Joff Silberg, Ph.D., is a Baker Institute Rice faculty scholar in the Center for Health and Biosciences and the Stewart Memorial Professor of BioSciences at Rice University. His primary area of research involves fundamental and applied synthetic biology with a focus on biotechnologies related to the environment and sustainability.

Silberg has two decades of experience studying fundamental challenges in synthetic biology and biotechnology, including creating bioelectronic devices that interface cells and materials; programming environment consortia (e.g., soil, river and wastewater microbes) to report on the status of subterranean environments of relevance to remediation agriculture and sustainability; and designing biomolecules with novel functions to control energy and information flow in cells. His research has been funded by diverse federal agencies (DARPA, DOD, DOE, NASA, NSF, ONR, USDA), foundations (AHA, Keck, Kleberg, Moore, Welch) and companies (Shell).

Silberg also serves as the director for the Systems Synthetic and Physical Biology Ph.D. program and for two NSF-funded training programs including a National Research Traineeship (NRT) in Bioelectronics and a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) in Bionetworks. He is also a member of the Engineering Biology Research Consortium. He holds a B.S. in biology and chemistry and a Ph.D. in biology (2000) from the University of California, Irvine.

Contact at joff@rice.edu or 713-348-3849.