Geert Schmid-Schönbein

Dr. Schmid-Schönbein is Distinguished Professor, Director of the Microcirculation Laboratory and past Chairman of the Department of Bioengineering at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) Jacobs School of Engineering.

Dr. Schmid-Schönbein and his team have produced extensive research on how a process he refers to as “autodigestion” impacts human disease. The team discovered a mechanism for Type 2 diabetes, hypertension, obesity and co-morbidities in metabolic syndrome that is due to leakage of digestive enzymes out of the intestine and resulting unchecked digestive protease activity. They also proposed that shock, multi-organ failure, and subsequent death are due to autodigestion. Dr. Schmid-Schönbein has been the recipient of multiple federal grants in his field of research, and the discoveries from his lab laid the groundwork for the creation of Leading BioSciences in 2005.

Dr. Schmid-Schönbein received his Ph.D. in Bioengineering at UCSD. Following three years as Post-doctoral Fellow in the Department of Physiology of Columbia University, he joined the faculty of the Department of Bioengineering at UCSD in 1979. Among his many distinctions, Dr. Schmid-Schönbein is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering and a Fellow of the American Heart Association. He is a founding Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), and winner of the Melville Medal from the American Society of Mechanical Engineering as well as former President of the Biomedical Engineering Society, the Microcirculatory Society and the North American Society of Biorheology.

His research interest is in microcirculation, cell and molecular mechanics applied to pathophysiology. He has published over 500 original peer-reviewed research reports, several books, and is an inventor on multiple patents.