3ME - Modelling Methods for Medical Engineering

Medical Engineering is emerging as a new frontier for the engineering profession. The engineer of tomorrow may be just as likely to be working with human tissues and cells, as with steel or concrete. Medical Engineering is attracting an impressive range of new, talented individuals who see that many of the latest bio-medical research topics have engineering problems at their heart.At Keele University, the Research Institute for Science & Technology in Medicine (ISTM) was established in 2004 to bridge the gap between new advances in basic science and technology with medicine and clinical practice. Basic scientists and engineers have different methods of working, terminology and professional cultures to those working in the medical professions. There are often difficulties in linking clinicians to areas of science and technology that can help them to understand, diagnose and treat diseases. There are also difficulties in linking basic science projects to relevant areas of clinical need. Those difficulties are mainly through using different terms, lack of space and lack of time to meet. ISTM at Keele has successfully linked many basic scientists to clinicians by taking a bench to bedside approach. But ISTM has identified two further areas of expertise within the University that would help to advance several of its ongoing projects, especially in areas such as growing replacement human tissues in the laboratory through Tissue Engineering and Stem Cell Engineering.1. Keele's Mathematical Modelling Group employ mathematical modelling techniques to solve problems in industrial processes, biology and human physiology. This group has an international profile and is increasingly interested in applying its expertise to exciting new areas like stem cells and cell engineering.2. Keele's Applied and Environmental Geophysics Research Group uses ultra-high resolution geophysical techniques and numerical modelling to study features of geology, especially oil reserves, archaeology and other aspects of the environment. The group's expertise covers fuel cells, clean energy, biomass utilisation, pollution control, waste management, green chemistry, clean and innovative utilisation of coal, involving academic and commercial links throughout the world. The expertise they have in creating images of features and spaces in the earth can equally well be applied to human bodies.Together these scientists and clinicians have decided to form the Modelling Methods for Medical Engineering (3ME) Initiative to try to encourage working together, enabling new ways of thinking about some of the problems that have been encountered in trying to develop medical engineering technologies. Four Professors are leading the Initiative: Prof Alicia El Haj and Prof Jon Dobson from the Medical Engineering side, Prof Graham Rogerson from Mathemtical Modelling and Prof Peter Styles from Geophysics. They each lead research groups involving other professors, lecturers, research assistants and research students, and so there are about 30-40 staff at Keele who are interested to be involved in the 3ME Initiative. There are several ways to forge new links between those groups:1. Speed Dating and Pairing introducing young lecturers to each others research.2. Researcher in Residence scheme in which staff swap roles to immerse themselves in a new research culture. They will present lectures and other sessions to colleagues and students.3. Problem Scoping Workshops identifying a series of complex problems of mutual interest and defining approaches to tackle them.4. Sandpit meetings in which 30 selected participants discuss ideas intensively for two days, and the best idea receives around 25,000 support to help develop it and carry out some first experiments. There will be two of these.5. Back-to-Back Seminars : several pairs of 40 minute seminars, one after the other.6. Visiting Senior Research Fellows who will visit from other universities.