Attendees
Bill Craig, Frederich Cahn, Christophe H. Schilling, Mike Magers, Laurie Phillips, David Gough, Michael Whitt, Michelle Mazzoni, Geert Schmid-Schönbein, Luchy Roteliuk, Shu Chien, Paul Citron, Tatyana Matusov, Imani Tyus

Dr. Craig opened the meeting by introducing some of the new attendees. He welcomed Mike Magers, a new representative for Innercool therapies, Inc. to the board. Mr. Frederich Cahn, CEO of BioMedical Strategies, was invited to the meeting to get acquainted with the program and consider joining it. Paul Citron, Vice President of Corporate Science & Technology at the IAP longstanding member, Medtronic, Inc., came from Minnesota to attend the meeting. He was introduced to the members.

Approval of Minutes from 02/20/03 meeting
Approved as submitted.

Dr. Craig informed the members that Dr. Jeff Hasty who was scheduled to talk at the meeting was unable to come due to an illness. In his place, Dr. Shu Chien presented the new developments in bioengineering at the University of California.

New Developments in Bioengineering at the University of California System-wide
Dr. Chien spoke about the ways bioengineering programs were developing at the University of California (UC). The Whitaker Institute of Biomedical Engineering is an Organized Research Unit (ORU) at UCSD. While ORUs are units operating within a single campus to foster interdisciplinary programs, the Multicampus Research Unit (MRU) being proposed will be an inter-campus body that unites all UC campuses, including UC Merced that is being established as the 10th UC campus. The number of faculty in Biomedical Engineering in the UC campuses will triple by 2005 in comparison with the year of 2000. The same will happen with the number of graduate students. The number of undergraduate students will double.

Dr. Chien gave the members an overview of the bioengineering program development on different campuses. UCSD program was started the first in 1966 by Drs. Y.C. Fung, Benjamin Zweifach and Marcos Intaglietta. The Department of Bioengineering was established in 1994. UC Davis had their program started in 1970 with the department established in 2001. UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco started their joint program in 1983 and the department in 1998. Currently, UCSF is in the process of establishing a new department. UC Irvine launched their program in 1997 and the department in 2001. UC Santa Barbara started their program in 1997 and does not yet have a department of bioengineering. UC Santa Cruz established the Department of Biomolecular Engineering in 2002. UC Riverside and UC Merced are in the process of establishing their programs.

Many of the UC campuses have received strong support from Whitaker Foundation in forms of Leadership or Development Awards, as well as Special Opportunity Awards.

The proposed bioengineering MRU will be established for the following purposes:

• Inter-campus organization for research and training.
• Research collaborations through symposia and workshops and inter-campus exchange of faculty and students.
• Collaboration in extramural funding.
• Enhancement of training.
• Cooperation with industry.
• Outreach to the public.
• Advancement of biomedical engineering to enhance the health and well-being of humankind.

The status of the MRU is as follows:

• Participation of all campuses.
• Headquarters to be established at UCSD.
• Review is under way by UC Academic Senate and Office of the President.
• Interim approval of the formation of a Multicampus Research Program.
• Funding by UCOP, UCSD and all campuses.
• Whitaker Special Opportunity Award for joint development of Web-based Teaching.
• Annual holding of Systemwide Bioengineering Symposia.

Dr. Chien further spoke about the Whitaker Special Opportunity Award. The special aims for this award are the following:

1. To build a UC Systemwide Bioengineering Network for collaboration and communication in bioengineering education and training.
2. To combine the talents and capabilities of UC campuses for the cooperative education of bioengineering students, focusing on the development of course materials to supplement teaching and other collaborative distance education initiatives.
3. To contribute to a new paradigm for bioengineering education and training that is based on inter-institutional cooperation, and to expand this approach beyond the UC.

The award was given for one year with a provision that the MRU will present a report on its results. If the review is positive, funding for the next two years will be available. Some of the courses to be developed on-line are: Biomechanics, Biomaterials, Biosensors, Tissue Engineering, etc. Tissue Engineering will be the first course to be developed.

Dr. Chien spoke about the UC Systemwide Bioengineering Symposium that will be held on June 22 and 23, 2003. The motto of these symposia used to be "Nine Campuses United as One" but now that UC Merced is joining the symposium it will be changed to "ten campuses." The previous symposia were held at UC Davis (2000), UC Santa Barbara (2001), and UC Berkeley (2002). The symposium in 2004 will take place at UC Irvine.

This year's symposium is a two-day event. A preliminary program has been set up. The presentations of the first day include plenary lectures by Dr. Robert Full on "Bipedal Bugs, Galloping Ghost, and Gripping Geckos: BioInspired Robots, Adhesives and Artificial Muscles" and Dr. Roger Tsien on "Engineering Molecules to Spy on Cells". Dr. Chien will report on the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering where he is an ad hoc member of the Advisory Council, and the UC Multi-campus Research Unit.

The members were given a website address (http://ucbmes.ucsd.edu/) for the symposium and the contact information of Lore Meanley (lmeanley@bioeng.ucsd.edu) to register.

Dr. Geer Schmid-Schönbein stressed the importance of the industry presence at the symposium and the opportunities it gives the students to interact with its representatives. Industrial representatives will have a chance to meet with many students informally and formally. The department will accommodate the interview-type meetings if there is a need. Company representatives can also use this time to discuss internships with students participating in the program. Dr. Schmid-Schönbein encouraged the Board members to have their companies' posters and exhibits at the symposium. Some of the companies that expressed their interest in sponsoring the event are Edwards Lifesciences, Medtronic, and Aurora.

Dr. Bill Craig spoke about the great role UCSD Bioengineering plays in fostering the interaction with industry. He also praised the Industrial Affiliates Program for keeping this relationship between academia and industry on the high level. He also stressed the importance of having informal discussions and meetings of industry representatives with students, as this would give UCSD an opportunity to show potential graduate students how strong the relationship was. Dr. Craig informed the members that his company, ISTA Pharmaceuticals, was going to be a sponsor of the event and suggested that registration fee as one way to sponsor.

Dr. Chien said that any amount of support would be welcome and that the industry presence would be even more important because it would help to meet one of the goals of the symposium, i.e., to foster industry-academia interaction.

Mike Magers asked if a Human Resources person could represent a company at the symposium. Dr. Chien replied that they would be very welcome. Paul Citron wanted to know how company representatives would get information on where and when they could meet with students. Drs. Chien and Schmid-Schönbein suggested poster sessions, lunchtime, and breaks as the times for such interactions. The conference rooms in the Powell-Focht building are available for such meetings. Dr. Chien also suggested setting up a place to present poster boards for company representatives. Mr. Citron thought it was a good idea to announce the time and location of meeting sessions with industry people on the web. Other members supported the idea of having an announcement board near the scientific posters with the companies' information. Luchy Roteliuk thought the company representatives should be more active themselves and should choose the students they would like to talk to. Christophe Schilling also suggested that company representatives attend the presentations to be able to see the students that suit the company needs best. He also thought the poster session would be a good place to interact with the students, as a special "industry representatives room" might sound intimidating to students.

Mike Magers wanted to know what the students' awareness of the companies in the area was. Dr. Schmid-Schönbein thought the company announcement boards should have the names and description of the companies. The web site should also give such information.

Dr. Craig invited the members to attract other companies to attend and sponsor the event.

Students Internships Update
Imani Tyus reported to the members on the internship program development. She informed the members that many students were willing to participate in the program. Dr. Schmid-Schönbein spoke about the two different internship programs that the department had implemented. The Master of Engineering students write their report while doing their research at a company. They have a company's industrial mentor and a UCSD academic advisor. The other program is for undergraduate interns. Interns will sign the confidentiality agreement and their final reports will not be published. The intellectual property will belong to the company.

Mr. Citron wanted to know if only local companies were considered for the internships. He was assured that any company could participate. There were students traveling to other states for their internships during a spring break.

Dr. Chien informed the members that a team of four students from the Jacobs School of Engineering three of them from Bioengineering) would participate in the inaugural ABIOMED team internship project in Boston area this summer.

Update for the West Coast Regulatory Meeting
Dr. Bill Craig reported on the progress in organizing a West Coast Regulatory meeting. The dates of the meeting have not been defined yet, but will most probably be in March-April of 2004. The meeting should complement the one that took place on the East Coast, in Atlanta. Dr. Robert Nerem, who was one of the organizers of the East Coast meeting, will be helping with the West Coast meeting. Drs. Laurie Phillips and Stephen Flaim will be assisting Dr. Craig in organizing the meeting.

The members discussed the importance of choosing a topic for the meeting so that it does not duplicate the previous meetings. Paul Citron suggested a topic of coordination of approval and provisional compensation to allow patients access to innovative technology. Now it takes up to five years after the formal approval for the companies to get reimbursed for the innovations.

Laurie Phillips suggested the integration of new technology with gene expression and diagnostics as a topic for the meeting.

Paul Citron told the members about the work of Medical Technology Leadership Forum (MTLF), a not-for-profit educational corporation designed to give new meaning and a public purpose to the future of medical technology. Begun in late 1996 by Senator Duhrenberg, MTLF has a Board made of academia and industry representatives. The Board identifies a topic to address and invites a faculty member to discuss the chosen topic. It allows many people to share their expertise, opinion, and knowledge and get feedback on their research. Mr. Citron called these events "intellectuals coming together."

Dr. Craig will meet with the MTLF representatives in July. After that meeting the process of the West Coast Regulatory Meeting organization will go faster.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:00 am.

Respectfully submitted: Tatyana Matusov