Announcements

The recent accreditation effort was successful and the Biomedical Engineering Department has been accredited by the Engineering Accreditation Commission of ABET, http://www.abet.org, for another six years.

A gift from the estate of J. Lawrence Katz has created the J. Lawrence and Gertrude Katz Award in Biomedical Engineering. Income from this fund will be used to annually provide an award to the outstanding graduating senior receiving a BS degree in Biomedical Engineering. The award will be given at the graduation ceremony in May. J. Lawrence Katz was a long time faculty member at RPI and the founding department head of the BME department. He served in that capacity from 1974-1985. The department is delighted to receive this generous gift from our late colleague.

General Electric has donated a GE Global Research Universal CT Benchtop to Ge Wang's laboratory. The equipment has an estimated value of $1M and will be a key piece of equipment for Dr. Wang's research.

The annual Northeast Bioengineering Conference (NEBEC) will be held at RPI in 2015. This is the 41st NEBEC conference and the department is excited to be the host. The conference will include plenary speakers, session keynotes, and contributed papers and posters, as well as a undergraduate senior design competition. Traditionally a couple of hundred contributed papers and posters are submitted and several hundred researchers attend the conference; we expect next year's contributions to be similar in number.

Deepak Vashishth has been appointed to the PLOS ONE Editorial Board and will serve as an Academic Editor. About the journal: PLOS ONE is an international, peer-reviewed, open-access, online publication. PLOS ONE welcomes reports on primary research from any scientific discipline. PLOS ONE features reports of original research from all disciplines within science and medicine. By not excluding papers on the basis of subject area, PLOS ONE facilitates the discovery of the connections between papers whether within or between disciplines.

The Graduation dinner was held at the Franklin Plaza in Troy on May 23, 2014 to celebrate the achievements of the students graduating this year. A total of 96 students will graduate with a BS, 14 with a Masters, and 6 PhDs will be awarded. The number of students receiving each of these degrees are at or near record values, reflecting the popularity of the program. In addition to honoring the graduating students, several award recipients were also announced at the dinner: The Paul B. Daitch Memorial Award: Haygan Ngo The Zelda & David G.

Joel A. Mowatt received the Willie Stanton Award (1981). This award was established by the Rensselaer Union and the award is in honor of William P. (Willie) Stanton, Class of 1972 (hon.). Willie Stanton was a dishwasher and cook who served the academic and social needs of Rensselaer students for over 45 years. This award is presented annually to the senior who is judged to have contributed the most to the service of the student body. Congratulations, Joel!

Vivian K. Lee has received the Karen & Lester Gerhardt Prize in Science and Engineering (1982). This prize was established to honor a full-time engineering or science doctoral candidate who, by the originality and insights of his/her work, emphasizes the tradition of excellence that is Rensselaer. Congratulations, Vivian!