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MIT Certifies Biological Engineering Major
chrisd writes "In same week that Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney reitereates his opposition to stem cell research, MIT has certified its first new major in 29 years, Biological Engineering. The boston globe has a solid writeup about the biotech major."
Romney said last week he favors allowing research on existing embryonic stem cells taken from embryos that would otherwise be discarded by fertility clinics , but he would seek to outlaw the creation of embryos specifically for research.
''Lofty goals do not justify the creation of life for experimentation and destruction," Romney wrote in a letter to Senate President Robert E. Travaglini.
It says (right in the headline!) that BME is a minor, and BE might become a major.
I'd like to mention at this point that the "ban on stem-cell research" that so many people get worked up about, doesn't exist. There is nothing saying "don't do that" (it's being done). There is nothing saying "don't start any new embryonic stem cell lines for research" (anyone who wants to, can). There is nothing saying "The federal government (US) won't pay for embrionic stem cell research" (they do). What the US government won't pay for is for any additional embrionic stem cell lines to be created for research.
While it's all well and good to disagree with various politicians on a topic or two, people are pretending there's an outright ban on something, when it's really a "we won't pay you to do (thing) in (mode) with (condition)" situation.
Sorry but Biomedical Engineering is different from what they are proposing. Biomedical Engineering deals mostly with biomedical instrumentation, which for the most part is like traditional engineering except it deals with tools used on living organisms.
While the Globe's writeup may be "solid", it implies that a new major ("course") was created 29 years ago, and that's misleading. Yeah, like anybody here cares. But "Linguistics and Philosophy" was just a merger of the pre-existing "Linguistics" and "Philosophy" departments, each with their own major ("course"). Philosophy was 24, I don't remember what Linguistics was. The last completely new major was, I think, well before then.
It's a collaboration between Vanderbilt, Northwestern, Texas, and Harvard/MIT, using a $10mill NIH grant, to establish a curriculum for Biomedical/Biological Engineering. Vanderbilt is leading the group, mostly because of the fine Peabody School of Education that is part of the university, and I interned over one summer with the group ('02 graduate with a BE in BME). vanth.org]
MIT is obviously one of the biggest engineering schools in North America, but it should be noted that my school has had a Biological Engineering Program for quite some time.
Don't get me wrong, good on MIT for adding this new major, but it should be noted that others have already done so.
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one " -Albert Einstein
WASHINGTON -- Senator Edward M. Kennedy yesterday blasted Governor Mitt Romney's proposal to ban the cloning of embryos for stem cell research, saying the governor's approach would rob Massachusetts of the benefits of one of the most promising areas of scientific research.
Romney, meanwhile, indicated he is open to new research as a compromise on the thorny ethical issue. On Friday, he is scheduled to be briefed on a method of generating embryonic stem cells without creating embryos.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Most people that I know of who are familiar with the process of IVF and stem cell research and consider a zygote to be a human being (A fairly narrow group, but one you seem to be asking about.) do regard IVF as unethical as stem cell research. The short version is that any time you're creating a human being with the knowledge that it will be destroyed, you're on shaky ethical ground. Whether that's the embryos lost in implantation, freezing, thawing, stem cell research, contraimplantational devices, or what have you, it's ethically the same.
/. in that direction, and I sincerely hope that scientists manage to accomplish that goal. Stem cell research is a technology with incredible potential, but it must be pursued in line with ethical guidelines.
This is the heart of the stem cell debate for most people that I know. If an ethical method of harvesting stem cells that doesn't involve creating embryos to kill them can be found, then I'm all for it! There have been several promising stories on
RTFA, please. MIT is already a leader in what you call "bioengineering," particularly in interdisciplinary fields integrating biology and engineering. In addition, MIT already has a joint program with Harvard medical school (the Health Sciences and Technology program). The new "biological engineering" field is different in that the tradition view of BE/BME is "engineering applications of biology." MIT wants to rethink this view. From TFA:
However, each established engineering discipline is naturally limited to addressing a certain range of problems within biology that fall within the scope of tools and approaches of that discipline. The fusion of engineering with modern biology, then, requires development of a new discipline of engineering, "Biological Engineering," which brings to bear on biology the appropriate tools and perspectives from chemical, civil, computer, electrical, materials, mechanical, and nuclear engineering in an integrated way. Biological Engineering is not envisioned as replacing the individual efforts, but rather enhancing them by pushing new frontiers.
Biosystems Engineering Majors are incredibly common. Almost all land grant universities have had them for over 10 years. When biotech started getting popular, all the land grant universities changed their agriculture engineering departments to biological engineering departments. They changed the courses to reflect more environmental and biological topics. The professional society for biological engineering is ASAE(American Society of Agricultural Engineers). Biological engineering is well defined and is considered engineering systems that relate to the creation of food products, handling of plants and animals, and processing of these biological materials. This is different than biomedical engineering which is directed just at the human body and generally involves creating replacement parts(heart valves). It doesn't look like MIT's major will be following the standard biological engineering program, so they should probably call it something else to avoid confusion (maybe celluar engineering). A few of the schools with well-established biological or biosystems engineering degrees: Kansas State University (Biological & Agricultural Engineering) Texas A&M University (Biological & Agricultural Engineering) Iowa State University (Agricultural & Biosystems Engineering) Nebraska University (Biological Systems and Agricultural Engineering) Oklahoma State University (Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering) I am a student in the BAE department at Oklahoma State University. Just to let everyone know that biological engineering has been around for a long time.