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.
Medtronic Partnership Allows Visible Heart Lab Research to Flourish
Paul Iaizzo | Via University of Minnesota | November 26, 2012You could call it a long-term, heartfelt commitment. In addition to its large, ongoing research contract, Medtronic recently committed another $350,000 to the University of Minnesota’s Visible Heart® Laboratory—the only place in the world where human hearts (donated, not suitable for transplantation) are reanimated so scientists can see exactly how they work from the inside. […]
Improving Health By Our Own Devices
Tejal Desai | Via UCSF Medical Center | November 26, 2012Innovation can be born of necessity, conscience, creativity, luck, or more likely, all of the above, all at once. Whatever the impetus, the active ingredient of invention is collaboration. The five scientists highlighted here — bioengineers Tejal Desai and Shuvo Roy, MD/PhD candidate Mozziyar Etemadi, microbiologist Joe DeRisi, and physician/surgeon Dr. Michael Harrison — trace […]
M.I.T. Lab Hatches Ideas, and Companies, by the Dozens
Robert Langer | Via New York Times | November 24, 2012HOW do you take particles in a test tube, or components in a tiny chip, and turn them into a $100 million company? Dr. Robert Langer, 64, knows how. Since the 1980s, his Langer Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has spun out companies whose products treat cancer, diabetes, heart disease and schizophrenia, among […]
Biomarking Time: Methylome modifications offer new measure of our “biological” age
Trey Ideker | Via UC San Diego | November 21, 2012Women live longer than men. Individuals can appear or feel years younger – or older – than their chronological age. Diseases can affect our aging process. When it comes to biology, our clocks clearly tick differently. In a new study, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, with colleagues elsewhere, describe […]
Acpharis Speeds Drug Discovery with In-Silico Protein Interaction Tools
Sandor Vajda | Via BU Blogs | November 20, 2012Over the past decade, systems biologists have mapped large networks of protein interactions related to various diseased states, providing many potential new drug targets for the pharmaceutical industry. These targets are dissimilar to traditional drug targets, generally lacking natural small molecule ligands and being physically flatter than the cavities used by many drugs; presenting a […]
Research Breakthrough Selectively Represses the Immune System
Lonnie Shea | Via NIH | November 19, 2012In a mouse model of multiple sclerosis (MS), researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health have developed innovative technology to selectively inhibit the part of the immune system responsible for attacking myelin–the insulating material that encases nerve fibers and facilitates electrical communication between brain cells. Autoimmune disorders occur when T-cells–a type of white blood […]
Breakthrough Nanoparticle Halts Multiple Sclerosis
Lonnie Shea | Via Northwestern University | November 19, 2012In a breakthrough for nanotechnology and multiple sclerosis, a biodegradable nanoparticle turns out to be the perfect vehicle to stealthily deliver an antigen that tricks the immune system into stopping its attack on myelin and halt a model of relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis (MS) in mice, according to new Northwestern Medicine research. The new nanotechnology […]
Nolan Wins Funds to ‘Map’ Lineages in Ovarian Cancer Cells
Garry Nolan | Via Stanford Medicine | November 19, 2012Garry Nolan, PhD, professor of microbiology and immunology, is the first recipient of the Ovarian Cancer Research Program’s Teal Innovator Award. The $3.2 million, five-year award, which is administered by the Department of Defense, is intended to advance the understanding and treatment of ovarian cancer. The OCRP is one of several Congressionally Directed Medical Research […]
Materials Researchers Find Opportunity in Biomedicine
Michele Marcolongo | Via Science Careers | November 16, 2012Over the last few years, biomaterials research—see this companion article for a definition of the field—has undergone what two of the researchers who Science Careers spoke to called a “maturation of the field,” as the science has become more sophisticated and progressed toward the clinic. Over these last few years, biomaterials researchers have become more […]
Materials Researchers Find Opportunity in Biomedicine
John Fisher | Via Science Careers | November 16, 2012Over the last few years, biomaterials research—see this companion article for a definition of the field—has undergone what two of the researchers who Science Careers spoke to called a “maturation of the field,” as the science has become more sophisticated and progressed toward the clinic. Over these last few years, biomaterials researchers have become more […]
These Bots Were Made for Walking: Cells Power Biological Machines
Rashid Bashir | Via University of Illinois News | November 15, 2012They’re soft, biocompatible, about 7 millimeters long – and, incredibly, able to walk by themselves. Miniature “bio-bots” developed at the University of Illinois are making tracks in synthetic biology. Designing non-electronic biological machines has been a riddle that scientists at the interface of biology and engineering have struggled to solve. The walking bio-bots demonstrate the […]
Mini Bio-Bot Walks When its Rat Heart Cells Beat
Rashid Bashir | Via NBC News | November 15, 2012With the aid of a 3-D printer, researchers have fashioned soft, quarter-inch-long biological robots out of gel-like material and rat heart cells. When the cells beat, the bio-bots take a step. The robots resemble tiny springboards, each with one long, thin leg resting on a stout supporting leg. The thin leg is covered in the […]
Catch and Release
Jeffrey Karp | Via Harvard Gazette | November 14, 2012A research team at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) has developed a novel device that may one day have broad therapeutic and diagnostic uses in the detection and capture of rare cell types, such as cancer cells, fetal cells, viruses, and bacteria. The device is inspired by the long, elegant appendages of sea creatures […]
Injectable Sponge Delivers Drugs, Cells, and Structure
David Mooney | Via Wyss Institute | November 13, 2012Compressible bioscaffold pops back to its molded shape once inside the body Bioengineers at Harvard have developed a gel-based sponge that can be molded to any shape, loaded with drugs or stem cells, compressed to a fraction of its size, and delivered via injection. Once inside the body, it pops back to its original shape […]
Georgia Tech Awarded $1.2 Million Diabetes Training Grant
Athanassios Sambanis | Via Georgia Tech News Center | November 8, 2012The Georgia Institute of Technology has been awarded $1.2 million by the National Institutes of Health for a training program for post-doctoral fellows to develop bioengineering skills and leadership applicable to research into type 1, insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM). The Innovation and Leadership in Engineering Technologies and Therapies (ILET2) for diabetes postdoctoral training grant is […]
Wyss Institute Models a Human Disease in an Organ-on-a-Chip
Donald Ingber | Via Wyss Institute | November 7, 2012Researchers at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University have mimicked pulmonary edema in a microchip lined by living human cells, as reported today in the journal Science Translational Medicine. They used this “lung-on-a-chip” to study drug toxicity and identify potential new therapies to prevent this life-threatening condition. The study offers further […]
Georgia Tech Gets $1.2M Diabetes Training Grant
Athanassios Sambanis | Via American City Business Journals | November 7, 2012Georgia Tech receieved a $1.2 million federal grant to train post-doctoral fellows to develop bioengineering skills to research into type 1, insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM). The grant, awarded by the National Institutes of Health, is a cross-disciplinary training program in cell- and tissue-based therapies and novel insulin delivery technologies. Ten faculty members from Georgia Tech […]
Duke Invention Makes WHO Top 10 List of Most Innovative Health Technologies
Robert Malkin | Via Duke Global Health Institute | November 6, 2012The World Health Organization has selected the Pratt Pouch as one of the top ten innovative health technologies of the year for use in low-resource settings around the world. Developed by Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering and DGHI faculty member Robert Malkin, the Pratt Pouch helps stop the spread of disease from HIV-infected mothers to […]
Laser-Light Testing of Breast Tumor Fiber Patterns Helps Show Whose Cancer is Spreading
Zaver Bhujwalla | Via Johns Hopkins Medicine | November 5, 2012Using advanced microscopes equipped with tissue-penetrating laser light, cancer imaging experts at Johns Hopkins have developed a promising new way to accurately analyze the distinctive patterns of ultra-thin collagen fibers in breast tumor tissue samples and to help tell if the cancer has spread. The Johns Hopkins researchers say their crisscrossing optical images, made by […]
Seal and Ph.D. Student Reid Win AVS Awards
Sudipta Seal | Via UCF Today | November 4, 2012Dr. Sudipta Seal and David Reid will be honored by AVS: Science and Technology of Materials, Interfaces, and Processing. The AVS Awards Ceremony will be held on Wednesday, October 31, 2012 in Tampa, FL. Seal will receive the 2012 AVS Fellow award “for pioneering developments in design and synthesis of nanostructures for protective coatings, sensors, […]