Biography: John Hanks

John Hanks is professor of practice in the Department of Biomedical Engineering and director of industry relations for the Center for Remote Healthcare Technology (CRHT). Professor Hanks is an industry veteran with more than 25 years of corporate experience at National Instruments and Siemens Medical Systems. While at National Instruments he held positions as vice president of life sciences and healthcare and vice president of industrial and embedded products. As vice president of life sciences and healthcare, Hanks led teams that developed commercial subsystems and prototype optical coherence tomography imaging, mass spectrometry, DNA sequencing and molecular diagnostics devices. In addition, as vice president of industrial and embedded products he led efforts to bring wireless sensor network, data acquisition, computer vision, motion control, and field programmable gate array-based embedded measurement and control software and hardware products to market. Professor Hanks brings a wealth of industry knowledge, engineering and product management, intellectual property negotiations and licensing, and commercialization experience to the department.

As CRHT associate director, Hanks works to identify unmet patient needs and collaborate with corporate partners to close the technology gaps spanning from devices to big data in today’s fragmented healthcare landscape, allowing for earlier interventions, personalized treatment, and fewer patient visits and hospitalizations. CRHT research is multidisciplinary and involves investigators from across the world including clinicians, electronics and software engineers, and life science faculty.

Professor Hanks’ research interests include low-power wearable sensor technology for personal fitness, home patient and military personnel monitoring. Along with research and corporate collaborators, he develops mobile fitness, medical and point-of-care technology using high-volume commercial form factors such as smart phones, smart watches and wearable sensors. These form factors combine software and LEDs, lasers, optics and low-power electronics to measure heart rate, blood pressure, blood oxygen levels, oxygen consumption and novel measurements such as caloric burn. Other interests include affordable prototyping and design, technology market validation, emerging FDA regulations for mobile apps, and disruptive technology innovation. Professor Hanks is often a panelist and guest speaker on innovation at corporate events and conferences.