Grant to develop biological engineering capabilities at USC
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As part of its share of a $9 million National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to South Carolina’s EPSCoR program, USC plans to recruit several new faculty members with expertise in biological engineering.
The award is received through a federal-state-university partnership in South Carolina referred to as the Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, or EPSCoR.
USC’s $3 million share of the three-year grant will help cover salary and laboratory start-up costs for the new faculty members, said Michael Amiridis, chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering and of a campus-wide committee on biomedical engineering.
“There has been a strong push from the National Academy of Engineering to incorporate biology into engineering,” Amiridis said. “Many of our peer institutions have strong biological components in engineering, and biology is joining chemistry and physics as core requirements in the sciences for chemical and mechanical engineering majors.”
USC plans to recruit a senior faculty member in biological engineering who would join the University by next summer. “After that, we hope to hire several junior faculty members with expertise in similar areas,” Amiridis said.
In addition, a cluster of six faculty members could be recruited for the program through the University’s Faculty Excellence Initiative. While the majority of them will be in the College of Engineering and Computing, appointments are also expected in the School of Medicine and in the College of Arts and Sciences.
In a related initiative, the College of Engineering and Computing plans to offer undergraduate and graduate degree programs in biomedical engineering; the new degrees would be jointly administered by the chemical engineering and mechanical engineering departments.
USC will submit its final application this fall to the state Commission on Higher Education (CHE) for approval of the degree programs, which would include a 128-credit bachelor’s degree. The School of Medicine and the College of Arts and Sciences will also participate in course instruction. If formal approval is received from the CHE, it is anticipated that the first students could be enrolled for fall 2006.
As part of the NSF/EPSCoR grant, USC will focus on measuring, modeling, and controlling biochemical, biomechanical, and cellular phenomena to develop specialized cells and tissues, with special emphasis on cardiovascular tissue.
The project will complement other ongoing initiatives at USC, including establishment of a state-funded Center of Excellence in regenerative medicine and creation of a strong interdisciplinary research component between the College of Engineering and the School of Medicine. Biomedical sciences and engineering represent key priority areas for USC’s research enterprise and are among the cornerstones of the future research campus.
The full NSF/EPSCoR grant also will fund programs at Clemson University, the Medical University of South Carolina, Claflin University, and S.C. State University. The award will be matched with $4.5 million in non-federal funding, for a total of $13.5 million. The state Legislature plans to provide some of the matching funds.
Chris Horn, USC Times
