Berggren Center co-director takes on new role translating quantum science to the clinic

After nearly 40 years at the University of Chicago, Julian Solway, MD, Emeritus Professor of Medicine, is excited to begin the next phase of his career. In May 2025, he became co-director of the Berggren Center for Quantum Biology and Medicine at UChicago, a new initiative established with a $21 million gift from philanthropist Thea Berggren to facilitate science that merges quantum technology with biology to transform the future of medicine.

Solway, who launched the Institute for Translational Medicine (ITM), a multi-institution effort to develop basic science discoveries into real-world applications for patient care, in 2007, said the transition was natural.

“My work at the ITM was all about taking new knowledge and helping to turn it into improved health. So, it’s an extension of work that I was already doing,” he said. “I’m excited about quantum technology, and I was thinking about how I would have more time after I became an emeritus professor, no longer seeing patients and closing my own laboratory. It was a natural next step.”

Harnessing the power of quantum for medicine

Housed within the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (UChicago PME), the Berggren Center’s goal is to harness the power of the burgeoning field of quantum engineering and apply it to unlock insights into biology and disease that were previously out of reach, paving the way for new diagnostics and therapies.

One immediate focus is quantum sensing, which uses the rules of quantum physics to measure things far more precisely than classical sensors allow. Quantum sensing applications measure things like the way electrons spin, which can be changed by the environment. This lets scientists build tools to take incredibly precise measurements in real time, allowing them to see biology with unprecedented precision. This, in turn, should lead to tracking immune responses in real time, detecting diseases earlier, and guiding therapies more precisely.

“We're going to be able to do things we can already do, but faster, better, and cheaper—and we’ll be able to do things that we could never do before in any practical way,” Solway said. “Now there is an opportunity to measure in real time things that we could previously measure, but you had to send samples off to the laboratory and wait for the results, even though the patient’s condition could be changing minute to minute.”

Building on a career of translational science

While the bulk of Solway’s career has been focused on medical research, treating patients with asthma, and fostering translational research at the ITM, he is no stranger to engineering and technology. He studied electrical engineering as an undergraduate and learned the principles of fluid mechanics as they apply to the lungs. He was also involved in early planning discussions to launch a molecular engineering program at UChicago, first as the Institute for Molecular Engineering in 2011, and later becoming the university’s first new school in three decades as UChicago PME in 2019.

Solway met his fellow Berggren Center co-director Greg Engel, PhD, through his early involvement with UChicago PME. Engel, who is a Professor of Molecular Engineering and Chemistry, also directs the Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Quantum Sensing for Biophysics and Bioengineering (NSF QuBBE), a National Science Foundation-funded initiative that brings together researchers from medicine, physics, biology, chemistry, and engineering to create new quantum sensors tailored for biomedical applications.

Engel invited Solway to lead a research thrust at the NSF QuBBE focused on translating new quantum sensors and imaging platforms into practical tools to address both fundamental and applied questions in biology and medicine—again, capitalizing on Solway’s long experience connecting basic scientific discoveries with real-world applications. The two continued to collaborate, eventually joining discussions with Berggren as they formulated ideas for the new center and agreeing to lead the effort together.

Training a new generation of ‘bilingual’ scholars

Solway plans to bring his translational experience to bear at the new Berggren Center, both in a scientific sense and in being able to speak multiple technical languages. A core focus of the center will be training a new generation of “bilingual scholars,” fluent in the vernacular of both quantum science and medicine. This new type of scientist will be able to capitalize on opportunities for applying quantum technology to biological questions.

“One of the things that the study of translation tells us is that you need to have experts in one field talk to experts in another field so that they can connect the dots, and the best way to do that is to train people who can speak both languages,” Solway said.

The Berggren Center will facilitate new training programs that invite medical students, residents, fellows and PhD trainees to become bilingual in biomedical research and quantum science. Trainees will have the opportunity to be mentored by both BSD and UChicago PME scientists, with rotations that move seamlessly from clinic and imaging suites to fabrication labs and data analysis rooms.

“Having a very grounded, very substantial understanding of the principles and the science of quantum and the science of medicine together in one person is going to be very valuable,” Solway said. “I have long experience making those connections from biomedical discoveries to the clinic, so I hope to help by teaching others how to recognize opportunities in quantum biomedicine too.”

—Article originally appeared on the Biological Sciences Division website