INTRODUCTION TO

BIOENGINEERING
BIOENGINEERING
• A discipline that applies engineering principles
of design and analysis of biological systems and
biomedical technologies.
• Practice of solving problems in life sciences
using an engineering approach.
• Application of engineering (technology) to living
things such as humans, animals, and plants.
HISTORY

Wooden toe prosthetic

Found in 2000 tied to the foot of a 3000-year old
mummy from Thebes
HISTORY
• Started to develop post WWII
Late 1940’s
• Pioneered kidney dialysis
• 1938 – design of artificial
kidney
• 1945 – a woman lived for
seven more years
• Acute kidney failure and end
stage renal disease

Dr. Willem Johan Kolff

Late 1940’s
• First kidney machine
using: laundry tubs,
wooden drum, metal,
semipermeable
sausage casing,
electric motor
1950’s
• 1952 – first artificial heart
valve implant by Charles
A. Hufnagel
• 1953 – first successful
human heart surgery
assisted by a heart-lung
machine by John H.
Gibbon, Jr.
• 1958 – first external
cardiac pacemaker was
used
DNA and rDNA
• 1953 – double-helix DNA
• 1970’s – introduction of recombinant DNA
• Signaled the beginning of the modern era of
bioengineering
ASSISTIVE Bioengineering
• Technology developed to help organisms but
DOES NOT change them
• Eyeglasses, antibiotics, wheelchair.
ADAPTIVE Bioengineering
• Technology developed to help living organisms
and DOES change them,
• Lasik eye treatment, knee replacement, GMOs
Branches of Bioengineering
• Biomedical – medical problems: replacement of
damaged-organs, instrumentation, diagnostic
applications of computers
• Tissue engineering
• Genetic Engineering
• Neural Engineering
• Pharmaceutical Engineering
• Clinical Engineering
• Bioinformatics
• Biomechanics
Genetic Engineering
• artificial manipulation, modification, and
recombination of DNA or other nucleic acid
molecules to modify an organism; led to
production of human insulin, human growth
hormone, hepatitis B vaccine.
Biomechanics
•Application of
mechanics to study the
structure, function,
and motion of the
mechanical aspects of
biological systems, at
any level from whole
organisms to organs,
cells, and cell
organelles
Branches of Bioengineering
• Biological Systems Engineering – agriculture,
biological production problems, external
operations, influence of environment, foods
sciences, ecosystem
• Biochemical Engineering – fermentation
engineering, microscopic biological systems,
production of new products by synthesis
Branches of Bioengineering
• Human-factors Engineering – application of
engineering, physiology, and psychology to the
optimization of the human-machine
relationship
• Environmental Health Engineering –
bioenvironmental; control of environment for
the health, comfort, and safety of human beings;
life-support systems for the exploration of
outer space and oceans
Branches of Bioengineering
• Bionics – construction of artificial systems that
have some characteristics of the living systems;
robotics
BIOMIMICRY/BIOMIMETICS
• Imitation of biological and natural processes
• Classic example: Leonardo da Vinci’s flying
machine inspired by birds
BIOMIMICRY/BIOMIMETICS

Velcro inspired by burrs Sharkskin inspired swimsuits

(Swiss engineer Georges
de Mestral, 1955)
MATERIAL SCIENCE
• Applies properties of matter to engineering
• Relationship between structure, properties,
processing, and performance of materials
• BIOMATERIALS
• Materials intended to interact with biological
systems and body tissues and cells.
• Must be biocompatible.
Prosthetics
• Artificial substitute to
amputated body parts
• Silicon, nylon sheets,
thermoplastic, titanium
• Carbon Fiber
• Made up of extraordinarily
thin filaments – about one
tenth the thickness of
human hair Sgt. Jerrod Fields, a below-
• Lightweight and very the-knee amputee; won a
strong material gold medal in the 100 meters
with a time of 12.15 seconds at
the Endeavor Games in
Edmond, Okla., on June 13,
2009
CASE 1: Tiny, Motorized Pill Delivers
Vaccine to Mouse Intestine

• Liangfang Zhang and Joseph Wang

• University of California, San Diego
• A. Abramson et al., “An ingestible self-orienting
system for oral delivery of
macromolecules,” Science. 363:611–15, 2019.
• X. Wei et al., “Biomimetic micromotor enables active
delivery of antigens for oral vaccination,” Nano
Letters. doi:10.1021/acs.nanolett.8b05051, 2019.
• Article: https://www.the-scientist.com/news-
opinion/tiny--motorized-pill-delivers-vaccine-to-
mouse-intestine-65482
CASE 1: Tiny, Motorized Pill Delivers
Vaccine to Mouse Stomach
CASE 1: Tiny, Motorized Pill Delivers
Vaccine to Mouse Intestine
• Objective: design an ingestible motorized device to
deliver immunization
• Summary:
• Pea-sized self-propelling gadget carrying a bacterial pathogen,
Staphylococus aureus
• Used micromotors made if magnesium, covered in titanium
dioxide with hole, and coated in red blood cell membranes
• Upon reaching the stomach, the coating dissolved and exposed
the magnesium motor converting water to H bubbles thus
propelling the device and bacteria toward the stomach lining.
• Generates mucosal immunity

• Mucosal immunity – when vaccines prompt response from

antibodies in the mucous membrane instead of stimulating
antibodies in the blood
Case 2: Lab-Grown Lungs
Transplanted into Pigs
• Production and transplantation of
bioengineered lung into a large-animal model
(2018)
• University of Texas Medical Branch
• Retrieved from
https://stm.sciencemag.org/content/10/452/ea
ao3926
Case 2: Lab-Grown Lungs
Transplanted into Pigs
Case 2: Lab-Grown Lungs
Transplanted into Pigs
Case 2: Lab-Grown Lungs
Transplanted into Pigs
• No organ rejection
• Transplanted lungs (TL) developed on its own
• TL facilitates development of a blood supply and
establishment of natural lung microbial flora
• However, the two-month-old TL had not
developed enough to independently supply the
animal with oxygen.

• Will bioengineered lung transplants be feasible

in humans within a decade?
REFERENCES
• http://content.whiteboxlearning.com/application/p
arm/p1l0101.html
• https://navigate.aimbe.org/why-
bioengineering/history/
• https://www.researchgate.net/publication/303522
079_BIOMATERIALS_IN_PROSTHETICS
• https://www.nature.com/subjects/biomimetics
• https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/lab-
grown-lungs-transplanted-into-pigs-64607
• https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2018
/10/news-gene-editing-crispr-mice-stem-cells/