ChE 2026 Spring Seminar Series – Hal Alper, PhD

Details

Speaker: Hal Alper, PhD
Chair
Department of Chemical Engineering
University of Texas at Austin

Talk Tile: Beyond the test-tube: metabolic engineering for next-generation applications

Abstract:
Advances in metabolic engineering and synthetic biology can enable microbes to produce nearly any organic molecule of interest—from biofuels to biopolymers to pharmaceuticals. While this approach has fueled the industrial biotechnology, new challenges arise for microbe engineering when considering non-conventional settings. This talk will highlight several unique application areas for metabolic engineering. First, the use of engineered biology for the degradation of waste products (including plastics and other hydrophobic substrates) will be discussed considering the unique challenges required to consume these non-carbohydrate substrates. Second, the use of a printable hydrogel system for encapsulating cells will be discussed as a means for both portable cultivation of engineered microbial systems as well as for responsive theranostics. Third, the engineering of microbial factories for space environments will be discussed. Robust “space-ready” organisms require an understanding of how cells respond to the unique challenges and stressors of space including microgravity, radiation, and desiccation. Together, these efforts demonstrate how to deploy metabolically engineered cells outside of traditional sugar-based bioreactor settings.

Biosketch:
Dr. Hal Alper is the Cockrell Family Regents Chair in Engineering #1 at The University of Texas at Austin. He earned his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2006 and was a postdoctoral research associate at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research from 2006-2008, and at Shire Human Genetic Therapies from 2007-2008. He is currently the Principal Investigator of the Laboratory for Cellular and Metabolic Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin where his lab focuses on metabolic and cellular engineering in the context of biofuel, biochemical, and biopharmaceutical production in an array of model host organisms. His research focuses on applying and extending the approaches of synthetic biology, systems biology, and protein engineering. Dr. Alper has published over 180 articles and 10 book chapters. Dr. Alper is the recipient of the Camille and Henry Dreyfus New Faculty Award (2008), Texas Exes Teaching Award (2009), DuPont Young Investigator Award (2010), Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award (2011), UT Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award (2012), Biotechnology and Bioengineering Daniel I.C. Wang Award (2013), Jay Bailey Young Investigator Award (2014), Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (2014), Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology Young Investigator Award (2015), ACS BIOT Young Investigator Award (2016), UT-Austin Emerging Inventor of the Year Award (2016) and AIChE Allan P. Colburn Award (2018), Biochemical Engineering Journal Young Investigator Award (2019), and Edith and Peter O’Donnell Award in Engineering (2019), AIChE Andreas Acrivos Award for Professional Progress in Chemical Engineering (2023), and International Metabolic Engineering Award (2025). He was elected as a Fellow to the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering in 2018, the National Academy of Inventors in 2019, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2024.