Bioengineering

Hello readers

Welcome to the Imperial Bioengineering Blog. This blog will evolve to cover a whole range of bioengineering, so if you are interested in finding out more about the research, innovations and generally cool stuff that is going on in the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College London and the discipline more globally then this is the blog for you.

But why, you may wonder has the Department decided to start a blog now? There is a very good reason for this, which I will dedicate the rest of this first blog to answering.

Bioengineering is the fastest growing discipline of engineering. Data from the USA shows that Biomedical Engineering is the “Best job in America” with 10-year job growth of 61.7% and a good median and top pay. But it is more than the job prospects and salary that make biomedical engineering such an attractive profession. Christine Schmidt, a professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Florida was quoted in the CNN piece as saying “You can impact so many lives by creating technology that will repair a hip or help repair eyesight or allow somebody to breathe better.”

It is this that make biomedical engineering such an attractive, necessary and fast growing discipline. Now you have probably noticed I have used both biomedical engineering and bioengineering interchangeably in the last paragraph. I think it is useful in this first post to define what we mean by bioengineering in the Department of Bioengineering here at Imperial.

Bioengineering is the application of engineering principles to biological or medical problems. 

In the Department we go on to further define the three pillars of bioengineering:

Biomedical Engineering Developing devices, techniques and interventions for human health.

Biological Engineering Solving problems related to the life sciences and their applications for health.

Biomimetics Using the structures and functions of living organisms as models for the design and engineering of materials and machines.

Biomedical engineering is also the “most valuable College major” another US statistic, this time from Forbes. Which brings me onto the catalyst for this blog, my imminent trip to the USA to find out more about bioengineering over there.

I fly out on the 23rd February to America for two weeks of meetings to find out more from those at the centre of the discipline. The first few posts on this blog will be about what I learn as I meet some incredible bioengineers all around the US, beginning in Boston and travelling to New York, Baltimore, San Francisco and finishing up in Los Angeles. Please do comment on the blogs especially if you have questions or would like to know more. Below I have listed the Universities I will be visiting on my travels, to those reading this who I will be meeting, I look forward to seeing you soon, for others I look forward to telling you all about it.

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Boston University
• Northeastern University
• Columbia University
• Johns Hopkins University
• Biomedical Engineering Society
• University of California- Davis
• Stanford University
• University of California- Berkeley
• University of California Los Angeles
• University of Southern California
• California Institute of Technology

‘Til next post.

Jenna

Outreach Manager, Department of Bioengineering, Imperial College London.