Week 1 - Intro to BMED
- Bioengineering: engineering, biology, and medicine, working cross-disciplinarily in agriculture, manufacturing, research, ...
- Biomedical Engineering: a specialty of bioengineering. Largely tries to improve healthcare
Bioengineers must work both with the theory of biology, as well as the hands-on application of engineering (circuits, statics, etc.). They help design:
- Pacemakers, Defibrilators, Hearts, ...
- Computer Systems to monitor patients during surgery or similar...
- Sensors to measure blood chemistry
- Instruments and devices for therapeutic uses
- Pilot monitoring systems to land a plane in the event of pilot incapacitation
Note that most BMED's are not even involved in biology whatsoever; they get pulled from other fields.
Why Us Learn BMED?
It's important because:
- Most engineers, like me, are not bioengineering majors. Rather, they're trained in their specialties, then come work and apply their expertise at a biotech company.
- It's important to know the health services and technologies currently in use today, in case they ever save your life one day.
- More knowledge allows a democracy to know what options it has in nuance, as well as have more of a wealth of options.
14 Grand Challenges of Engineering
The US National Academy of Engineering (NAE) proposed 14 challenges that were believed to be achievable and sustainable:
- Make solar energy economical: harvesting energy primarily through light using phytosynthesis
- Provide energy from fusion
- Develop Carbon sequestration methods: Having the ability to remove carbon from the air, probably using biological methods. For instance, using carbon-absorbing algae (Algadisk).
- Manage the nitrogen cycle: Fixed nitrogen is steadily increasing due to the use of fertilizers. Too much nitrogen can lead to acid ran and "dead zones" in lakes, rivers, and oceans
- Provide access to clean water: includes filtering used waste water back into drinkable water.
- Restore and improve urban infrastructure
- Advance health informatics
- Engineer better medicines
- Reverse engineer the brain: creating a general intelligence that's biologically based
- Prevent nuclear terror
- Enhance virtual reality
- Advance personalized learning
- Engineer the tools of scientific discovery