Adjunct Professor, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.
Adjunct Professor, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan (China)
Researcher (Academic), Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia.
Helmut Thissen obtained his PhD in Chemistry from RWTH Aachen University in Germany, where he also started to translate biomedical research into the clinic while working at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Clinical Research. His main interests are the interdisciplinary topics of Biomaterials, Regenerative Medicine and Biosensors, with a focus on the control of interactions between material surfaces and biomolecules, cells and tissues. He then moved to Melbourne, Australia to join the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in 1998, where he is now serving as a Team Leader in the Manufacturing Business Unit and working with over 40 outstanding scientists. Within these years, serving as the Director of CSIRO’s Biomedical Materials Translational Facility (BMTF) his team has successfully transformed a number of research results into a variety of biomedical products. What’s more, he was awarded the CSIRO Medal for Research Achievement and the Newton Turner Award. Moreover, he has published more than 150 peer-reviewed journal publications and book chapters, his strong translational focus is reflected by more than 10 patent families. Apart from frequently serving as an expert evaluator for multiple national and international institutions, ranging from the NHMRC to the European Commission, he is also an Adjunct Professor at Monash University in Melbourne and National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan (China). He has served his scientific community in many different roles, including President of the Australasian Society for Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering (ASBTE), Program Leader of the Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) for Polymers, chair of multiple national and international conferences and symposia and mentor of many early career scientists.
Projects:
1.Preventing catheter-associated urinary tract infections
Duque Sanchez, Lina (Primary Chief Investigator (PCI)), Voelcker, Nicolas (Supervisor), Thissen, Helmut, CSIRO Manufacturing (Supervisor), Peleg, Anton (Chief Investigator (CI))
Drug Delivery Disposition & Dynamics, Infectious Diseases, Centre to Impact AMR, Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute
31/03/20 – 30/03/23
2.In vitro study of biofilm formation on new HVAD driveline
Qu, Yue (Primary Chief Investigator (PCI)), McGiffin, David (Chief Investigator (CI)), Peleg, Anton (Chief Investigator (CI)), Thissen, Helmut (Chief Investigator (CI))
Infectious Diseases, Microbiology, Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Surgery Alfred Hospital
27/08/20 – 27/08/21
3.Development of theranostic biomaterials
Pei, Yi (Primary Chief Investigator (PCI)), Voelcker, Nicolas (Supervisor), Thissen, Helmut (Supervisor)
Drug Delivery Disposition & Dynamics
27/04/20 – 26/04/22
4.Surface modifications prevent driveline infection
Qu, Yue (Chief Investigator (CI)), McGiffin, David (Primary Chief Investigator (PCI)), Thissen, Helmut (Chief Investigator (CI)), Forsythe, John (Primary Chief Investigator (PCI)), Meagher, Laurence (Chief Investigator (CI))
Infectious Diseases, Surgery Alfred Hospital, Materials Science & Engineering
1/10/16 – 1/06/17
5.Next Generation Virus Biosensors & Wearable Nanoneedle Array Bioseneors
Voelcker, Nicolas (Primary Chief Investigator (PCI)), Prieto-Simon, Beatriz (Chief Investigator (CI)), Thissen, Helmut, CSIRO Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (Chief Investigator (CI)), Alba Martin, Maria (Chief Investigator (CI)), Rose, Stephen E (Chief Investigator (CI))
Drug Delivery Disposition & Dynamics
7/04/17 – 6/04/20
Publications:
1.R. Blindt; K.M. Hoffmeister; H. Bienert; O. Pfannschmitt; G. Bartsch; H. Thissen; D. Klee; J. Vom Dahl. Development of a New Biodegradable Intravascular Polymer Stent with Simultaneous Incorporation of Bioactive Substances. The International Journal of Artificial Organs on March 13, 2018.
2.Fanyi Li; Vinh X. Truong; Helmut Thissen; Jessica E. Frith; John S. Forsythe. Microfluidic Encapsulation of Human Mesenchymal Stem Cells for Articular Cartilage Tissue Regeneration. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces on March 02, 2017.
3.Jizhen Lu; Katrin Kaestle; Jijun Huang; Qiao Liu; Peng Zhang; Ling Gao; James Gardiner; Helmut Thissen; Huang-Tian Yang. Interactions of human embryonic stem cell-derived cardiovascular progenitor cells with immobilized extracellular matrix proteins. Journal of Biomedical Materials Research Part A on February 02, 2017.
4.Yue Qu; Helmut Thissen; David McGiffin; Anton Y. Peleg. Optimizing Microplate Biofilm Assays to Screen Anti-infective Surfaces. Trends in Biotechnology in January, 2017.
5.Berkay Ozcelik; Renxun Chen; Veronica Glattauer; Naresh Kumar; MarkD.P. Willcox; Helmut Thissen. Crosslinked Platform Coatings Incorporating Bioactive Signals for the Control of Biointerfacial Interactions. Macromolecular Bioscience in 2017.