AIMBE
Fellowbook News
AIMBE Fellowbook collects news stories highlighting the members of the AIMBE College of Fellows. Read the latest stories, jump to the College Directory, or search below to find the newest research, awards, announcements and more for the leaders of the medical and biological engineering community.
Researchers Unlock a New Means of Growing Intestinal Stem Cells
Robert Langer | Via Massachusetts Institute of Technology | December 1, 2013Researchers at MIT and Brigham and Women’s Hospital have shown that they can grow unlimited quantities of intestinal stem cells, then stimulate them to develop into nearly pure populations of different types of mature intestinal cells. Using these cells, scientists could develop and test new drugs to treat diseases such as ulcerative colitis. The small […]
Pills of the Future: Nanoparticles
Robert Langer | Via Massachusetts Institute of Technology | November 27, 2013Drugs delivered by nanoparticles hold promise for targeted treatment of many diseases, including cancer. However, the particles have to be injected into patients, which has limited their usefulness so far. Now, researchers from MIT and Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) have developed a new type of nanoparticle that can be delivered orally and absorbed through […]
MIT Center for Integrative Synthetic Biology Receives Five-Year NIH Grant
Christopher A. Voigt | Via MIT | November 27, 2013The MIT Center for Integrative Synthetic Biology, under the leadership of director Ron Weiss and co-director Christopher Voigt, has been awarded a $11.4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The five-year P50 grants, awarded by NIH’s National Institute of General Medical Sciences, support research for disease diagnosis, treatment and prevention at centers […]
Four Named Fellows of American Association for the Advancement of Science
Stephen A. Boppart | Via University of Illinois News Bureau | November 25, 2013Four University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign faculty members have been named fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Stephen A. Boppart, Sharon Hammes-Schiffer, Kanti Jain and William P. King are among 388 honorees recognized for their “scientifically or socially distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications.” New fellows will be recognized […]
Milner Named Inventor of the Year
Thomas Milner | Via University of Texas at Austin BME News | November 20, 2013Professor Thomas Milner was named Inventor of the Year at the university’s annual Inventor Award Ceremony on Nov. 19. Milner pioneered the development of optical-based instrumentation applications that help physicians and patients in clinical settings.Milner, a professor in the Cockrell School’s Department of Biomedical Engineering who holds the Marion E. Forsman Centennial Professorship in Engineering, received […]
Researchers Gain Fuller Picture of Cell Protein Reactions
William Miller | Via Northwestern Engineering | November 19, 2013Over the past decade, advances in genetic mapping tools have provided great insight into how DNA influences cell behavior. But genetics is only half the equation; much of cells’ behavior is the result of post-transcriptional processes, events that occur after DNA is transcribed, carried out by complex enzyme interactions within the cell. The roles that […]
Genes Without Patents
George M. Church | Via Harvard Gazette | November 14, 2013As Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan questioned Myriad Genetics’ attorney about patenting genes, Chris Hansen rejoiced. The attorney said that yes, genes should be patentable. But it was only under the pressure of further questions that he said that chromosomes, too, should be patentable, and — more reluctantly still — organs such as kidneys. “It […]
Engineers Explore Ways to Understand, Outwit Blood-Brain Barrier
Eric V. Shusta | Via University of Wisconsin Engineering | November 14, 2013With support from the New Frontier Science group of Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers are conducting innovative research that could open new avenues for treating such diseases as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis and others. NFS collaborates with external researchers in an effort to advance innovative technologies and integrate them into future medicines. “There […]
New Way to Monitor Induced-coma Patients
Emery Brown | Via MIT Library News | November 14, 2013Brain injury patients are sometimes deliberately placed in a coma with anesthesia drugs to allow swelling to go down and their brains to heal. Comas can last for days, during which patients’ brain activity must be regularly monitored to ensure the right level of sedation. The constant checking is “totally inefficient,” says Emery Brown, an […]
Stanford geneticist Leonard Herzenberg dies
Leonard Herzenberg | Via paloaltoonline | November 12, 2013Leonard Herzenberg, a retired geneticist whose discoveries are said to have kept thousands of people alive, died Oct. 27 at Stanford University Hospital, where he had been since Oct. 8 after suffering a severe stroke. He was 81. A retired professor at Stanford School of Medicine, Herzenberg helped develop the first fluorescence-activated cell sorter, enabling […]
Karp Receives Honor for Reader App Competition
Jeffrey Karp | Via Brigham & Women's Hospital | November 8, 2013Jeffrey Karp, PhD, associate professor in BWH’s Department of Medicine, has been honored as the runner up in the Cell Press Reader App Competition. Karp conceived of an app that would list the top ten papers with the most citations that week, in the Cell Press Journal Reader App. His idea is to list the […]
Karp and Pomahac Win Innovative Product of the Year Award
Jeffrey Karp | Via Brigham and Women's Hospital | November 8, 2013Jeffrey Karp, PhD, of the Division of Biomedical Engineering in BWH’s Department of Medicine, and Bohdan Pomahac, MD, director of Plastic Surgery Transplantation, have been honored with the Innovative Product of the Year Award from the Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) for their research on worm-inspired microneedle tissue adhesives. These adhesives have the potential to […]
Before Cells, Biochemicals May Have Combined in Clay
Dan Luo | Via Cornell Chronicle | November 7, 2013Clay – a seemingly infertile blend of minerals – might have been the birthplace of life on Earth. Or at least of the complex biochemicals that make life possible, Cornell biological engineers report in the Nov. 7 online issue of the journal Scientific Reports, published by Nature Publishing. “We propose that [in early geological history] […]
Clotting Protein Hardens Aging Hearts
Jane Grande-Allen | Via Rice University News | November 7, 2013Heart valves calcify over time, and Rice University scientists are beginning to understand why. The Rice lab of bioengineer Jane Grande-Allen found through studies of pigs’ heart valves that age plays a critical role in the valves’ progressive hardening, and the problem may be due to the infiltration of a protein known as von Willebrand factor (VWF). […]
Open-Access Genome Project Lands in UK
George M. Church | Via Nature | November 7, 2013In 2008, a group of prominent scientists and entrepreneurs announced, after careful consideration, that they would make their genome sequences public, marking the launch of the Personal Genome Project (PGP). The “open source” genomics effort sought to make the genomes and medical histories of 100,000 people available for anyone to use. It was started by […]
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Professor Georges Belfort Elected Fellow of AIChE
Georges Belfort | Via RPI News | November 6, 2013World-leading bioseparations expert Georges Belfort, Institute Professor and a member of the Howard P. Isermann Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, was recently elected a fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE). In a citation, the AIChE recognized Belfort for “seminal contributions in chemical molecular engineering, bioseparations engineering and […]
Keasling, in Israel, Looks to Future of Alternative Energy
Jay Keasling | Via UC Berkeley News Center | November 4, 2013Jay Keasling, a UC Berkeley professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and of bioengineering and the chief executive officer of the Joint BioEnergy Institute, was in Israel last week to deliver a keynote address at an international conference on biofuels. The Agro-Energy Nexus Summit, in the city of Herzilya, was convened by the Fuel Choices […]
Breakthrough in Retinal Implants Expected to Restore Sight to the Blind
Wolfgang Fink | Via Arizona Engineer | November 1, 2013Retinal implants have not lived up to their potential, argues a joint UA-German research team, until now. Researchers at the University of Arizona and University of Tübingen have made a breakthrough in retinal implant technology that could help people who have lost their sight see more than just light and vague shapes. Wolfgang Fink, an […]
Innovation in Regulation Applied to Descending Thoracic Aortic Endografts
Dorothy Abel | Via Endovascular Today | November 1, 2013FDA Regulatory Review Scientist Dorothy B. Abel discusses what led to the unique expanded approval of a thoracic endograft and a landmark postapproval study. In September 2013, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) broadened its approval of the Gore TAG thoracic endoprosthesis (Gore & Associates, Flagstaff, AZ) to remove the exclusion of repair of […]
Nanoparticles Attack Aggressive Tumors
Paula Hammond | Via MIT Library News | October 31, 2013MIT chemical engineers have developed a new treatment for an aggressive form of breast cancer whose tumors resist chemotherapy drugs. Led by David H. Koch Professor in Engineering Paula Hammond, the team designed nanoparticles that pack a one-two punch: They deliver a cancer drug along with short strands of RNA that shut off genes used […]