IGERT: Training Innovative Leaders in Biofabrication

这个综合研究生教育和研究培训（IGERT）奖在WPI为生物工程，特别是生物制造领域的博士生建立了一个独特的培训计划。该项目将培养学生的创业思维，为毕业生提供必要的技能，为创新经济做出贡献，同时也解决重要的医疗需求。智力优势：该培训计划的目标是培养将成为学术界和工业界未来创新者的工程师，导致生物工程和生物制造技术的翻译和商业化。今天好吗?美国的医疗器械有一个缺点，那就是它们的材料与人体格格不入，容易产生排斥反应。不断发展的生物制造领域使用生物物质作为基本构建块来组装用于治疗和筛选的先进生物组织。学员将参与有指导的实验室研究、本学科的正式课程以及国际研究合作。此外，学员将通过整合的创业培训模块培养创业思维，并在WPI？生命科学和生物工程中心是一个多功能的研究/工业设施。最后，实际操作的工业培训将使IGERT受训者了解消费者的需要和使用。更广泛的影响：该计划将有助于维持美国？通过培养博士生成为未来生物制造领域的领导者，推动美国创新经济的发展。WPI是真的吗？美国的教育培训理念，？Lehr and Kunst？（理论与实践），拟议的研究目标集中在开发商业上可行的使能技术的实际方法上，以满足生物制造中关键的未满足需求。将与意大利米兰理工大学和中国清华大学合作，提供国际研究经验。预计IGERT经验的成果也将延伸到项目之外，并可能随着新公司的成立、就业机会的创造、专利申请和产品进入临床试验而得到衡量。IGERT是一项nsf范围内的计划，旨在满足教育美国博士科学家和工程师的挑战，他们具有跨学科背景，所选学科的深厚知识，以及未来职业需求所需的技术，专业和个人技能。该项目旨在建立研究生教育和培训的新模式，在一个超越传统学科界限的合作研究的肥沃环境中，让学生了解研究转化为社会效益创新的过程。

This Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) award establishes a unique training program at WPI for Ph.D. students in the field of bioengineering, and specifically biofabrication. The program will train students in the entrepreneurial mindset, providing graduates with skills necessary to contribute to the innovation economy while also addressing important medical needs.Intellectual Merit: The goal of this training program is to produce engineers who will be future innovators in academia and industry, leading to the translation and commercialization of bioengineering and biofabrication technologies. Today?s medical devices suffer from the drawback that their materials are foreign to the human body and prone to rejection. The growing field of biofabrication uses biological matter as the basic building blocks to assemble advanced biological tissues for treatments and screenings. Trainees will participate in mentored lab research, formal coursework in their discipline, and international research collaborations. In addition, trainees will develop an entrepreneurial mindset through integrated entrepreneurship training modules, and an immersive innovation culture at WPI?s Life Science and Bioengineering Center, a mixed-use research/industrial facility. Finally, hands-on industry training will expose the IGERT trainees to the needs and use of consumers.Broader Impacts: This program will help sustain America?s innovation economy by training Ph.D. students to be future leaders in biofabrication. True to WPI?s educational and training philosophy, ?Lehr und Kunst? (Theory and Practice), the proposed research aims are focused on practical approaches to developing commercially viable enabling technologies to fulfill critical unmet needs in biofabrication. International research experiences will be provided in collaboration with Politecnico di Milano in Italy and Tsinghua University in China. Outcomes of the IGERT experience are also anticipated to extend beyond the program and may be measured as new companies launched, jobs created, patents filed, and products reaching clinical trials.IGERT is an NSF-wide program intended to meet the challenges of educating U.S. Ph.D. scientists and engineers with the interdisciplinary background, deep knowledge in a chosen discipline, and the technical, professional, and personal skills needed for the career demands of the future. The program is intended to establish new models for graduate education and training in a fertile environment for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries, and to engage students in understanding the processes by which research is translated to innovations for societal benefit.