BME,faculty News

October 30, 2006

Duke Packard Fellow to Examine Processing Speed of “Reprogrammed” Bacteria

Lingchong You, assistant professor of biomedical engineering at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering, has won a fellowship from the David & Lucile Packard Foundation for his research into the information processing speed of bacteria that have been “reprogrammed” to perform new, and potentially useful, tasks. The Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering aims to provide support for “unusually creative researchers” within their first three years as faculty, according to the foundation’s web site. You--one of ...

September 25, 2006

Six Pratt Faculty To Be Honored At Founder's Day Convocation

Duke University will honor outstanding students, faculty, employees and alumni at its annual Founders’ Day Convocation in Duke Chapel at 4 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 28. Among the winners are six members of the Pratt School of Engineering faculty. Honorees at the service, which is open to the public, include philanthropists Russell Robinson II and his wife, Sally Dalton Robinson; Ruby Leila Wilson, dean emerita of Duke School of Nursing; and longtime university photographer William “Jimmy” Wallace ...

May 1, 2006

Distinguished Alums and Faculty Honored at Awards Ceremony

Three distinguished alumni and six faculty members were honored for their career accomplishments, service to Pratt and excellence in teaching, mentoring and research at the 2006 annual Engineering Alumni Council Banquet held at the Searle Center on April 28. William A. Hawkins III E'76, was awarded the Distinguished Alumnus Award. James G. Whayne E'90, was awarded the Distinguished Young Alumnus Award. And Pratt Senior Associate Dean of Development and Alumni Affairss Judge Carr was awarded the ...

May 1, 2006

Duke Engineer Wins Beckman Young Investigator Award

Jingdong Tian Biomedical engineer Jingdong Tian of Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering has been named a Beckman Young Investigator by the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation. Tian will receive $264,000 over three years to pursue research titled “High-Throughput Forward Engineering of Novel Biological Systems Using Microfluidic DNA Microchip.” Tian aims to develop new strategies and enabling technologies for efficient engineering, fabrication, and optimization of novel, genetically encoded bionanosystems. Such technology has the potential to aid in gene ...

April 14, 2006

Duke Engineer Wins Beckman Young Investigator Award

Biomedical engineer Jingdong Tian of Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering has been named a Beckman Young Investigator by the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation. Tian will receive $264,000 over three years to pursue research titled “High-Throughput Forward Engineering of Novel Biological Systems Using Microfluidic DNA Microchip.” Tian aims to develop new strategies and enabling technologies for efficient engineering, fabrication, and optimization of novel, genetically encoded bionanosystems. Such technology has the potential to aid in gene medicine ...

April 1, 2006

Myers Named Senior Associate Dean for Industrial Partnerships and Research Commercialization

Barry Myers, Ph.D., M.D., M.B.A. Professor Barry Myers has been appointed senior associate dean for industrial partnerships and research commercialization at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. Myers will lead the school’s efforts to increase industry involvement in engineering education, research, technology commercialization and entrepreneurship. A member of the Duke faculty since 1991, Myers earned his M.D.-Ph.D. from Duke in 1991 and an M.B.A. from Duke in 2005. He is the Anderson-Rupp Professor in the Department of Biomedical ...

April 1, 2006

Tuan Vo-Dinh To Lead Duke’s Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics

Tuan Vo-Dinh Tuan Vo-Dinh, a pioneer in the field of photonics at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has joined the department of biomedical engineering at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering, where he will serve as director of the Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics. Vo-Dinh said he plans to establish Duke as a national “center of gravity” for photonics research by tapping into the breadth of faculty expertise and facilities of the Pratt School of Engineering, as well as ...

March 28, 2006

New Pratt Senior Associate Dean for Industrial Partnerships and Research Commercialization Appointed

DURHAM, N.C. -- Professor Barry Myers has been appointed senior associate dean for industrial partnerships and research commercialization at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. Myers will lead the school’s efforts to increase industry involvement in engineering education, research, technology commercialization and entrepreneurship. A member of the Duke faculty since 1991, Myers earned an M.D.-Ph.D. from Duke in 1991 and an M.B.A. from Duke in 2005. He is the Anderson-Rupp Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, ...

March 17, 2006

Tuan Vo-Dinh to Lead Duke's Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics

DURHAM, N.C. -- Tuan Vo-Dinh, a pioneer in the field of photonics at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has joined the biomedical engineering department at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering, where he will serve as director of the Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics. Vo-Dinh said he plans to establish Duke as a national “center of gravity” for photonics research by tapping into the breadth of faculty expertise and facilities at the Pratt School, as well as Duke’s ...

March 1, 2006

Leong to Lead Initiative Aimed at Nanomedicine

Kam Leong Kam Leong, a national leader in drug and gene delivery at Johns Hopkins University, has joined the department of biomedical engineering at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering, where he will serve as director of the school’s Bioengineering Initiative. Leong said he plans to focus on the emerging field of “nanotherapeutics,” the application of devices on the scale of nanometers -– one billionth of a meter -- for treating disease via drug, gene and immunization ...

January 24, 2006

Duke’s Ramanujam Wins MIT’s Global Indus Technovators Award

Associate professor Nimmi Ramanujam of Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering is a recipient of the 2005 Global Indus Technovators Award for her work developing minimally invasive, light-based technologies for early cancer detection. An awards reception was held on Jan. 24, 2006, in Boston. The honor is bestowed on top scientists and engineers by the Indian Business Club at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to inspire a culture of innovation among young people of South Asian ...

April 24, 2005

Engineering Alumni and Faculty Members Honored

Duke’s Engineering Alumni Association April 23 honored 1974 graduate Capers McDonald of Potomac, Md., with its Distinguished Alumnus Award and 1990 graduate Edward L. Trimble of Atlanta with the Distinguished Young Alumnus Award. Professor F. Hadley Cocks of the Pratt School of Engineering Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science (MEMS), received the Distinguished Service Award for 33 years of service to the School of Engineering, joining the school in 1972 as assistant professor after six ...

April 1, 2005

Reichert Receives Mentoring Award

William Reichert The Duke University Graduate School is giving its Dean's Award for Excellence in Mentoring to Professor of Biomedical Engineering William Reichert; Linda K. George, professor of sociology and psychology; and Alexander Rosenberg, R. Taylor Cole Professor of Philosophy and professor of biology. "This year's award recipients have diligently applied themselves in various ways to ensuring that the experience of dedicated scholars remains accessible to the full spectrum of eager and curious minds that enter Duke's ...

March 26, 2005

Reichert is Among Three Professors to Receive Graduate School Mentoring Award

The Duke University Graduate School is giving its Dean's Award for Excellence in Mentoring to Professor of Biomedical Engineering William Reichert; Linda K. George, professor of sociology and psychology; and Alexander Rosenberg, R. Taylor Cole Professor of Philosophy and professor of biology. "This year's award recipients have diligently applied themselves in various ways to ensuring that the experience of dedicated scholars remains accessible to the full spectrum of eager and curious minds that enter Duke's graduate ...

March 24, 2005

Biomedical Engineering Professor Emeritus Fredrick L. Thurstone Dies

Duke University engineering professor emeritus Fredrick L."Fritz" Thurstone, a pioneer of diagnostic ultrasound, died of cancer March 17 in Kissimmee, Fla. He was 73. Thurstone moved to Duke in 1967 as one of the founding members of the Department of Biomedical Engineering. He is credited with playing a key role in Duke engineering's development and commercialization of ultrasound in medicine. "Professor Thurstone was a leader in the field of ultrasound holography and a pioneer of the use ...

February 28, 2005

Reichert Honored for Role in Minority Recruiting in Biomedical Engineering

Ten years ago there were no black doctoral students in engineering at Duke and few in the other math and science departments at the university. Biomedical Engineering Professor William “Monty” Reichert decided to see what he could do about that. With funding from the engineering school and the Graduate School at Duke, Reichert took a sabbatical leave in 1996 at North Carolina Central University, a historically black university in Durham. He immersed himself in minority education ...

August 26, 2004

Three new faculty join Pratt's BME Department

At the start of the fall semester, Pratt’s Department of Biomedical Engineering welcomes three new tenure track faculty members. Jean-Marc Fellous, previously a post-doctoral fellow at the Salk Institute, became an assistant professor in the BME department and a core member of the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience in September 2004. Fellous earned his Ph.D. in computer science and artificial intelligence at University of Southern California, Los Angeles. He research involves a combination of in vitro, in ...

July 30, 2004

Duke Engineering Professor Named to Federal Scientific Review Panel

DURHAM, N.C. -– Duke University’s Gregg E. Trahey has been appointed a member of the Biomedical Imaging Technology Study Section of the National Institute of Health’s Center for Scientific Review. Trahey, Ph.D., is the James L. and Elizabeth M. Vincent Professor of Biomedical Engineering in the Pratt School of Engineering, and also holds an appointment as professor of radiology at Duke University Medical Center. He is a specialist in medical ultrasound and instrumentation, adaptive imaging, breast ...

April 29, 2004

Niklason Named to NIH Panel

Duke University’s Laura E. Niklason has been appointed a member of the Bioengineering, Technology and Surgical Sciences Study Section of the National Institute of Health’s Center for Scientific Review. Niklason, who has M.D. and Ph.D. degrees, is an assistant professor with joint appointments in biomedical engineering at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering and anesthesiology and surgery at Duke Medical Center. She is a specialist on tissue engineering, a rapidly developing field that integrates areas of biomaterials, ...

March 1, 2004

Schuler, Wax Receive NSF Career Awards

Assistant professors Andrew Schuler and Adam P. Wax at Dukey’s Pratt School of Engineering have received Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) awards from the National Science Foundation. Each award is expected to total $400,000 over five years. “The CAREER award is NSF’s most prestigious honor for junior faculty members,” the federal research agency said. “The CAREER program recognizes and supports the early career-development activities of those teacher-scholars who are most likely to become the academic leaders ...

February 25, 2004

Two Duke Engineering Professors Win Career Awards

Assistant professors Andrew Schuler and Adam P. Wax at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering have received Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) awards from the National Science Foundation. Each award is expected to total $400,000 over five years. “The CAREER award is NSF’s most prestigious honor for junior faculty members,” the federal research agency said. “The CAREER program recognizes and supports the early career-development activities of those teacher-scholars who are most likely to become the academic ...

January 1, 2004

Science Recognizes Chilkoti As Top Prof for Postdocs

Duke’s Ashutosh Chilkoti, associate professor of biomedical engineering, was named a Top Principal Investigator in a Science magazine Science Careers survey, published in October. The goal of the survey was to determine what characteristics postdocs value most in the researchers they work for, and to identify the principal investigators who best embody those characteristics. For Chilkoti, building successful working relationships with postdoctoral fellows is all about ‘learning the individual.’ “There is no one mode of success, but ...

September 1, 2003

George Truskey Named Chair of Department of Biomedical Engineering

Professor George A. Truskey, director of undergraduate studies in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering, has been named chair of the department, Dean Kristina Johnson announced July 1. Truskey succeeds Professor Morton Friedman, who is returning to full-time teaching and research in the department. "Dr. Truskey is a world class researcher who also is one of our most gifted teachers,” Johnson said. “His role in shaping the department, which will be expanding ...

July 1, 2003

George Truskey Named Chair of Department of Biomedical Engineering

DURHAM, N.C. – Professor George A. Truskey, director of undergraduate studies in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering, has been named chair of the department, Dean Kristina Johnson announced Tuesday. Truskey succeeds Professor Morton Friedman, who is returning to full-time teaching and research in the department. "Dr. Truskey is a world class researcher who also is one of our most gifted teachers,” Johnson said. “His role in shaping the department, which will ...