Announcements

Dr. Doug Schumer joined the Biomedical Engineering Department as a professor of practice. Doug received his PhD from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and he has held numerous positions in industry over the last 35 years.

Approximately half of our undergraduate and essentially all of our graduate students participate in research. One important aspect of research is to be able to present results to an audience of experts, such as those found at national/international conferences. An additional benefit of presenting research results is that it hones communication skills which we deem essential for our students. Unfortunately, obtaining funds to send students to conferences is getting harder to come by nowadays due to budget limitations of most federal and state agencies.

Leo Wan, an assistant professor in the Department, has been name of a 2013 Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences by the Pew Charitable Trusts. As part of the award, Wan will receive $240,000 in unrestricted funds over four years to develop multiscale devices for measuring the chirality of cells and to understanding the underlying molecular mechanisms. Cell chirality is critical for the development of organisms of consistent left-right asymmetry, or handedness.

Juergen Hahn has been appointed as an editor of the Journal of Process Control. The appointment will start on January 1, 2014. The Journal of Process Control is a journal of the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC).This international journal covers the application of control theory, operations research, computer science and engineering principles to the solution of process control problems. Papers on the theory in these areas are also appropriate for the journal provided the theoretical contribution is aimed at process control. Dr.

Mariah Hahn is joining the Editorial Board for Scientific Reports, a journal from Nature Publishing Group, the publishers of Nature. Scientific Reports launched in 2011 as a multidisciplinary, online-only, open access publication covering all areas of the natural sciences. Editorial Board Members are recruited for an initial 2 year term, and the principle responsibilities are to assess whether manuscripts should be sent for peer review and to manage the peer review of manuscripts and make final editorial decisions.

Lingling Zhao, a graduate student in Xavier Intes' group, is the recipient of the 2013 Ajit Prabhu Graduate Fellowship. The Ajit Prabhu fellowship was established in 2012 by Mr. Ajit Prabhu, a former student of the department. The fellowship honors a student in the last semester of the doctoral program for their academic achievements. Linigling also recently won a poster award at the International Symposium on Metabolic Imaging and Spectroscopy Honoring the 100th Birthday of Britton Chance. The symposium was held at the University of Pennsylvania on June 18.

Ge Wang's work on how to measure scientific impact has been discussed at phys.org. The article refers to a recent paper that Wang and co-authors have published in PNAS. More information can be found here: Jonathan Stallings, Eric Vance, Jiansheng Yang, Michael W. Vannier, Jimin Liang, Liaojun Pang, Liang Dai, Ivan Ye, and Ge Wang "Determining scientific impact using a collaboration index." PNAS Early Edition. http://www.pnas.org/content/110/24/9680

The RPI Board of Trustees has approved Ryan Gilbert's promotion to Associate Professor with tenure. Ryan received his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University. He joined Michigan Technological University as an Assistant Professor in 2005 and moved to Rensselaer in 2010. Ryan specializes in developing translational biomaterials to aid in spinal cord repair. His laboratory is developing biomaterials to guide axonal and cellular migration through an injury site, as well as, locally deliver therapeutics.