Seminars

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT
ME/IE 8773-8774
MAIN DEPARTMENT SERIES
4th ME FOUNDERS’ LECTURE


We extend an invitation to join us as we celebrate our 4th Annual ME Day.
This year’s focus is the field of bioengineering. We will be highlighting the research activities
of Perry L. Blackshear. We hope you will be able to participate on this special day.

Biomedical Engineering: The Challenge of Success

by

Kenneth H. Keller
Charles M. Denny, Jr. Professor of Science, Technology, and Public Policy
Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455

Wednesday, April 20, 2005
4:00-5:00 p.m.
Room 2-690 Moos T
515 Delaware Street S.E.

Abstract: Over the past 40 years we have witnessed the birth and development of a new field—biomedical engineering. Its history has much to teach us about the maturation of a new discipline: the transition from multidisciplinary to interdisciplinary approaches; the significant influences the new field has on the disciplines that gave rise to it; and the excitement and institutional complexity introduced when the several areas of fundamental science are advancing simultaneously with their interactions and applications. And beyond all of this, when the field involves human health, how the very successes that magnify its impact, challenge scientists and engineers to confront the social consequences and social choices to which their inventiveness gives rise.
This talk presents a brief history of the field to illustrate these points, but focuses primarily on its current state and its contrasts with that earlier history: the forefronts of the field today, the confluence of devices, drugs, and biologics, and the scientific and institutional challenges that result. In a sense, it is a systems approach to the discipline: the recognition of the interconnectedness of the science, the engineering, the applications, and the social, political, and cultural factors through which each part of the discipline affects all the others.

Bio: Dr. Kenneth H. Keller is Charles M. Denny, Jr. Professor of Science, Technology and Public Policy at the University of Minnesota and also Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science. Educated at Columbia and Johns Hopkins, he spent most of his career at Minnesota where he joined the faculty of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science in 1964, became Vice President for Academic Affairs in 1980 and President of the University in 1985. From 1990 to 1996, he was Senior Fellow for Science and Technology at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York and, for two of those years, Senior Vice President for Programs. He presently chairs the Medical Technology Leadership Forum and the National Research Council’s Board for the Technical Assessment of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. He is also a member of the NRC’s Board on Life Sciences.

His scientific research over some 20 years focused on fluid mechanics and mass transfer in biological systems, with particular emphasis on blood flow phenomena. For that work, he received the American Institute of Chemical Engineers' Food, Pharmaceutical and Bioengineering Division Award. Currently, his research interests include the impact of science and technology on international politics and economics, the policy issues raised by high technology medicine, and the role of American institutions of higher education in research and development.
In 1987, Dr. Keller was named Twin Citian of the Year and, in 1996, he received a Distinguished Alumnus Award from Johns Hopkins University. He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. He has also been named a National Associate of the National Academies for his contributions to the public policy work of the Academies.

5:30 PM RECEPTION, Lounge Corridor of the Campus Club
4th Floor Coffman Memorial Union, 300 Washington Ave SE