Kunal Sailesh Parikh, PhD

Kunal Parikh, PhD, is the Boone Pickens Rising Professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (JHU) in the divisions of Glaucoma and Nanomedicine at the Wilmer Eye Institute and in the Center for Bioengineering Innovation & Design in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. Dr. Parikh leads a translational, R01-funded, interdisciplinary lab of engineers, scientists, and clinicians working together to create and translate novel biomedical solutions to alleviate human suffering at scale. His research program utilizes the biodesign and insight informed innovation methodologies to develop digital health technologies, surgical instruments, medical devices, multi-functional biomaterials, and therapeutics that can be readily scaled and adopted into clinical practice to enable access to care, improve treatment outcomes, and prevent post-operative complications.

Dr. Parikh has a particular interest in improving health outcomes for vulnerable populations. He leads the Global Institute for Vision Equity, an initiative working to enable equity in eye care globally through development and translation of novel solutions addressing critical needs in ophthalmology and designed for the patients, care providers, and context of care in under-resourced settings. He is a member of the International Association for the Prevention of Blindness Technology Access Taskforce and previously served as Cofounder & President of Access HEARS, a social enterprise providing affordable, accessible hearing care.

Dr. Parikh also works at the intersection of nanotechnology, drug delivery, and medicine to develop the next generation of biomaterials, combination products, and drug delivery systems with exceptional safety profiles that provide sustained therapeutic efficacy directly at the site of pathology to improve clinical outcomes. Several of his laboratory’s inventions have been licensed to industry or formed the basis for startup companies (Eyedea Medical, Cove Therapeutics, Samata Therapeutics, Visilant), including multiple commercial products.

Previously, Dr. Parikh built and served as the Executive Director of the Social Innovation Lab at JHU where he advised and funded mission-driven entrepreneurs. Prior to arriving in Baltimore, he was the founding CEO of Core Quantum Technologies, a venture-backed biotechnology company developing superior imaging and detection reagents.

He earned his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering at JHU where he was a Roche/ARCS Scholar and National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering from The Ohio State University. He has been recognized as a Leader of Tomorrow for the Mid-Atlantic bioeconomy and by Forbes as one of 30 under 30 in Health care for his work inventing and commercializing novel technologies to improve human health.