
The University of New Mexico
NEWS RELEASE
July 26, 2006
UNM Receives $2.5 Million NSF Grant for Biomaterials Partnership
The University of New Mexico Center for Biomedical Engineering will receive $2,537,500 from the National Science Foundation over the next five years to fund a research and educational partnership with Harvard University, Albuquerque Public Schools (APS) and the Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute (SIPI).
The project, funded by NSF's program on Partnerships for Research and Education in Materials, will focus on a multidisciplinary area of materials technology: biomaterials, which are synthetic and natural, solid and sometimes liquid, and used in medical devices or in contact with biological systems.
“This connection will allow us to efficiently use biomaterials technologies to motivate minority students to pursue research careers,” said Professor Gabriel López, principal investigator and director of the Center for Biomedical Engineering at UNM. “This partnership will help us bring a world-class biomaterials research and education program to New Mexico.”
Biomaterials represent a huge and rapidly growing economic component of the health care system, estimated at over $100 billion per year worldwide. They also provide an important opportunity for students from under-represented groups to pursue materials research careers.
“We anticipate working closely with minority-focused science and engineering organizations to both expand outreach activities and recruit talented students from APS and SIPI to participate in our research programs,” said Joseph L. Cecchi, dean of the UNM School of Engineering.
The focus will be on developing new materials technologies for three areas of medicine that are especially problematic in minority populations: infectious diseases, cardiovascular diseases and cancer. Talented students will be recruited from APS, a school district with a large minority population; SIPI, a tribal college with an emphasis in science, technology, engineering and math education; and UNM, a Hispanic-serving research university.
Harvard professors will come to UNM to set up collaborations and do research. In each research project, teams will be assembled to maximize research and training efforts, while taking full advantage of the spectrum of state-of-the-art facilities available at Harvard and UNM.
During the summer, UNM undergraduates will do research at Harvard. Students will benefit from this partnership with Harvard by gaining access to team-based research experiences, new course offerings, networks of research professionals, professional development resources, and community outreach experience. This combination of activities is designed to encourage UNM students to strive for the highest level of research and educational careers, especially in academia.
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