Engineering Newsletter

Columbia Engineering has had a significant impact on bettering the human condition since its founding in 1864. The School’s first dean, Charles Frederick Chandler, a chemist, improved safety standards in New York City for milk and water, regulated gas companies and slaughterhouses, supported compulsory smallpox vaccinations for children, and invented the flush toilet.

While Chandler was still dean, Michael I. Pupin, an 1883 graduate who became a professor of electrical engineering, created an X-ray tube that produced an image after only a few seconds of exposure. Pupin’s 1896 discovery was only weeks after Wilhelm Roentgen found that X-rays would produce an image after several hours of exposure. The first use of the Pupin Xray tube was medical: he helped a surgeon determine where buckshot was imbedded in a patient’s hand.

As more became known about fighting disease, biochemical engineering emerged as a promising field. Elmer L. Gaden, a chemical engineer, received his BS in 1944 and, after serving in the Navy, returned to Columbia for graduate work. His doctoral thesis contained a process for mass production of antibiotics by supplying the optimum amount of oxygen for the rapid growth of penicillin mold. This discovery earned him the title “father of biochemical engineering.”

Gaden was a professor at Columbia for 26 years. In 1962, he headed the Committee on Bioengineering, with faculty members from the College of Physicians and Surgeons (P&S) and Engineering. It provided an early forum for interdisciplinary cooperation. For many years, it was chaired by Edward F. Leonard, professor of chemical engineering.

In 1974, a University-wide Bioengineering Institute was established under William Nastuk, M.D., professor of physiology at P&S. Four years later, Richard Skalak ’43, ’46, ’54, a professor in the Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, became director. Skalak applied his knowledge of hydraulics to microcirculation, developing new approaches to cellular and molecular engineering, tissue engineering, and orthopedic biomechanics. His discoveries on blood cell mechanics, pulmonary circulation, and tissue growth have been applied to research on cancer, sickle cell disease, hypertension, atherosclerosis, and other diseases.

By the mid-1980s, Columbia boasted one of the largest orthopaedics research labs in the country, following the recruitment of Van C. Mow and W. Michael Lai. Both held joint appointments, the first of their kind at Columbia, as professors of mechanical engineering (SEAS) and orthopaedic bioengineering (P&S).

In 1995, a Whitaker Foundation grant spurred the creation of the Center for Biomedical Engineering. Mow was named director of the Center and Leonard became associate director of academic affairs. A second Whitaker grant, supplemented by significant funds from The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science (SEAS) and the University, transformed the center into a full-fledged department. The department was launched on January 1, 2000, with Mow, who now holds the Stanley Dicker Professorship in Biomedical Engineering, as founding chair. Today it is one of the most popular majors in the School, leveraging the School’s historic strengths in biomechanics, biomedical imaging, and cell and tissue engineering.

As you will see in the following pages, the scope of health-related research at Columbia Engineering involves almost every department. Amazing breakthroughs have happened or are about to happen as our faculty fight diseases and conditions, bringing to bear their exceptional and unique talents to chip away at problems that affect the quality of life and, indeed, life itself.

Feniosky Peña-Mora
Dean