March 13, 2014

Biomedical engineering institute honors four faculty

Four Vanderbilt University faculty members have been elected to the College of Fellows of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE).

Four Vanderbilt University faculty members have been elected to the College of Fellows of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE).

Bruce Damon, Ph.D.

Among 120 “outstanding leaders, engineers, entrepreneurs and innovators in medical and biological engineering” nominated by their peers and elected to the class of 2014, they are:

• Bruce Damon, Ph.D., associate professor of Radiology and Radiological Sciences, of Molecular Physiology and Biophysics, and of Biomedical Engineering, and director of graduate studies of the Chemical and Physical Biology Program;

• Mark Does, Ph.D., professor and director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, professor of Electrical Engineering and of Radiology and Radiological Sciences, and director of the Center for Small Animal Imaging in the Vanderbilt University Institute of Imaging Science (VUIIS);

Mark Does, Ph.D.

• Michael Miga, Ph.D., professor of Biomedical Engineering, Neurological Surgery and Radiology and Radiological Sciences; and

• Thomas Yankeelov, Ph.D., Ingram Associate Professor of Cancer Research, associate professor of Radiology and Radiological Sciences, Biomedical Engineering, Cancer Biology, and Physics, director of Cancer Imaging Research for VUIIS and the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), and co-leader of the VICC Host-Tumor Interactions Research Program.

Michael Miga, Ph.D.

They join 13 other current and emeritus Vanderbilt faculty members in the college, which has more than 1,500 fellows. Thomas Harris, M.D., Ph.D., professor emeritus of Biomedical and Chemical Engineering and Medicine, was AIMBE president in 2005-2006.

“These elections were each very well deserved and speak to the strength of the biomedical engineering community at Vanderbilt,” said VUIIS director John Gore, Ph.D., Hertha Ramsey Crest Professor of Medicine, who was elected to the 1998 class of AIMBE fellows.

“I think it is unprecedented to have four faculty members simultaneously elected to AIMBE, and it is especially encouraging that all four are active in imaging but recognized for quite different areas of specialization,” Gore said.

Thomas Yankeelov, Ph.D.

“Election as an AIMBE fellow is a terrific achievement and each of our new Fellows has earned this honor through their professional accomplishments,” added Todd Giorgio, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering and a member of the 2007 class.

“Collectively, they reflect the growing national recognition of high impact biomedical engineering work conducted at the interface between Vanderbilt’s Schools of Engineering and Medicine,” Giorgio said.

The 2014 fellows will be inducted March 24 during the AIMBE annual meeting in Washington, D.C.