The Fannie and John Hertz Foundation named Christopher Loose the inaugural recipient of its Peter Strauss Award. The award honors a recent graduate or current Hertz Fellow “who has demonstrated exceptional leadership in his or her entrepreneurial endeavors,” including patents, licensing agreements, company formation and inventions. Loose was a 2003 Hertz Fellow and a 2007 recipient of the Hertz Foundation Thesis Prize.

The Hertz foundation supports the study of physical, biological and engineering sciences.

Loose, who earned a BSE from Princeton and a Ph.D. from MIT, both in chemical engineering, is the founder of Semprus BioSciences. This company, headquartered in Cambridge, Mass., develops medical implant devices with surface modifications engineered to reduce infection, clotting, fouling and other possible health complications.