high performance - The Schulich School of Engineering - University ...

In the opinion of several leading biomedicalengineering researchers, the currentemphasis on high performance in the fieldcan be linked to some defining characteristicsthat set engineers apart from scientists andmedical practitioners.Janet Ronsky, a Schulich School ofEngineering professor of mechanical andmanufacturing engineering and CanadaResearch Chair in Biomedical Engineering,specifically contrasts the approach of medicaldoctors with that of engineers.Doctors are trained to look for patternsthat fit a diagnosis. “Their creativity isin detecting what you’ve got. After that,the solution is pretty well prescribed.For engineers, however, there are a wholebunch of possible solutions to any problem,”Ronsky says.A complementary view is expressed byMichael Buschmann, a professor in theÉcole Polytechnique’s department ofchemical engineering and Canada ResearchChair in Cartilage Tissue Engineering.Molly Shoichet is looking for ways tostimulate stem cells to begin repairs afterspinal column injuries or strokes.Photo by Darryl Augustine“Engineers love to use numbers. Theyfavour a quantitative approach,” he says.And while engineers embrace the scientificpoint of view known as a priori knowledgethey “typically want to solve problems,not just understand something.”U of T researcher Molly Shoichet, aprofessor in the department of chemicalengineering and applied chemistryand Canada Research Chair in TissueEngineering, notes that a decade agofew engineering students were eventaught biology.“Yet today we can think about not simplyimplanting a device for every specificfunction but about actually overcomingthe very disease itself through biomedicalengineering,” she says.In addition, a special kind of engineer isattracted to biomedical engineering, saysRonsky. “The field tends to capture peoplewhose imagination is turned on by theadditional layer of complexity when youadd a biological system to the standardengineering areas.”Ronsky’s long-term research provides anexample of just such complexity. Since1998 she’s been leading a project toimprove the diagnosis and treatment ofS-shaped curvature of the spine (scoliosis)in youth. The research has produceda 3-D reconstruction of the torsoderived primarily from two-dimensionalphotographs captured with four cameras.This technique lets doctors track theprogression of the affliction withoutrelying on twice-yearly heavy doses ofX-rays, with their heightened potential forharm during puberty.As well, Ronsky’s team has marriedgeomatics with the photographic techniqueso the technicians who fashion braces forspinal scoliosis can now work from a detailedmathematical model of an individual’storso on a computer monitor. Once theyhave designed a brace that best matchesthe 300,000 points defining that specifictorso, fabrication instructions are sent toa computer numerical controlled (CNC)milling machine which produces a full-scaleversion, exact in every detail.“We can now start applying some science towhat’s working in the design of the bracesand what’s not working,” says Ronsky.She estimates that the customized bracemakingis three to four years away fromcommercial application. That’s smack-dabin the middle of the two-to-seven year timeframe that is the mantra for the newestCanadian initiative in this burgeoningfield – a national biomedical engineeringinnovation centre announced in 2008 byU of C President Harvey Weingarten in hisannual Report to the Community.The Biovantage Alberta Ingenuity Centreat the University of Calgary will provide anational focus on moving the promisingproducts of biomedical engineeringto market – a priority of the federalS&T strategy – by bringing togethercommercialization experts with researchersfrom the university, government andprivate sectors. It will be “very much runlike a business,” says Ronsky, who is theinaugural director.A technological showpiece of the centreis a unique suite of test instruments forbiomaterials and tissue engineering thatare being custom built by the ElectroForceSystems Group of the Bose Corporation,better known to consumers for high-endaudio components. The instruments aredriven by a Bose-designed linear motorthat provides leading-edge fidelity.The centre at the Universityof Calgary will provide anational focus on movingthe promising productsof biomedical engineeringto market – a priority ofthe federal S&T strategy– by bringing togethercommercialization expertswith researchers from theuniversity, governmentand private sectors. It willbe “very much run like abusiness,” says Ronsky, whois the inaugural director.Ronsky says the test instruments willallow centre researchers to preciselymeasure how much deformation iscaused when any given force is appliedto everything from a stretch of skin rightup to ligaments attached to bones. Theinstruments can be run through repetitivecycles which would simulate the effectson ligaments of walking, for example.That’s not all that sets the new centreapart from more conventional researchfacilities, even those incorporating socalledbusiness “incubators.” While thecentre will not hire new faculty, it willfund “innovators in residence” who arepursuing projects with commercializationprospects within that two-to-seven yeartime frame. These could be people fromthe University of Calgary, other academicinstitutions, industry or “anywhere inthe world” says Ronsky.“There’s a world-wide shortage of peopletrained in biomedical engineering andwith entrepreneurial skills.”Moving the bright ideas of universityresearch to market has long been seen asa problem by policy-makers. In the early1970s, the Science Council of Canadadefined the issue in a landmark studyentitled “Innovation in a Cold Climate.”An innovation report earlier this year fromthe Council of Canadian Academies foundthat little had changed in three decades.Ronsky says there are three reasons thenew centre should make a difference.It will:• provide a venue and a capacity specificallydesigned to make commercializationhappen;• allow researchers to take part at their“comfort” level, from handing their ideaover to others for commercialization totaking it all the way to market themselves;• give industry a mechanism for partneringwith academic research and gaining accessto specific problem-solving expertise oreven clinical trials.With more than 100 researchers alreadyworking in biomedical engineeringresearch at Schulich and across thecampus, Biovantage already has its eyeon some projects that could even becalled “shovel-ready,” such as the imagingtechnology developed in Ronsky’s spinalscoliosis project.Also close to marketability, accordingto Schulich’s Carolyn Anglin, is acomputer-assisted system to help surgeonshorizontally slice the patella or kneecapmore accurately, an essential step in kneereplacement operations.Patellar cuts that are tilted rather thanflat are thought to be an important factorin the post-operative pain experiencedby as many as one in four knee surgerypatients. >>SCHULICH30 ENGINEERSCHULICH 31 ENGINEER