NSF gives $1.38-million entrepreneurial boost to bioengineering program.

The National Science Foundation has awarded Lehigh $1.38 million to help give the university's one-year-old bioengineering program a technical entrepreneurship focus.

During a recent meeting in Washington, D.C., Bruce Kramer, director of NSF's Division of Engineering Education and Centers, called Lehigh's program a "flagship program" due to its non-traditional approach to engineering education and its potential impact on other interdisciplinary engineering programs.

The bioengineering program is one of Lehigh's most diverse and demanding undergraduate majors. Students are required to complete two summer internships and to work on team research projects during their junior and senior years under the supervision of a professor, a mentor from a hospital, and a mentor from a biotechnology firm.

To facilitate the internships and interdisciplinary projects, the program has formed close ties with academic departments at Lehigh and with regional hospitals, medical schools and biotechnology firms.

"What makes this program distinctive is the balance of science, humanities, technology and business," said Mohamed El-Aasser, dean of the P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science. "This core is then integrated with an experiential learning curriculum that includes classroom lectures, research, industry, clinical and business internships, co-ops and projects."

El-Aasser said the NSF grant will help fund internships, new courses in bioengineering, and new laboratories in biopharmaceutical engineering, cell and tissue engineering, and bioelectronics and biophotonics, which are the names of the three tracks in which bioengineering majors will choose specialties. Biopharmaceutical engineering encompasses biochemistry and chemical engineering, while bioelectronics and biophotonics covers electrical engineering and physics. Cell and tissue engineering straddles the fields of molecular and cell biology, materials science, mechanical engineering and electrical engineering.

"Some of the most important areas for the future of engineering represent creative fusions of traditional disciplines," said Gregory Farrington, president of Lehigh. "Bioengineering is a great example. The NSF grant is a real vote of confidence in the vision and creativity Lehigh faculty have brought to this initiative."

The new program is administered by the RCEAS and the College of Arts and Sciences. In partnership with the College of Business and Economics, bioengineering students can be admitted into the Integrated Business and Engineering program. Students who complete the bioengineering program fulfill the requirements of Lehigh's pre-med program.

In designing research projects for students, the bioengineering program will also collaborate with Lehigh's award-winning Integrated Product Development program and with the state's PA Life Sciences Greenhouse.

"The success of implementing this bioengineering program at Lehigh will serve as a national model for universities and colleges that are strong in science, engineering, design and business but are without a medical school," said El-Aasser.

Since students began enrolling in the program in the fall of 2002, more than 40 have declared a major in bioengineering. The program is directed by El-Aasser. Daniel Ou-Yang, professor of physics, is project manager, and Svetlana Tatic-Lucic, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, is associate project manager. John Ochs, professor of mechanical engineering and mechanics and director of the IPD program, is entrepreneurship project leader.

In January 2004, Anand Jagota will join the faculty as professor of chemical engineering and director of the bioengineering program and its sister program in the College of Arts and Science, the Applied Life Science Program.

Jagota, a senior research scientist at DuPont, has led research groups in pursuing biological and chemical routes to nanoelectronic devices and in solving problems related to ceramic processing and mechanical properties, polymer sintering, and composites.