Biomedical Engineer
A Definition

Edward T. Woodruff has experience in Biomedical devices.  This information sheet is for your interest and edification.  Please see Home and Accomplishments to learn more about our performance results and contributions.  

The Grace Research Division was developing technology in the Biomedical Engineer arena in the 1990's.  This brought Edward T. Woodruff into the sphere of the Biomedical Engineer.  The projects that we worked on included the artificial pancreas, the LDL device and the LAD device.  These products used hollow fiber membranes to separate the human's blood flow from the (biologically) active components on the shell side of the membrane.  The artificial pancreas idea was to be an implantable that would generate insulin for diabetics.  The LDL device would be outside the body and used to remove Cholesterol from the blood stream.  The LAD device was explored to assist cancer patients whose liver function was in bad shape.

The biomedical engineer applies engineering principles and procedures for design to problems of a medical nature in humans. The biomedical engineer covers the disciplines of biochemical engineer, biomechanical engineer and bioelectrical engineer. All of these disciplines make up the field of the biomedical engineer.

The field of the biomedical engineer is an important item of the time in which we now live. There are many diseases and maladies humans find themselves in which the biomedical engineer may well help solve their problems. For the discipline of biochemical engineering as applied to the biomedical engineer there is the area of implants. For the biomedical engineer these include the development of woven acrylic artificial arteries to prevent blood clotting too rapidly in arterial blood vessels. The biomedical engineer also saw the development of silicone capsules to protect cardiac pacemakers and to allow their integration into the human tissue. The biomedical engineer produced the artificial kidney for patients beyond recovery otherwise.

The biomedical engineer has seen other advances in technology for human health and safety. Developments achieved in the field covered by the biomedical engineer where he is a bioelectrical engineer include the pacemaker, the defibrillator, and the electrocardiograph. Other developments for the biomedical engineer are from the biomechanical engineer .which consist of the iron lung, artificial implants, artificial limbs, and artificial hearts.

All of this is achieved under the term biomedical engineer.

See also biomedical engineering and biomedical process design.

Also see Accomplishments.