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Dr. Ronald X. Xu（徐晓嵘）

  • Experiences:
    Dr. Ronald X. Xu is a full professor and PhD advisor at the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), a fellow of the Institute of Physics, and a senior member of the Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Dr. Xu obtained his B.S. degree from Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation at USTC in 1992, followed by a M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Stony Brook University (SUNY Stony Brook) in 1995 and a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1999. After graduation from MIT, he continued his postdoctoral research at Stanford University and subsequently joined a medical device startup company in Silicon Valley. As Technical Director of the company, Dr. Xu facilitated technology commercialization and regulatory approval of a tissue oximeter device from the idea to the market. In late 2004, he was recruited by Department of Biomedical Engineering at The Ohio State University as an Assistant Professor, and was later promoted to the rank of Associate Professor with tenure. In 2012, Dr. Xu returned to USTC and chaired the Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation from 2014 to 2018. In 2021, he joined the USTC Suzhou Institute for Advanced Research (SIAR) as co-director of center for innovative medical equipment and devices (IMED) and director of human resources.
  • Email:
    xux@ustc.edu.cn

Research interests:

  Dr. Xu's research interests include biomedical optics and surgical navigation, micro-nano drug delivery systems, and 3D printing of biomedical biomimetic tissues. He has completed more than twenty research projects sponsored by both domestic and international agents and has published over a hundred academic papers in high-impact SCI journals. He has been featured in Columbus CEO magazine and has been recognized as one of the top ten outstanding individuals in Ohio. He has also received several prestigious awards, including the Wallace H. Coulter Translational Research Young Investigator Award, the Tech Columbus Inventor of the Year Award in Ohio, and the Lumbley Research Award.

Focus, Academic Achievements, and Innovations:

  • Multimodal Biomedical Imaging and Surgical Navigation: Dr. Xu has led a team in developing over ten portable diagnostic and surgical navigation systems. He pioneered technologies such as in-situ projected surgical navigation and remote surgery, allowing surgeons to observe lesion boundaries and surgical paths accurately with the naked eye. These advancements significantly enhance surgical outcomes and have been validated in hundreds of clinical experiments. His team's deep learning-based automatic diagnostic technology for skin diseases has achieved remarkable results in international dermatology competitions, addressing the lack of medical resources in remote areas and improving public health.
  • Drug Delivery Systems: Dr. Xu's research involves creating complex multilayer microcapsules using microfluidic techniques such as flow focusing, electrospray, and interface shear. These capsules encapsulate oxygen, nanoparticles, drugs, and cells uniformly and efficiently. Through external stimuli like magnetic fields, optics, ultrasound, and temperature changes, controlled drug release is achieved. His research has expanded the applications of microdroplet techniques in various fields and has been published in reputable journals such as Nature, Biomaterials, Lab on a Chip, Advanced Science, and ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces.
  • Standardization of Medical Instruments: Addressing the lack of traceable standards for medical optical instruments, Dr. Xu initiated research on traceable standards for biomimetic materials. He introduced the concept of digital biomimetic materials and developed microspheres that simulate red blood cell oxygenation and spectral characteristics. He led a major project funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and successfully developed a 3D printing system for biomimetic optical materials.
Representative Publications:
    • Zhu, Zhiqiang, Tianao Chen, Fangsheng Huang, Shiyu Wang, Pingan Zhu, Ronald X Xu, and Ting Si. "Free‐Boundary Microfluidic Platform for Advanced Materials Manufacturing and Applications." Advanced Materials 2304840.
    • Yao, Peng, Shuwei Shen, Mengjuan Xu, Peng Liu, Fan Zhang, Jinyu Xing, Pengfei Shao, Benjamin Kaffenberger, and Ronald X Xu. "Single Model Deep Learning on Imbalanced Small Datasets for Skin Lesion Classification." IEEE transactions on medical imaging 41, no. 5 (2021): 1242-54.
    • Xu, Wanghuai, Huanxi Zheng, Yuan Liu, Xiaofeng Zhou, Chao Zhang, Yuxin Song, Xu Deng, Michael Leung, Zhengbao Yang, and Ronald X Xu. "A Droplet-Based Electricity Generator with High Instantaneous Power Density." Nature 578, no. 7795 (2020): 392-96.
    • Dwivedi, Pankaj, Sonia Kiran, Shuya Han, Monika Dwivedi, Renuka Khatik, Rong Fan, Farhana Akbar Mangrio, Kun Du, Zhiqiang Zhu, and Chaoyu Yang. "Magnetic Targeting and Ultrasound Activation of Liposome–Microbubble Conjugate for Enhanced Delivery of Anticancer Therapies." ACS applied materials & interfaces 12, no. 21 (2020): 23737-51.
    • Xu, Jeff S, Jiwei Huang, Ruogu Qin, George H Hinkle, Stephen P Povoski, Edward W Martin, and Ronald X Xu. "Synthesizing and Binding Dual-Mode Poly (Lactic-Co-Glycolic Acid)(Plga) Nanobubbles for Cancer Targeting and Imaging." Biomaterials 31, no. 7 (2010): 1716-22.

           Check the following link for the complete list of publcations: https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=zh-CN&pli=1&user=6mdSGQMAAAAJ

Notable Research Awards:

           Wallace Coulter Translational Research Young Investigator Award (2007)

           Top Ten Outstanding Individuals in Ohio (2010)

           TechColumbus Inventor of the Year Award in Ohio, the Only Awardee (2011)

           Outstanding Mentor Award by Chinese Academy of Science (2018)