Biomedical engineering honors
Elliott research group wins travel and summer fellowship awards
1:28 p.m., April 20, 2016--Three members of Dawn Elliott’s research group in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Delaware recently won awards.
John DeLucca was selected as a Whitaker International Summer Fellow, Babak Safa was awarded an IBBM Summer Course Fellowship, and Amy Claeson received a travel award to attend an upcoming Gordon Research Conference.
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DeLucca, a doctoral student in biomedical engineering, will spend eight weeks doing research in Australia this summer with the support of the Whittaker Program, which provides funding for U.S. bioengineers and biomedical engineers to continue their ongoing graduate work abroad.
DeLucca’s research is aimed at identifying the mechanical consequences of intervertebral disc degeneration using finite element modeling, mechanical testing, and medical imaging techniques.
He will spend the summer using the state-of-the-art hexapod robot in the Biomechanics and Implants Laboratory at Flinders University, continuing a collaboration between Elliott and John Costi.
Safa, a doctoral student in mechanical engineering, will attend the Summer Course on Image-based Biomedical Modeling in Park City, Utah, from July 11-21. The course offers field-specific expertise and hands-on experience solving bioelectric or biomechanical problems that arise in current biomedical research and clinical practice.
His research focuses on establishing mechanisms of damage and failure in tendons using state-of-art mechanical testing, structural electron microscopy, and mathematical modeling.
Claeson, a postdoctoral fellow in biomedical engineering, will attend the Musculoskeletal Biology and Bioengineering Gordon Research Conference: Stepping Across Disciplines to Spur Innovation in Musculoskeletal Biology and Bioengineering in Andover, New Hampshire, from Aug. 7-12.
The aim of the program is to bring together thought leaders from across the field to discuss how their interdisciplinary approach has led to advances in musculoskeletal biology and bioengineering research.
Claeson’s work involves the use of noninvasive MRI and image registration techniques to quantify the changes in internal disc strain after partial nucleotomy, a surgical procedure to treat herniation.
“These awards are a testament to the outstanding research trainees that we have in engineering at UD,” says Elliott, who is professor and department chair. “The new knowledge my students will both gain and share will significantly advance our research and that of others.”
Article by Diane Kukich
Photo by Evan Krape