Message from the Chair
The Department of Bioengineering, located at the junction of Rice University and the Texas Medical Center (TMC), is part of a growing world-class community of interdisciplinary researchers and physicians who work together to address a broad spectrum of problems in science and medicine.
This unique environment provides bioengineering students with hands-on research, education and design experiences in laboratories located at Rice’s BioScience Research Collaborative (BRC), the Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen, and in clinical settings in the TMC, which is the largest medical center in the world.
In July 2012, we will welcome renowned physicist Herbert Levine as the Hasselmann Professor of Bioengineering thanks to a $4 million grant from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT). Dr. Levine’s research at Rice will specialize in nonequilibrium processes with applications for a wide variety of biological systems.
Dr. Levine and his collaborator José Onuchic, Rice’s new Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess Chair of Physics, are co-directors of the Center for Theoretical Biological Physics funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Physics Frontiers Centers program. They will bring the core of that center to the BRC in stages over the next two years.
The Department of Bioengineering's core faculty, emeritus, joint appointments, and adjunct faculty serve as the backbone to its overall strength and competitive ranking as an internationally recognized teaching and research institution. Currently, the department has 11 tenured professors, 7 tenure-track assistant professors, 4 teaching faculty, 1 faculty fellow, and 8 research scientists who are gaining funding for exceptionally creative projects, engineering robust platform technologies, and advancing the field of bioengineering through teaching and research. For their outstanding contributions many faculty members have been recently honored by the university and the professional societies they serve.
Dr. Antonios Mikos has been elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) — one of the highest professional honors accorded an engineer. He becomes Rice’s 14th active NAE member. Mikos, Rice’s Louis Calder Professor of Bioengineering, professor in chemical and biomolecular engineering and director of Rice’s Center for Excellence in Tissue Engineering, was among 66 new members elected to the academy. He was selected “for advances in tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, biomaterials and drug delivery, including development of biodegradable polymers.” In addition to becoming a member of the NAE, Dr. Mikos was one of six Rice faculty members to be named fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world's largest general scientific society and the publisher of the journal Science.
Dr. Michael Deem has earned one of Texas' highest scientific honors, the O'Donnell Award from The Academy of Medicine, Engineering and Science of Texas (TAMEST). Dr. Deem, the John W. Cox Professor of Biochemical and Genetic Engineering and professor of physics and astronomy, was honored with the engineering award "for fundamental theoretical work that brought new tools and ideas to vaccine design, mathematical biology and nanoporous materials structure."
Dr. Amina Qutub, an immensely talented computational theorist, has earned a National Science Foundation Early Career Development (CAREER) award to study microvasculature formation in the blood brain barrier. Dr. Jane Grande-Allen, whose research looks at heart valve disease from both material and mechanical perspectives, became the first Rice faculty member to win an Established Investigator Award from the American Heart Association. Two Rice bioengineering professors – Jianpeng Ma and Kyriacos Zygourakis – have been elected college fellows of the American Institute for Medical & Biological Engineering (AIMBE); Dr. Tomasz Tkaczyk won the Paul F. Forman Engineering Excellence Award by the Optical Society (OSA); Dr. Ann Saterbak was selected for the George R. Brown Prize for Excellence in Teaching – Rice’s top teaching award; and Dr. Kurt Kasper earned the Hershel M. Rich Invention Award, the Graduate Student Association Faculty Teaching/Mentoring Award, and the Young Investigator Award by the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS).
Efforts to further basic, and applied and translational research between the BioScience Research Collaborative and the Texas Medical Center continue to show great potential for clinical applications. Recent studies from Dr. Jeffrey Jacot’s laboratory, which were published online by the journal Tissue Engineering Part A, have discovered ways to turn stem cells from amniotic fluid into cells that form blood vessels. The efforts of his lab at Rice and Texas Children’s offer hope that such stem cells may be used to grow tissue patches to repair infant hearts. Collaborative research between my laboratory and Dr. Tomasz Tkaczyk to produce robust point-of-care technology is leading to the creation of an affordable, palm-sized, programmable system to diagnose disease in the developing world. The initiative is supported by a Grand Challenges in Global Health grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
The department’s short courses, symposia, and events have become tremendous venues for students and researchers to gather and share ideas and discoveries in science and medicine. Last semester we hosted the TERMIS North America Annual Conference and Exposition, which has become the major event for the presentation of basic tissue engineering and regenerative medicine research, and its clinical application.
On July 27, Dr. Jacot and co-hosts from Texas A&M University and the University of Texas will present - Biomaterials Day at Rice University. Biomaterials Day, which is funded by the Society for Biomaterials (SFB), is a one day symposium at five different locations throughout the United States. Biomaterials Day at Rice University will enhance networking between academic and industrial sectors and increase student exposure to exciting biomaterials research.
From August 8-11, the Center for Excellence in Tissue Engineering, Department of Bioengineering, and Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering will host the 20th Advances in Tissue Engineering Short Course. Every year more than 100 participants converge from around the world for the four-day event to learn first-hand about a range of topics involving computational structural biology, cell migration, biomimetic strategies, nanotech approaches to treatment, and the clinical translation of tissue engineering practices. The event is organized each year by Dr. Mikos.