Paulette Spencer

Dr. Spencer joined KU's Department of Mechanical Engineering in 2007, after serving as an adjunct at KU since 2003. In addition to her academic role, she is Founding Director of the Bioengineering Research Center. Dr. Spencer previously held full-time positions at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Dentistry, and served in administrative leadership roles there, including Director of Graduate Studies and Research, Department of Oral Biology and Acting Chair Acting Chair in the Department of Oral Biology.

With an interdisciplinary background that includes a D.D.S, an M.S. in materials engineering, and a Ph.D. in Oral Biology and Physics, Dr. Spencer is among the pioneers in the development of non-destructive techniques for in situ characterization of structure/property relationships at material/tissue interfaces. She maintains an active research program in biomaterials, where her group focuses on mechanistic evaluation of material/tissue interfacial failure and the application of this knowledge to the rational design and development of biomaterials. Working with her research team and supported by the National Institutes of Health, she is developing polymers that are capable of autonomous repair and peptide-polymer hybrids that repair mineralized tissue and impede bacterial attachment that could lead to infection and failure.

Dr. Spencer is a Fellow in the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), the Biomaterials Science and Engineering-International Union of Societies for Biomaterials, and the American College of Dentists. She was a U.S. Fulbright to Brazil in 2014-2015, and received the Clemson Award for Basic Research: Society of Biomaterials in 2019.

Learn more about Paulette Spencer on KU's Department of Mechanical Engineering website.