Dr. Jan Liphardt grew up in Michigan and New York. He received a BA from Reed College (1993-96) and a PhD from Cambridge University, UK (Churchill College, 1996-99). Jan is a Searle Scholar, a Sloan Research Fellow, a Hellman Fellow, and the recipient of the 2007 Mohr Davidow Ventures Innovator’s Award. Basic research in his lab is funded by federal agencies such as the NCI, NIGMS, NSF, and the DOE. Jan teaches the "Engineering Living Matter" (BioE80) course with Drew Endy, the module on AI/Machine Learning in BioE301C, and a crypto/blockchain class (BioE60 - Beyond Bitcoin: Applications of Distributed Trust).
Dr. Jan Liphardt's lab is a team of physicists, engineers, and biologists. They investigate the organization and dynamics of single molecules in living cells using new optical tools. In these studies, the lab collects time-series data and then analyzes them to find underlying regulatory and organizational principles.
Beyond 'basic' biophysics, the lab also tries to tackle broader problems in medicine. Public health and disease prevention are still significantly constrained by limited data. Current medical record systems and health AI tools are not yet optimized for rapid, private, and low cost delivery of high-quality prevention and care. However, new computational and cryptographic techniques have the potential to make health much more accessible all around the world. For example, using Secure Multiparty Computation, volunteers can allow cloud doctors to learn from symptom data and provide health recommendations, without sensitive data ever leaving a person's phone.
