Mission Statement
IMPRINT combines biotechnology, biomanufacturing, precision medicine, health data sciences, and entrepreneurship to create a one-of-a-kind hub of innovation to enhance biomanufacturing, improve health outcomes, grow life science startups, and catalyze regional economic development in North Texas.
IMPRINT aims to grow the research and training capabilities for biomanufacturing; foster collaborative research in precision medicine using genomics and multi-omics initiatives across institutions; develop entrepreneurial start-ups; and establish experiential training program to support undergraduate and graduate academic programs.
Founding Director
Jon Weidanz, Ph.D., MPH is the Founding Director of IMPRINT and the Associate Vice President for Research, Professor with tenure, College of Nursing and Health Innovation and College of Engineering, and a member of the Center for Innovation in Health Informatics at the University of Texas at Arlington. He founded the North Texas Genome Center at UTA in 2018 and served as its director until 2022. Dr. Weidanz has broad experience and interest in biotechnology with particular knowledge and expertise in immunology and immunotherapy research and product development. He has more than 60 peer-reviewed articles, book chapters and published conference proceedings and has been an invited speaker at more than 50 conferences, universities and companies.
While at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, he was named as a Distinguished Professor and recognized for his teaching accomplishments, receiving the prestigious President’s Excellence in Teaching Award and the Chancellor’s Council Distinguished Teaching Award.
