TED Community » Jose Gomez-Marquez

About Me

Jose Gomez-Marquez is the program director for the Innovations in International Health initiative at MIT and co-founder of LDTC+Labs, a design and strategy consultancy for international development technology. Among the projects under his technology practice at IIH is the Aerovax Drug Delivery System, a device for mass delivery of inhalable drugs and vaccines to remote populations. The rest of his IIH invention portfolio includes SafePilot, a wireless cane for the blind, and most recently, the X out TB program, which aims to increase TB therapy adherence in developing countries using novel diagnostics and mobile technology. Recently, the group has developed the MEDIKit, a series of design building blocks that empower doctors and nurses in developing countries to invent their medical technologies. The lab's work has been profiled in Discover, Wired, and The Economist.

Jose serves on the European Union’s Science Against Poverty Taskforce and has participated as an expert advisor in the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. He is an instructor of MIT's D-Lab: Health, a course on designing global health technologies at MIT. After working in institutional investments and international development, Jose went back as a mid-career student to the Worcester Polytechnic Institute where he focused on policy research studies covering international technology transfer and small team innovation. Jose is a 3 time MIT IDEAS Competition winner, including two Lemelson Awards for International Technology. In 2009, Jose was selected to Technology Review's T35, which also named him Humanitarian of the Year. He arrived to the United States from his native Honduras on a Rotary scholarship and currently lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.