Kristi Anseth is a professor of chemical and biological engineering and a Howard Hughes Medical Investigator at the University of Colorado in Boulder. She has pioneered the use of photopolymerization and hydrogels for tissue engineering of cartilage[1] among other tissues.[2] Kristi Anseth grew up in northwestern North Dakota. At Williston State College, Kristi played on both the volleyball and basketball teams,[3] earning the honor of Academic All-American in her second year. Kristi Anseth transferred to Purdue University where she began her research career as an undergraduate student in the lab of Dr Nicholas A. Peppas. She obtained her PhD working under Dr Christopher Bowman, himself a former graduate student of Nicholas Peppas, at the University of Colorado.[3] Aside from being the first engineer, male or female, to be selected as a Howard Hughes Medical Investigator, Kristi Anseth is a member of both the Institutes of Medicine and the National Academies of Engineering (a distinction she shares with chemical engineers Robert Langer, Nicholas Peppas, Frances Arnold, and Rakesh Jain).
In 1999, she was named to the MIT Technology Review TR100 as one of the top 100 innovators in the world under the age of 35.[4]