Biomedical Engineering

1. Biomedical Engineering Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering Kate Gleason College of Engineering Rochester Institute of Technology http://www.rit.edu/kgcoe/biomedical Daniel Phillips, Ph.D., Program Director dbpeee@rit.edu

2. Outline What is biomedical engineering? Applications and challenges Employment prospects and data Questions? Demonstrations

3. What is Engineering? Scientists explore to gain understanding - Engineers develop creative solutions to problems based on that understanding. • Engineering focuses on the development of new products and processes to enhance the world around us, • leveraging in creative and innovative ways the vast knowledge base embraced by the physical and life sciences (biology, chemistry, and physics), • enhanced by the quantitative power of mathematics.

4. What is Biomedical Engineering? The branch of engineering that uniquely leverages the vast knowledge base embraced by biology to solve problems focused on healthcare & the human body. Biomedical Engineers understand the inner workings of the human body, including its organs, circulatory system, nerves, muscles, and bones, as well as the unique constraints placed on design. are experts at assessing the human body as a complex, interactivesystem. provide teams a link between human biology & engineering analysis. work in teams of experts across multiple disciplines to create medical and health-related products

5. Biomedical Engineers work in teams to develop devices that solve medical and health-related problems Artificial organs and tissues Prostheses Implants develop probes and sensing equipment specific to the human physiology develop procedures to implement devices and new technologies in and on the human body interpret and run clinical trials on new devices and procedures What is Biomedical Engineering?

6. Core Competencies: Human anatomy, biology, physiology Statistics Problem solving capability Systems engineering What is Biomedical Engineering? • All core sciences, integrated with mathematics and infused with engineering training, are used to address a wide variety of challenges • related to the healthcare and the human body!

7. Kidney Blood & Waste Blood Waste Systems Engineering Approach Example: The Kidney Function of kidney is to remove soluble waste from body. Engineers analyze the kidney’s functions subject to given inputs, and develop models that can predict outputs. Engineers develop devices that replicate kidney functions.

8. Systems Engineering Approach The kidney does not operate in isolation; it interacts with other systems in the body! Heart Blood & Waste Blood & Waste Waste from cellular processes Need to analyze kidney and interactions! Waste from cellular processes Kidney Blood Blood & Waste Waste

9. US Dept of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics Biomedical Engineering Occupational Employment Statistics Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2010 http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes172031.htm

10. Biomedical engineers • Employment by: • industry, occupation, and percent distribution, • (2008 and projected 2018) • * (Employment in thousands) • **Industries with fewer than 50 jobs, confidential data, or poor quality data are not displayed • Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2010-11 Edition • ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/special.requests/ep/ind-occ.matrix/occ_pdf/occ_17-2031.pdf

11. Questions?

12. A “simple” challenge – • Measure oxygen actually delivered to tissue • Take tissue sample and measure oxygen content (pretty invasive, messy) • Take blood perfusing tissue and measure oxygen content (somewhat removed, still sort of messy)

13. A “simple” challenge – • Measure oxygen actually delivered to tissue • NONINVASIVELY (no bloodshed) • Pulse oximetry provides an indirect method to assess two parameters simultaneously • Percentage of oxygenated hemoglobin • Mechanical pumping action of heart

14. The science: Oxygen carried mainly via oxygenated hemoglobin Deoxygenated hemoglobin absorbs light differently than oxygenated hemoglobin

15. Engineering solution – amount of oxygen delivered Measure absorbance at two different wavelengths to determine percentage of oxygenated hemoglobin If you know amount of hemoglobin per unit volume of blood, you can assess amount of oxygen available to be delivered to tissue (basic goal) SpO2 – percentage saturation of hemoglobin with oxygen

16. Engineering solution – measuring pumping action of heart • Heart pumping produce pulsatile pressure in arterial vasculature • Pressure pulses produces local volume changes • Volume changes change overall absorbance of light • Measuring absorbance changes provides indication of pressure changes which can be traced back to heart pumping • Photo-plethysmography

17. Pulse oximeter – a multidisciplinary effort Biomedical – basic design of the instrumentation based on understanding of cardiovascular physiology, cell and molecular biology Electrical – light drive and sensing circuitry Mechanical – finger clip mechanism Computer – signal processing Chemical – Organic Light Emitting Diode display Optical – light source and detection

18. Demonstration • Finger pulse oximeter • Meaures pulse rate and SpO2 • Which would you expect to change more rapidly? • Which would you expect to vary the most – person to person? • Simple breath hold and release • - What happens to Pulse Rate? • - What happens to SpO2?