ENGINEERING BETTER SOLUTIONS BIOENGINEERING TAKES AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH Written by LINLEY ERIN HALL ’01 THE CHILD WITH A BRAIN INJURY, THE GRANDMOTHER WITH
FAILING EYESIGHT, THE ACTOR DESIRING RHINOPLASTY—all of these people may one day benefi t from research conducted by HMC students who work in the lab of Elizabeth Orwin ’95, associate professor of engineering. Orwin is an alumna and engineering major who went on to
earn a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, in biomedical engineering. She’s now sharing her extensive background in biomaterials, tissue engineering and wound healing through the Robert and Mary Jane Engman Fellow- ship Program, which enables students to explore cutting-edge bioengineering research. Students in Orwin’s lab include fi rst years without discipline-specifi c knowledge and those with majors outside engineering and biology. “They do pick up a lot of what they need for my research
in their various courses, but what they don’t know, we learn as we go,” Orwin says. “It teaches them the process you have to go through as a graduate student. These are not cookie- cutter projects with one answer.” One of her four research projects focuses on a tissue- engineered brain patch that facilitates healing. When a
“I PUT TOGETHER INTERDISCIPLINARY TEAMS THAT HAVE OWNERSHIP OF THE PROJECT, MENTORING AND EXPOSURE TO CUTTING-EDGE TECHNOLOGY. THIS IS NOT JUST A SUMMER RESEARCH PROJECT.” - ELIZABETH ORWIN ’95
22 Har vey Mudd College SPRING 2013
brain injury occurs, the body’s immune system causes additional damage because it generates infl ammation as it attempts to make repairs. “We’re trying to create a brain patch that will infl uence the wound-healing environment while creating a space for the neurons to regrow,” Orwin says. The brain patch research takes an approach similar to that
of a long-running project to recreate a damaged cornea. The cornea is the transparent layer at the front of the eye. Students are growing corneal cells in an artifi cial matrix and then investigating what signals they should give to the cells so that they behave as they would in a natural cornea. They examine whether the corneal cells produce the correct proteins, are transparent and have the appropriate strength. Students have brought a wide variety of perspectives to
the artifi cial cornea project. Kacyn Fujii ’13 is interested in applying electrical engineering to biological problems and so decided to focus on improving the electrospinning process that is used to create a material that resembles the natural cornea. Demetri Monovoukas ’15 has been designing and testing a bioreactor to culture cornea cells under variable strain and light conditions. As Orwin explains, “I put together interdisciplinary
teams that have ownership of the project, mentoring and exposure to cutting-edge technology. This is not just a summer research project.” The students also attend conferences, make presentations
and write papers about their work. Fujii, who will study electrical engineering at Stanford University on a National Sci- ence Foundation Graduate Fellowship, presented her work at the 2012 Biomedical Engineering Society meeting. Monovoukas presented a hand-held wound measurement device at the Massachusetts Medical Device Development New Venture Competition to 300 scientists, doctors, entrepre- neurs and investors. “I was by far the youngest person at the event and gained a lot of confi dence and maturity from the experience,” says Monovoukas, who developed the device as
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