The Beginning: Biomedical EngineeringA Candid Discussion with Dean Don P. Giddens of the College of EngineeringWilla Ni ‘12

Biomedical engi-neering, the new kid o n t h e b l o c k a t Georgia Tech and Emory, took off in 1997 as a pioneering j o in t depa r tmen t . More than a decade later, I sat down with Dr. Don P. Giddens, the Dean of the Col-lege of Engineering and one of the foun-ders of the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Bio-medical Engineering, for a peek into the beginnings of our major.

During the 1980s, the modern academic biomedical structure began, according to Giddens, as a “growing in-

terest in applying engineer-ing to medicine in research.” Originally research-oriented, biomedical engineering be-gan as an academic disci-pline in the 1990s. As Gid-

dens notes, “While the BME research field is old, the aca-demic field is relatively new.”

Georgia Tech and Emory University already had a ba-sis of collaborative research in the biomedical engineer-ing field before they under-

took the initiative to start the unique department. Invited by Georgia Tech and Emory in July of 1997, Giddens and others pushed proposals for the department, developed a

new curriculum, and fo rmed a d ive rse faculty and admini-stration. This ulti-mately resulted in the biomedical engi-neering department we see today.T h o u g h G i d d e n s holds a PhD. in aero-thermodynamics and a M.S. in aerospace engineering, his un-derstanding of fluid dynamics also ap-plied to blood flow

in arteries. In turn, this application led

deeper into cardiovascular research resulting in a non-traditional, yet highly bene-ficial branch of studies. Like Giddens, the majority of the faculty he hired came from diverse backgrounds rooted in other academic fields that eventually led to applica-

ISSUE ONE VOLUME THREE SEPTEMBER , 2008

1

A GT-BMES STUDENT PUBLICATION FOR THE COMMUNITY OF GT-BME

Dean Don P. Giddens talks with Wi!a Ni about the foundations of bio-medical engineering. Photo by Chun Yong.

tions of biomedical engineer-ing in research. Faculty with foundations from mechanical e n g i n e e r i n g t o a p p l i e d mathematics, like Giddens, “got more and more inter-ested and stayed there.” Their common interest in BME research gath-ered them to Geor-gia Tech, but their diversity enhanced the department.

T h e c u r r e n t BME department is not only the product of an amazing cast of faculty and ad-m i n i s t r a t o r s , b u t a l so of generous grants from the Whi-t ake r Founda t ion and the Wallace H. Coulter Foundation. Formed from the generous estate of U.A. Whitaker, the Whitaker Foundation in 2000 donated $16 million dollars to the founding of the Georgia Tech BME department hence the U.A. Whitaker Building. As Giddens explains, “The Whi-taker Foundation believed that for BME to have perma-nence [ in the scient i f ic communi ty] depar tments needed to be created.” Later in 2001 the Wallace H. Coul-ter Foundation from the Wal-l a c e H . C o u l t e r e s t a t e granted our BME department

with $25 million dollars, which not only allowed the development of the under-graduate BME program on top of the original doctorate program, but also supported translational research. The Coulter donation is com-

m e m o r a t e d in the nam-i n g o f t h e B M E d e-partment.A s t o d a y ’s i n t e g r a t i o n of medicine and technol-ogy far sur-passes tha t of 1997, in-d u s t r y b e-comes more

aware of t h e a d-vantages o f a

BME degree. The wide vari-ety of career opportunities for our major reflects that growing awareness, but also the origins of our department in a diverse faculty and an insightful founding team.

BMED 2300 LECTUREWhy Am I Here?Melody Keith ‘09

As a student of BMED 2300 with Franklin Bost, I of-ten wondered to myself about

ISSUE ONE VOLUME THREE SEPTEMBER , 2008

2

BMES Pioneer Editorial Board

Editor in ChiefAlice Chan ’10

Melody Keith ‘09

Layout EditorsAllaine Dela Cruz ’12

Beatrice Wan ‘11 Chun Yong ‘12

Features EditorRebekah Hamrick ’10

Staff WritersNatalia Cuenca ’12Kirsten Kepple ‘09

Willa Ni ’12Alysia Rudis ‘09

Rosemary Song ‘12

Development EditorsAileen Li ‘10

Rohan Trivedi ’10

PhotographersMichael Glatzer ‘12

Kiersten Petersen ’10Ludmila Tsai ‘11

‣ The History of BME at GT

‣ BMED 2300: Franklin Bost

‣ New Fun Section!

‣ BMED 2210 Comic

‣ Crossword Puzzle

‣ Upcoming Events

What’s Inside?

“ Faculty with foundations

from mechanical engineering to applied

mathematics got more and more interested and stayed there. ”

the class’s purpose. No one seemed to care, especially about the lecture. Are Gantt charts really necessary? And while I have multi-color high-lighted the technical report re-quirements six times, I still seem to lose points on “not following instructions.” What? Amidst my confusion and the overarching apathy that swept over the student constituency, I decided to ask the professor myself. I had a feeling that he wanted to achieve more zeal among the students than which was cur-rently present. “Basically, we

want to introduce the whole design process to students, what you’re studying in bio-medical engineering is only part of the process; the

Product-Realization Process goes all the way from idea concept, whether it’s from the doctor, user, or engineer inter-facing with the clinicians, all the way through the develop-ment process, where it brings in the marketing, sales, and regulatory aspect. The alumni panels say that they want the students to have a working knowledge of it, ” Bost cheer-fully resounded. However, I was still bothered that no one cared. It just seemed like I was learning more business-y things as op-posed to grasping the hardcore fundamentals of engineering. Bost reiterated that “you don't have to go out and be an engi-neer. You can do quality assurance and quality control, learn things from the manufacturing stand-point. You migrate into technical sales, with so-phistication of medical devices these days. It’s not like being a used car salesman, you become a con-sultant to doctors and users of the device.” OK, so what about half the BME student body that want to become doctors, with no intention of engineering design? Why is BMED 2300 important to them? I should have prepared myself for the

glowing response: “I know thousands of doctors here in the U.S. and overseas, mostly carrying around 3-4 products ideas around with them, some are good, but often they're too busy or don't know how to ac-tualize it. So those doctors with engineering backgrounds have a better opportunity for working with industry and moving things forward.” Since we're all engineers here, we can do some basic math:

I suppose that was fair enough, but why is medical design so important to Bost? What made him excited about it? “I spent a lot of time in the hospital just hanging out. I spent a week in the operating room, the delivery room, the emergency room, and one on the floor, just observing the environment, how to be in sur-

ISSUE ONE VOLUME THREE SEPTEMBER , 2008

3

Doctorhood + Engineering Degree

= Ability to patent

your own designs

= Your Wildest

Dreams Come

True

Professor Franklin Bost, CEO of SpherIngenics Inc. Photo courtesy of BME dept website.

gery and not get in trouble[...], how to stand, and how to ob-serve. Particularly, [hospitals are] used to having students (ie, interns and residents), so they're very interested in teach-ing. The doctors will make room for you to come over to look and see very closely what they're doing. It got me very excited about the profession.” Kind of makes me want to hang out in hospitals. Bost actually had some pretty good post-grad career advice, recommending work in larger companies because “they have established proce-dures, a lot of resources, train-ing programs, so it's easier to

integrate yourself into the en-vironment; however, you really have to be your own advocate when you get out into busi-ness.” He brought up a good point that “employees who wait for their manager to come up with something for them to do is a drudgery. If you have an enthusiastic employee that wants to try new things, it may not happen immediately, but the manager will probably go out of his way to let those things happen.” “I would like the class to give me feedback on what they liked about the class, and what they liked about the lab,” expounded Bost. “I'm not here

to do research; the only reason I'm here is to teach for the students...and well, for me too, because it makes me feel good.” “Don't view the pro-jects as a task,” he advised, in that there is no final answer at the end of a book chapter. “It is a chance to be a little bit freer.” There’s a unique oppor-tunity behind working with someone who cares about your future, especially someone with technical knowledge, hav-ing effectuated the pathway to advancement. I think I want to take advantage of this. As for those who don't care, I’m get-tin’ on the success train, see

you at the never stop!

ISSUE ONE VOLUME THREE SEPTEMBER , 2008

4

Comic by Melody Keith.

Why are we doing experi-ments on people and measuring their body fat content in BME 1300? I predict we get zero female volunteers to have their body fat measured by us.

I just think it's funny.

- Erik Gustafson

Student Voice Section

ISSUE ONE VOLUME THREE SEPTEMBER , 2008

5

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

28 29 30 1UROP - App Deadline

IBB Vendor Showcase

2 3 4

5 6

EXXONMOBIL Info Session

7 8 9BMES Student Research Panel

IBB-Wide Poster Session

10 11

12 13 14 15 16 17 18

Buzz on Bio-technology Open House

19 20 21IBB Breakfast Club Seminar

22 23 24 25

26 27 28

UROP Men-toring Work-shop

29 30 31

October 2008

BMES Conference (1st to 3rd)

Frontiers in Multi-Scale Systems Biology International Launch Con-ference (18th - 21st)

FALL BREAK!!