David R. Walt, Ph.D.

David is the Hansjörg Wyss Professor of Bioinspired Engineering and a professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, as well as a core faculty member of the Wyss Institute at Harvard University. Additionally, David is an associate member at the Broad Institute, Howard Hughes Medical Institute professor, and co-director of the Mass General Brigham Center for COVID Innovation.

David pioneered the use of microwell arrays for single-molecule detection and genetic measurements, which has revolutionized the process of genetic and proteomic analysis, enabling the cost of DNA sequencing and genotyping to plummet nearly a millionfold in the last decade. He is the scientific founder of Illumina and Quanterix Corp. David also co-founded multiple life science startups, including Ultivue, Arbor Biotechnologies, Sherlock Biosciences, Vizgen and Torus Biosciences. His lab develops new diagnostics tools and new biomarker assay technologies based on single molecule detection that can address unmet clinical needs in diagnostics. The lab focuses on early detection of breast cancer, active tuberculosis, and other infectious diseases and diagnosis of neurodegenerative diseases. His lab has also helped develop new tools to understand and diagnose COVID-19 and pursues fundamental research on single enzyme molecules to provide insight into enzyme mechanisms.

David has received numerous national and international awards and honors for his fundamental and applied work in the field of optical microwell arrays and single molecules, including the 2021 Kabiller Prize in Nanoscience and Nanomedicine. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Medicine. David is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the National Academy of Inventors, where he was inducted into its Hall of Fame.

David received a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from the University of Michigan and a PhD in Chemical Biology from SUNY at Stony Brook in New York.