BMES members elected to 2015 National Academy of Engineers class

The National Academy of Engineering has elected 67 new members and 12 foreign members, the organization announced. Three of the new inductees are Biomedical Engineering Society members.

The BMES members elected to NAE include Sangeeta Bhatia, Samir Mitragotri and Ajit P. Yoganathan.

Academy membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions to "engineering research, practice, or education, including, where appropriate, significant contributions to the engineering literature," and to the "pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, making major advancements in traditional fields of engineering, or developing/implementing innovative approaches to engineering education," according to NAE.

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Use of light to manipulate stiffness could one day help better treat cancer and cardiovascular disease

Light is used as a diagnostic, therapeutic, and drug delivery tool. Researchers in the University of Texas at Austin's Department of Biomedical Engineering believe light can also be used to help answer biological questions.

According to a paper published by Professor Laura Suggs' research group in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, light can be used to learn about the effect of extracellular matrix stiffness on disease progression. Suggs is a Biomedical Engineering Society member.

The paper, Dynamic Phototuning of Hydrogel Stiffness, describes a technique using a 3D hydrogel cell culture system where the stiffness of the extracellular matrix, the outside perimeter of a cell, can be adjusted with light, according to a university article.

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Jorgensen leads new Wichita State Biomedical Engineering department

BMES member Michael Jorgensen will lead the new biomedical engineering department at Wichita State, according to an article in the Sunflower.

The university has had a BME program since 2009, but it became an official department in 2014, according to the Sunflower article.

Jorgensen was recently named to chair the department. He was the program coordinator for the BME effort at the university from the start, according to the article. The department currently has 160 undergraduate students.

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Sakiyama-Elbert wins grant for spinal cord study

Biomedical Engineering Society member and fellow Shelly Sakiyama-Elbert was awarded a $1.7 million grant from the National Institutes of Health for her research on how connections rewire after spinal cord injury, according to the university.

Sakiyama-Elbert is a professor of biomedical engineering in the School of Engineering & Applied Science at Washington University in St. Louis. Her research uses novel methods to take a closer look at how these nerve cells grow and make new connections to reroute signals between the brain and the body that could restore function and movement in people with these debilitating injuries, according to the article.

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Innovative nanoparticle gene therapy system eliminates cancerous brain cells

Despite decades of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therpy treaments for glioma, a cure for this life-threatening brain cancer has remained elusive. In a study published on the website of the journal ACS Nano, BME Associate Professor and BMES Member Jordan Green and other Johns Hopkins researchers have successfully used compound-filled biodegradable nanoparticles to effectively kill brain cancer cells and extend survival in rats.

The biodegradable nanoparticles filled with a DNA-encoded enzyme, herpes simplex virus type 1 thymidine kinase (HSVtk), proved to be potent in killing brain cancer cells. When researchers combined this with the compound ganciclovir, the loaded nanoparticles were 100 percent effective at killing glioma cells grown in laboratory dishes.

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Peppas Named Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry

BMES Fellow Nicholas Peppas, chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering and a professor in the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering and the College of Pharmacy at The University of Texas at Austin, has been named a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC).

The Royal Society of Chemistry, founded in 1841, is the United Kingdoms professional body for chemical scientists and the largest organization in Europe for advancing the chemical sciences. The Royal Society of Chemistry partners with industry and academia, promotes collaboration and innovation, advises governments on policy and promotes the talent, information and ideas that lead to great advances in science. The designation FRSC is given to a group of elected Fellows who have made outstanding contributions to chemistry. The names of newly elected Fellows are published each year in The Times (London).

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