{"id":145028,"date":"2023-10-04T16:40:09","date_gmt":"2023-10-04T20:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/?p=145028"},"modified":"2023-10-04T16:42:23","modified_gmt":"2023-10-04T20:42:23","slug":"converging-on-training-tomorrows-bioengineers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/2023\/10\/04\/converging-on-training-tomorrows-bioengineers\/","title":{"rendered":"Converging on Training Tomorrow\u2019s Bioengineers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nation\u2019s first training program for biological control workforce wins NSF grant<\/strong><\/h3>\n

By Patrick L. Kennedy<\/strong><\/p>\n

With a competitive National Science Foundation Research Traineeship (NRT) award, Boston University is positioning itself to become a major hub not only in the emerging research field of biological feedback control, but also in the training of tomorrow\u2019s engineering biology workforce.<\/p>\n

\u201cA Convergent Training Program on Biological Control,\u201d co-directed by ENG Dean ad interim<\/em> Elise Morgan<\/a> (ME<\/a>, MSE<\/a>, BME<\/a>) and Associate Professor Mary Dunlop<\/a> (BME), aims to train a diverse group of PhD students\u2014approximately 75 over the next five years\u2014for tomorrow\u2019s workforce in biotech, synthetic biology, manufacturing, robotics, sustainability, and other sectors. The agency announced the award this month. Professors Christopher Chen<\/a> (BME, MSE) and Ahmad \u201cMo\u201d Khalil<\/a> (BME) are PIs along with Morgan and Dunlop.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Some salamanders can regenerate lost limbs. Photo by Zden\u011bk Mach\u00e1\u010dek on Unsplash<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Researchers working in biological control focus on understanding and replicating the remarkable abilities that living systems have to self-regulate and adapt by using feedback to respond to changes in their environment. From salamanders that can regrow a lost limb to bacteria that sense and move toward food sources, examples of feedback control abound in nature.<\/p>\n

In recent years, researchers have been digging into the complex workings of feedback control as it occurs in nature, with an eye to effecting similar processes artificially. Potential applications include tissue regeneration, sustainable farming, decontaminating polluted water, designing microbes to produce sought-after chemicals in a sustainable manner, and developing assistive devices for the disabled.<\/p>\n

However, despite all that promise, opportunities to learn feedback control as it applies in biological contexts are limited and ad hoc. Control theory traditionally sits within mechanical and electrical engineering curricula, where there isn\u2019t room to delve into nature\u2019s infinite array of biological control strategies. Meanwhile, biology students don\u2019t typically get trained in the quantitative analysis of feedback mechanisms.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Dean ad interim Elise Morgan and co-PIs, along with more than a dozen faculty across BU, garnered an NSF grant to train diverse engineers in biological control. Photo by Dana J. Quigley
<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

To bridge this gap, the BU team has proposed to create, and the NSF is investing nearly $3 million to facilitate, a first-of-its-kind graduate training program in biological control. The NRT program will feature all-new courses, boot camps, workshops, co-mentored research, and industry internships, all geared to advancing both the field of biological control and the position of BU graduates within it. The program will recruit students from underrepresented demographic groups as well as varied academic backgrounds, including mechanical, biomedical, and electrical engineering, biology, physics, chemistry, and data science, among others.<\/p>\n

Through the integration of the disciplines involved, faculty and students will \u201cdevelop a common language and shared body of technical skills in the fundamental underpinnings of biological control,\u201d the team wrote in their proposal to the NSF. Moreover, the team expects new discoveries to result from the transdisciplinary research projects, broadening researchers\u2019 understanding and potentially leading to new technologies in areas such as molecular-level control algorithms, microbial feedback control systems, self-powered hybrid systems that combine living and engineered parts, and advanced robotic systems that can heal and evolve.<\/p>\n

The NRT award is one of just 22 the NSF granted this year. The program encompasses a wide range of experts from departments and centers across BU, including not only researchers but also participants from the Newbury Center, the Professional Development and Postdoctoral Affairs office, and STEM Pathways. Other ENG faculty involved include Professor Calin Belta<\/a> (ME, SE<\/a>, ECE<\/a>), Professor Douglas Densmore<\/a> (ECE, BME, MSE), Assistant Professor Andrew Sabelhaus<\/a> (ME, SE), Assistant Professor Emma Lejeune<\/a> (ME), Assistant Professor Sheila Russo<\/a> (ME, MSE), Assistant Professor Tommaso Ranzani<\/a> (ME), Assistant Professor Michael Albro<\/a> (ME, MSE, BME), Assistant Professor Brianne Connizzo<\/a> (BME), and Assistant Professor Jeroen Eyckmans<\/a> (BME). Other BU faculty collaborators include LaDora Thompson<\/a> (physical therapy), the Travis M. Roy Professor at the College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences: Sargent College, as well as Assistant Professor Joe Larkin<\/a> (biology), Assistant Professor Maria Kamenetska<\/a> (physics), and Associate Professor Zeba Wunderlich<\/a> (biology) from the College of Arts & Sciences.<\/p>\n

\u201cBU ENG\u2019s focus on convergence\u2014bringing people from many disciplines together to work on societal challenges\u2014makes us uniquely positioned to bring the field of biological control from an emerging area to a mature discipline,\u201d said Morgan, who is also the Maysarah K. Sukkar Professor of Engineering Design and Innovation, and director of the Center for Multiscale & Translational Mechanobiology<\/a>, where the project will be headquartered. \u201cWe look forward to educating tomorrow\u2019s leaders in this area and creating a training program that can be replicated at other universities too.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With an NSF grant, a BU program will train a diverse group of PhD students for tomorrow\u2019s workforce in biotech, synthetic biology, and other sectors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2662,"featured_media":145035,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[236,1084,899,1068,1051,907,1041,1060,909,908,1042,1050,1036,910],"tags":[350,922,1085,359,354,775,983,744,1086,894,672,338,246,248],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145028"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145028"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":145039,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145028\/revisions\/145039"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}