculty of Medicine. Since 2014, H2i has trained more than 850 entrepreneurial health venture teams. Those early-stage ventures have gone on to generate more than $660M CDN. H2i has created a network of 160 industry mentors, and 155 funding and resource-sharing partners, that help deliver 145 activities annually from the early ideation phase to market launch.  

Santerre is an international fellow of Biomaterials Science and Engineering, and a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His many awards for innovation and technology transfer include the Julia Levy Award from the Canadian Society for Chemical Industry, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada’s Synergy Award for Innovation, the Manning Innovation Award, and the Governor General’s Innovation Award. 

“Professor Santerre has made outstanding contributions to innovation in the biomaterials field through the invention and commercialization of new technologies and the mentoring of up-and-coming inventors and entrepreneurs,” says Christopher Yip, Dean of U of T Engineering.  

“On behalf of the faculty, sincere congratulations to him on this well-deserved honour.”