Scientist
Human Assay Technologies Group, Vertex Pharmaceuticals
As a scientist at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Alex Brown works to develop engineered human cell-based models and assays to drive exploratory drug discovery efforts and answer key project questions. He earned his PhD in biological engineering at MIT, where he worked in the lab of Dr. Linda Griffith. While at MIT, he explored ways to use interactions at cell-material interfaces to study emergent behavior and self-organization in cell populations, centered around the idea that we can generate more complex but controllable in vitro models of human tissue relevant to the study of disease mechanisms and drug efficacy. Using rational design of biomaterials and culture platforms, Brown and colleagues worked on creating tissue models that generate data complementary to, and in some ways more physiologically relevant compared to those obtained from traditional cell culture and animal models. Brown received his Bachelor of Science degree in bioengineering from Lehigh University.
