Introduction to Biomedical Engineering
- Book Review,
by Michael M. Domach
From Book News, Inc.
A semester-course textbook for freshman or sophomore students of engineering that explores the nature of biomedical engineering and samples some of its topics and techniques.Copyright © 2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Book Description
This book presents readers with a study of the best engineering designs and exposes them to bioengineering practice from a variety of perspectives. Its aim is to explain basic engineering ideas and modes of analysis, synthesis, and design. Examining the living system from the molecular to the the human scale, this book covers such key issues as optimization, scaling, and design; and introduces these concepts in a sequential, layered manner. Analysis strategies, science, and technology are illustrated in each chapter. An excellent reference work for biomedical engineers.
From the Back Cover
This text has three aims: Explain the range of bioengineering activity in order to orient starting engineering students. Provide a sense of how engineering differs from science. Present some achievable depth on some salient science and engineering facets that drive a cross section of bioengineering practice. Emphasis is placed on biomedical engineering, while also providing some material that is relevant to bioresource engineering and biochemical engineering. The level of the discussion and homework problems are geared to freshmen college students who possess backgrounds in basic chemistry and physics. Chapters are provided that cover some highlights of modern biology and physiology to even out the life science backgrounds of the students. A chapter that explains how quantitative analysis is performed is often preceded by a chapter that provides a pictorial description of important phenomena. The mathematical level is primarily algebraic, but repeated use of some calculus techniques (e.g., optimization, separation of variables) in different problem contexts is done to challenge students with advanced placement and to motivate others on the relevance of their concurrent coursework in mathematics. The first half of the book covers molecular- and cell-level phenomena, and applications featuring Enzyme-based diagnostic technology Metabolic engineering Tissue Engineering The second half of the text covers human-scale bioengineering featuring biomechanical, biomaterial, and electrical sensing applications such as Human locomotion analysis and pace optimization Branching in the circulatory system and pressure management Magnetic resonance and signal processing basics
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Motivation and Intent Bioengineering enrollments have recently soared. Indeed, 96 freshmen enrolled in the Spring 2003 course entitled "Introduction to Biomedical Engineering" at Carnegie Mellon. This course was the first required offering in a new double major at Carnegie Mellon, and intended to be deep enough to be on par with other first courses in traditional engineering majors. Many excellent books exist on bioengineering topics. However, many require more advanced mathematical or biological expertise than freshmen or even sophomores possess. This book was written for freshman and sophomore engineers, and with curious colleagues in mind who desire to see the field's breadth and some depth. It is intended to provide a cross section of material. Design of the Text I tried to work backwards from the length of a semester and consider how students with a lot of demands on their time deal with information. Consequently, many good things were left out in order to produce 15 concise topics. The biomolecular, mechanical, materials, and electrical examples have proven to engage the students. One major surprise was that although the magnetic resonance material is quite challenging in that many layered concepts and phenomena have to be bundled to see how NMR/MRI works, the students responded best to this topic in all three semesters I have taught this course. The book was also designed to be honest with students. If you want to really do bioengineering, it is a good idea to at least appreciate the "bio" part. Put another way, not all bioengineers will be gene cloners, but there is some aspect of cell biology or physiology that we all get to know well enough so that we may effectively communicate with our stakeholders and collaborators. ABET and other specialists have advised that we elevate the social and political con9ciousness of our engineering graduates. Therefore, in some sections historical snippets are provided. The intent was not to waste space and placate those giving that advice. Rather, the history of bioengineering has much to be proud of and it is important to let our students know that their future work can also make a difference. Therefore, items such as Space Race Antibiotics (Chapter 0) and the long history of sugar (Chapter 7) appear in the text. The text also attempts to rationalize their future study in an effort to support the curriculum of your program and to build their overall view earlier in their education. Lastly, bioengineers are engineers, and all engineers share some problem-solving concerns and motifs such as contending with trade-offs, optimization, and scaling. Because the course this text supports is supposed to be "engineering" vs. "a survey of what bioengineers do for a living," I attempted to illustrate common facets of engineering analysis through biological and medical examples. The level of analysis was placed somewhere between superficial and so hard for a freshmari that the problem was forgotten in the midst of trying to deal with the math. Many homework problems are experiential in tone (pace optimization in hiking, drug candidate evaluation, bio space flight mission design, etc.) in an effort to make them interesting. I will leave it to you to determine why alcohol ingestion and metabolism was used as the pharmacokinetics example. Textbook versus Web In addition to the written text and solution manual, some web-based materials were developed for those who find the web a useful tool. First, a large collection of hyperlinks to sites that profile Nobel prize recipients and other potentially interesting sources of supplementary information have been assembled. Second, some basic animations and simulators are included that can be used in lectures or run by the students when they study. Third, slides that follow the book's chapters and a file with all the graphics used are available to the instructor, Currently, Prentice Hall will mount these materials on a web site and provide "keyed" access so the instructor can download them independently for customization efforts or instead, send students directly to the resources. What Students Need to Know My first polls on the prior experience of freshmen revealed that 60-80% claimed that they were exposed to enough biology beforehand to know what a gene and enzyme are. This year the number was 92%. Despite the positive upward trend, quite a few students still originate from high schools that quit after the tadpole-tofrog story. Thus, Chapter 1 is meant to be a refresher or equalizer. Beyond that, the text and problems encourage the students to apply the physics and math knowledge that they acquired or are concurrently learning. The majority of the problems (e.g., ligand binding analysis) are algebraic in nature. The calculus content is limited, and to provide for reinforcement, the particulars are "recycled" a number of times. Overall, a derivative is determined a few times, and the integration of dx, dxlx, and dxl(a + bx) is performed within the context of "separation of variables" to solve some problems. Integration factors are introduced only once to challenge the more advanced students in the class. Most students indicated that they were pleased to apply some of the math they have labored to learn. One Recipe for Running a Course While many good things were left out, there still probably is more material than can be covered in one course, which hopefully will provide flexibility. Assuming an enrollment that is equally partitioned between students interested in chemical, mechanical, materials, and electrical facets, I have presented four units that address the range of potential interests. Also, I assume there are some things that all bioengineers should know about each other in addition to the basics of modern biology. I cover Chapters 0 and 1 in two lectures to equalize the biology. Part I covers Chapters 1-4 (Parts vs. Systems View of Biosystems). Chapters 5 and 6 followed by selected examples from Chapters 7 and 8 comprise Unit 2 (Molecular & Cellular Technology & Basic Informatics). Unit 3 (Mechanics & Materials) covers biomechanics (Chap 10) and portions of Chapters 11 and 12 to show the union of biomechanics and biomaterials by highlighting shear stress, clotting, and an overviews of surface treatment strategies, Unit 4 exposes the students to signal processing and in the process gives them a feel for how MRI works. Other instructors will have other circumstances so it is hoped that some chapters will fill in the backgrounds of diverse students or serve as a platform for providing additional depth based on the instructor s expertise and interests. The resources provided on the website may enable some deeper excursions on particular topics. For example, links are provided to workshop reports and three-dimensional displays of protein structures. MICHAEL M. DOMACH Carnegie Mellon University
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