Professor Wei Shen leads a number of research teams at BioPRIA within the Department of Chemical Engineering at Monash University. Wei received his BEng (Chem) degree from Tsinghua University, China in 1982. He then worked for four years at the Beijing Printing Institute. In 1987 Wei came to Australia to pursue a doctorate, receiving his PhD in physical chemistry in 1991. This was followed by a postdoctoral appointment at La Trobe University.
Wei joined Monash University in 1995, researching paper surface modification and printing engineering. Since 2008, he has led research in bioactive paper- and thread-based microfluidic sensors. His group has applied their skills in paper surface modification and printing to fabricate microfluidic systems on paper, thread and polymer films. More recently Wei has begun new research into powder-liquid interfaces, constructing soft reactors using liquid drops and liquid marbles for stem cell research. He has also applied surface engineering to modify powdery materials for oil spill control. In 2012, Wei led his group to win the Australian Museum Eureka Prize and the IChemE Award (UK) for their innovation in bioactive paper diagnostics. In 2013, he was selected as a finalist in the Australian Innovation Challenge.
Current Projects
Surface engineering
Surface engineering projects that aim to understand wetting and drying of particulate materials and design interfaces for engineering and biological applications.
Bioactive paper – diagnostics and environmental sensors
Design of bio-functionalised papers for construction of sensory devices for diagnostics and environmental monitoring applications.
Soft micro-reactors
Liquid drops and liquid marbles are used to design highly efficient biological reactions for cell and stem cell research, and biochemical analysis.
Functional Printing
Printing technologies are developed as high precision materials transfer processes for fabrication of bioactive interfaces and nano technology devices.
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