Bioengineering M. F. Insana, Interim Department Head cooperation among individuals trained in different 3120 Digital Computer Laboratory disciplines. 1304 West Springfield Avenue MC-278 • The program has great strength in medical and biological Urbana, IL 61801 imaging, including ultrasound, MRI, fMRI, optical 217-333-1867 coherence tomography, and fluorescence dynamics, as http://www.bioen.uiuc.edu well as contrast agents to assist many imaging [email protected] modalities. • A program of bioacoustic studies draws heavily on The newly formed Department of Bioengineering researchers with backgrounds in electrical engineering, (December 2003) has completed its startup phase, having physiology, biophysics, and medicine. grown to six faculty members and admitting four classes • Bioinformatics studies are carried out by bioengineers, of undergraduate students (total 112) and graduate students physiologists, microbiologists, and crop scientists. (total 30). It now begins a phase of integrating with and • There are projects in neural engineering, including leveraging campus strengths related to bioengineering, electrode array technology development, neural guidance, beginning with biomedical imaging science and extending computational models, and hearing aids. to cellular and molecular engineering, with likely foci in • A strong effort in cellular biomechanics includes molecular imaging, animal models of disease, nano/micro development of novel fluorescence sensors for monitoring biosensors, and functional genomic modeling. Plans call intracellular signaling pathways. for growth to 16 faculty members, 100 graduate students, • Faculty from many departments are involved in studies and 250 undergraduate students in the next several years. of the properties of normal and diseased bones, orthopedic Bioengineering has a large number of affiliate faculty, implants, immune response, and biomechanics. most of whom have contributed to the nondepartmental • Computational bioengineering includes simulation and program that existed for the previous 30 years of informatics. bioengineering research. However, this number has grown • Bioengineering simulation studies are conducted by with the addition of bioengineering focused faculty in other physicists, chemists, physiologists, integrative biologists, departments and the redirection of research efforts to electrical engineers, and computer scientists. bioengineering by existing Illinois faculty. Thus, there is a • Other areas of research, such as bioinstrumentation, strong base of bioengineering research on campus, much biomaterials, comparative biomedicine, and radiation of which is captured in this Summary report. studies, also require researchers with similar interests but Bioengineering brings to the study of biology and differing fields of expertise. medicine the methods of inquiry—both analytical tools and the design approach—that have been the A significant amount of the bioengineering research underpinnings of engineering and the physical sciences. activity at the University of Illinois is carried out at the Bioengineers seek to better understand biological Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology phenomena and living systems, to create new instruments and at the Institute for Genomic Biology, where and techniques to deal with biologically and medically interdisciplinary work is nurtured and promoted. oriented problems, and ultimately to improve the human The broad scope of research activities described here condition. reflects the interests of participating faculty and students Bioengineering research is conducted by the faculty, currently involved in the field. Graduate education in students, and staff of the College of Engineering as well as bioengineering is closely associated with the various the colleges of Veterinary Medicine; Applied Health research projects described. The research projects Sciences; Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental conducted in the College of Engineering are also included Sciences; Medicine; and Liberal Arts and Sciences in their respective departmental sections of the Summary (schools of Chemical Sciences, Molecular and Cellular of Engineering Research. Biology, and Integrative Biology). The projects are interdisciplinary in nature and require, in many cases, close 1 Jianjun Cheng Faculty and Their Interests Biomaterials, polymers, gene delivery, nanomedicine, self-assembly Narayan R. Aluru Bioengineering, computational science and engineering, Robert Clegg engineering mechanics, fluid dynamics, nano-, micro-, and Experimental biophysics with an emphasis on kinetics and meso-technology optical spectroscopy Thomas J. Anastasio Brian Cunningham Computational neuroscience Nanotechnology, photonic crystals, biosensors, micro/ nanofabrication methods and materials detection Rashid Bashir instrumentation BioMEMS and biosensors, bionanotechnology, nanomedicine, applications of MEMS and nanotechnology Howard S. Ducoff, Emeritus in medical and biological problems, multiscale tissue Radiation biophysics engineering. Albert S. Feng Philip M. Best Sound communication, pattern recognition, and Ion channels localization; computational neuroscience; neuroengineering Rohit Bhargava Infrared spectroscopic imaging, automated and Leon A. Frizzell, Emeritus quantitative histopathology, cancer pathology, Ultrasonic biophysics, ultrasonic bioengineering macromolecular dynamics in composites, molecular and tissue engineering, nanotechnology, biophotonics John G. Georgiadis instrumentation and algorithms Bioengineering, computational science and engineering, energy systems and thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, heat Stephen Boppart transfer, nano-, micro-, and meso-technology Optical biomedical imaging, molecular imaging, lasers in medicine and biology, optical coherence tomography, Steve Granick image-guided surgery, medical engineering, optical Polymers and biopolymers, nanorheology/tribology, diagnostics of cancer surface spectroscopies Richard D. Braatz William T. Greenough Multiscale systems and control Neuronal pattern analysis Yoram Bresler Dominique J. Griffon Biomedical imaging systems; statistical signal and image Applications of biomaterials in orthopedic surgery processing; inverse problems; statistical pattern recognition; sensor-array processing Bruce M. Hannon Biological modeling Bertram C. Bruce K-12 and university science education, technologies for Elizabeth Hsiao-Wecksler learning, community informatics Bioengineering, control systems, dynamic systems, engineering mechanics Sahraoui Chaieb Bioengineering, computational science and engineering, Michael Insana engineering mechanics, fluid dynamics, materials Development of novel ultrasonic instrumentation and behavior, nano-, micro-, and meso-technology methods for imaging soft tissue microstructure, elasticity, and blood flow John C. Chato, Emeritus Bioengineering, energy systems and thermodynamics, heat Eric G. Jakobsson transfer Computational biology and nanoscience 2 Iwona Jasiuk William D. O'Brien, Jr. Solid mechanics; biomechanics; mechanics of materials; Ultrasonic biophysics and bioeffects, acoustic microscopy, micromechanics; composite, biological and nano- ultrasonic bioengineering, ultrasonic dosimetry, ultrasonic materials; bone mechanics; composite interfaces; elasticity tissue characterization, acoustic imaging techniques Amy Wagoner Johnson Michael L. Oelze Synthetic biomaterials, failure mechanics of metals and Ultrasound, including backscatter microscopy, biomaterials quantitative imaging, computed tomography; use of ultrasound for cancer diagnosis and therapy; bioeffects of Neil L. Kelleher ultrasound; sonoporation; coded excitation and ultrasound Mass spectrometry, enzymology, "Top Down" proteomics, natural products Daniel W. Pack Drug and gene delivery systems Kyekyoon (Kevin) Kim Growth of GaN-based compound semiconductors and Adrienne L. Perlman fabrication of optoelectronic and electronic devices using Normal and disordered deglutition plasma-assisted MBE; plasma-arc-driven electromagnetic railgun for fueling of plasma devices; charged liquid Gerald J. Pijanowski cluster beam generation and application to thin film Orthopedic biomechanics deposition, micropattern generation, and nanoparticle fabrication; generation of solid and hollow, charged and Nathan D. Price neutral, monodisperse, micro- and nanospheres for Systems biology, cancer, model-guided cellular biomedical and other applications; plasma display panels; engineering, microbial biofuel production development of novel thin film deposition techniques using plasmas, charged particles, electrostatic spraying, Klaus Schulten and their combinations with other techniques; MEMS and Theoretical biological and computational physics, sensors; ionized source (cluster) beam deposition for low- statistical physics temperature growth of high-quality films; inertial confinement fusion targets Mark A. Shannon Bioengineering, combustion and propulsion, Waltraud M. Kriven computational science and engineering, energy systems Phase transformations in oxide ceramics (TEM, high-temp and thermodynamics, heat transfer, materials processing, XRD, and synchrotron), geopolymers, processing- nano-, micro-, and meso-technology microstructure-property relations in structural ceramics and composites, synthesis of oxide fibers, bioceramics, Bradley Sutton electron microscopy Functional magnetic resonance imaging, MR pulse sequence design, dynamic imaging for speech, diffusion Deborah E. Leckband weighted imaging, functional spectroscopic imaging