Timothy M. Wick, Ph.D.

Dr. Timothy Wick, Biomedical Engineering Professor, Chair and Graduate Program Director, was named a recipient of the 2011 Graduate Dean’s Award for Excellence in Mentorship. Wick was one of 20 professors from 17 departments at UAB to be selected for the honor.The award, now in its fifth year, recognizes exceptional faculty mentorship and demonstrates that UAB is a university that values the commitment to excellence in mentorship that is exhibited by its faculty, says Bryan Noe, Ph.D., dean of The Graduate School.

Chipped a bone in a car accident? No problem. Ripped cartilage apart in your knee from years of running? That can be fixed, too. Blood vessels constricted by disease? Let’s make some new ones to replace them.

These scenarios aren’t as far-fetched as they may seem. In fact, UAB researchers are researching those possibilities and many more in the BioMatrix Engineering and Regenerative Medicine (BERM) Center, and now you can get a hands-on look at their work.

The BERM Center will display some of its innovative tools from Nov. 26 through Jan. 2, 2011, in McWane Science Center. In two bioreactors UAB scientists will grow blood vessels and cartilage using cells and biomaterial during the McWane exhibit “If a Starfish Can Grow a New Arm, Why Can’t I?”

Tissue engineering — or regenerative medicine — is an emerging multidisciplinary field involving biology, medicine and engineering, and it could be the next revolution in medicine, says Timothy Wick, Ph.D., co-director of the BERM Center and chair of UAB’s Department of Biomedical Engineering.