REU Site: Multi-Scale Systems Bioengineering and Biomedical Data Sciences

从2019年到2024年，生物医学工程师的就业人数预计将增长23%，这对那些能够支持医疗保健中使用的新设备、系统和软件的设计、开发和生产的人产生了迫切的需求。生物医学科学和医学的进步将越来越依赖于严格的定量工程方法的应用，以表征和询问生物系统，以及数据科学工具，用于挖掘和分析诊断和治疗疾病所需的大量临床和生物数据。为了满足系统生物工程和生物医学数据科学领域日益增长的劳动力需求，弗吉尼亚大学多尺度系统生物工程和生物医学数据科学REU站点每年夏天将招募和培训10名本科生，从事最先进的系统生物工程和生物医学数据科学研究。虽然REU网站向全国范围内STEM领域的优秀学生开放，但它将专门针对在该领域研究机会有限的机构中主修STEM领域的有才华的本科生，重点招收来自代表性不足群体的学生。研究经验和指导将帮助这些REU学生准备在这个快速发展和开拓领域的工作，否则他们将无法在他们的家庭机构。在完成项目后，教师导师将与参与者保持持续的关系，帮助提高学生留在STEM的可能性。REU的总体目标是培养来自不同STEM背景的年轻工程师和科学家，并为他们提供在令人兴奋和不断增长的系统生物工程和生物医学数据科学领域成功职业所需的技能，信心和指导。学生将与教师导师一起进行为期10周的暑期研究项目，最后是一个抽象的公开研讨会，大多数学生也有机会在全国会议上发言。学生将参与协作、动手和密切指导的项目，这些项目将使他们沉浸在实验、计算和数据科学的结合中。学生将获得实践技能、知识、道德基础和沟通技巧，这些都是在高级研究生学习中取得成效和在现代生物技术行业成功就业所必需的。该项目还将为学生提供职业建议、研究伦理基础、科学交流培训，并在项目完成后提供持续的指导。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The employment of biomedical engineers is projected to grow 23% over the period from 2019-2024, creating a critical need for those who can support the design, development and production of new devices, systems, and software used in healthcare. Advances in the biomedical sciences and medicine will increasingly depend upon the application of rigorous and quantitative engineering-based approaches to characterize and interrogate biological systems, as well as tools of data science for mining and analyzing the massive amounts of clinical and biological data needed to diagnose and treat disease going forward. To meet the growing need for workforce pipeline development specifically in the areas of systems bioengineering and biomedical data sciences, the REU Site in Multi-Scale Systems Bioengineering and Biomedical Data Sciences at the University of Virginia will recruit and train ten undergraduate participants per summer in state-of-the-art systems bioengineering and biomedical data sciences research. While open to a broad national pool of top students in STEM, the REU Site will specifically target talented undergraduates majoring in STEM fields at institutions with limited research opportunities in the field, with an emphasis on recruiting students from underrepresented groups. The research experience and mentorship will help prepare these REU students for work in this fast-growing and pioneering field that would otherwise be unavailable to them at their home institutions. Faculty mentors will maintain continuing relationships with the participants after completing the program, helping to improve the likelihood that the students will remain in STEM.The overarching goal of the REU is to train a diverse corps of young engineers and scientists from a variety of STEM backgrounds and provide them with the skills, confidence, and mentorship necessary for successful careers in the exciting—and growing—area of systems bioengineering and biomedical data sciences. Students will be matched with faculty mentors for a 10-week summer research project, culminating in an abstract and public symposium, and with most students also having the opportunity to present at a national conference. The students will participate in collaborative, hands-on, and closely mentored projects that will immerse them in a combination of experimentation, computation, and data science. Students will acquire the practical skills, knowledge, ethical grounding, and communication skills necessary to be productive in advanced graduate study and be successfully employed in the modern biotechnology industry. The program will also provide students with career advising, grounding in research ethics, training in scientific communication, and ongoing mentorship after completion of the program.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.