Bryan James

About

Dr. Bryan D. James is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering at Northeastern University. He leads the EcoBioMaterials Design Lab focused on creating functional, sustainable, and benign materials for a safer, cleaner future by innovating at each stage of the engineering design process. He actively collaborates globally with academic colleagues, NGOs, and industrial partners, regularly engages with K-12 students and educators, and advises policymakers. Bryan received his B.A.Sc. in materials engineering from the University of Toronto in 2017 and his Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from the University of Florida (UF) in 2021. At UF, as an NIH F31 Predoctoral Fellow under the mentorship of Josephine Allen, Bryan pioneered the use of nucleic acid-collagen complexes for hard and soft tissue engineering and championed investigating sex as a biological variable in biomaterials research, identifying mechanobiological sex differences in vascular cells. Thereafter, Bryan was a Postdoctoral Scholar/Investigator at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), working with Mark Hahn, Collin Ward, and Chris Reddy. His postdoctoral research focused on understanding the fate, persistence, and toxicity of plastic in the ocean to inform the rational design of next-generation materials that are safe for people and the planet.

Selected Publications

• James, B. D., Bezerra, L. E. A., Buhler, D., Cavalcante, R. M., Chacon, M. L., Chen, B., Gros, J., Hanke, U. M., Lemkau, K. L., Nelson, R. K., Niles, S. F., Oliveira, A. H. B., Pitchford, T. D., Radović, J. R., Rodgers, R. P., Soares, M. O., Socolofsky, S. A., Summons, R. E., Swarthout, R. F., Teixeira, C. E. P., Valentine, D. L., White, H. K., Yang, M., Zhang, B., Zanardi-Lamardo, E., Reddy, C. M. Long-range transport of oil by marine plastic debris: Evidence from an 8500 km journey. Environmental Science & Technology. (2026)
• Maslowska-Jarzyna, K., Gomez-Maldonado, D., James, B. D., Christoff-Tempesta, T., Ehrmann, K., Comeo, E., Sarkar, S., Welch, C., Zhang, J.
  Global Voices, Shared Futures: Early-Career Scientists on the Power of Collaboration. ACS Central Science. 11, 11, 2018–2021 (2025).
• Radović, J. R., James, B. D., Nelson, R. K., Hall, G. J., Frysinger, G. S., Sanders, R. W., Swathout, R. F., Valentine, D. L., Pawlowski, S. R., Seymour, B. T., Conlin, D. L., Lemkau, K. L., Barrett, M. J., Reddy, C. M. The black tears of USS Arizona: Forensic assessment of residual oil from the Pearl Harbor shipwreck. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 222, 1, 118674 (2025).
• Sun, Y., James, B. D., Houston, K. R., Edwards, B., Izallalen, M., Mazumder, S., Shankar, R., Reddy, C. M., Ward, C. P. Temperature Controls the Lifetimes and Microbial Communities Degrading Cellulose Diacetate in the Coastal Ocean. Environmental Science & Technology. 59, 36, 19468–19478 (2025).
• James, B. D., Sun, Y., Pate, K., Irving, B., Ward, C. P. Designing circular, sustainable, and nonpersistent consumer plastic products: a case study of drinking straws. Environmental Science & Technology. 59, 34, 18177–18189 (2025).
• Ward, C. P., Reddy, C. M., James, B. D., Initial estimates of the lifetime of unsmoked cellulose diacetate and paper cigarette filters in the coastal ocean. Environmental Science: Advances. 4, 1014-1023 (2025).
• Pipis, N.*, James, B. D.*, Allen, J. B. Multifunctional DNA-Collagen Biomaterials: Developmental Advances and Biomedical Applications. ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering. 11, 3, 1253–1268(2025).
• James, B. D., Medvedev, A. V., Medvedeva, L. A., Martsen, E., Gorman, K. L., Lin, B., Makarov, S. S., Aluwihare, L. I., de Vos, A., Reddy, C. M., Hahn, M. E. Burnt plastic (pyroplastic) from the M/V X-Press Pearl ship fire and plastic spill contain compounds that activate endocrine and metabolism-related human and fish transcription factors. Environment & Health. 3, 1, 91–101 (2024).
• James, B. D., Sun, Y., Pate, K., Shankar, R., Izallalen, M., Mazumder, S., Perri, S. T., Houston, K. R., Edwards, B., de Wit, J., Reddy, C. M., Ward, C. P. Foaming enables material-efficient bioplastic products with minimal persistence. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering. 12, 43, 16030–16040 (2024).
• James, B. D., Medvedev, A. V., Makarov, S. S., Nelson, R. K., Reddy, C. M., Hahn, M. E. Moldable plastics (polycaprolactone) can be acutely toxic to developing zebrafish and activate nuclear receptors in mammalian cells. ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering. 10, 8, 5237–5251 (2024).
• James, B. D., Sun, Y., Izallalen, M., Mazumder, S., Perri, S. T., Edwards, B., de Wit, J., Reddy, C. M., Ward, C. P. Strategies to reduce the environmental lifetimes of drinking straws in the coastal ocean. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering. 12, 6, 2404-24011 (2024).
• James, B. D., Ward, C. P., Hahn, M. E., Thorpe, S. J., Reddy, C. M. Minimizing the environmental impacts of plastic pollution through ecodesign of products with low environmental persistence. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering 12, 3, 1185-1194 (2024).

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