Skip to main content
NIH Record - National Institutes of Health

Tromberg Named Next NIBIB Director

a smiling Dr. Tromberg at his desk

Dr. Bruce Tromberg will be the new director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, starting in 2019.

Photo: Paul Kennedy, UCI

Dr. Bruce Tromberg has been named new director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering. He is expected to join NIH in the new year.

A pioneering leader in the field of biophotonics, he is currently a professor at the University of California at Irvine, with dual appointments in the departments of biomedical engineering and surgery. He is also director of UCI’s Beckman Laser Institute and Medical Clinic, an interdisciplinary research, teaching and clinical center for optics and photonics in biology and medicine.

In his 30-plus-year academic and scientific career, Tromberg has conducted extensive NIH-supported research and has been the principal investigator for multiple NIH grants going back as far as 1994. This includes 20 years as PI for the Laser Microbeam and Medical Program, an NIH National Biomedical Technology Resource Center where several cutting-edge technologies have been developed and disseminated to laboratories and clinics around the world.

In addition to advisory committee appointments with numerous national and international entities, Tromberg has provided expertise on NIH working groups, review committees and boards, including the NIBIB National Advisory Council from 2012 to 2016.

Tromberg’s research spans biophotonics and biomedical optics, two rapidly growing fields that use light to image and conduct therapy at the molecular, cellular and tissue levels. He has co-authored more than 450 publications and holds 18 patents for biophotonics technologies and their applications in areas such as cancer, neuroscience and vascular disease. He specializes in new technology development as well as the “bench to bedside” clinical translation, validation and commercialization of promising methods designed to improve human health.

As a high school student, Tromberg volunteered in a National Cancer Institute laboratory, graduating in 1974 from Woodrow Wilson High School in Washington, D.C. He earned a B.A. in chemistry and psychology in 1979 from Vanderbilt University and a Ph.D. in chemistry in 1988 from the University of Tennessee.

While completing his Ph.D., he conducted research as a Department of Energy predoctoral fellow at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Dr. Jill Heemskerk has been serving as NIBIB acting director since November 2017, and will return to her role as NIBIB deputy director.

Back to Top