Bioengineering Day
Last week Gradcracker sponsored the Bioengineering Day at Imperial College London where we met students studying Bioengineering at both the University of Oxford and Imperial College London.
The day was an opportunity for employers (and Gradcracker) to get a better understanding of what bioengineering is and how students studying this subject would be ideal employees in industry.
There were a number of companies represented at the event including National Instruments, GE Healthcare, Imperial Innovations and Laerdal.
Bioengineering is one of the most diverse engineering disciplines that we have come across. It covers Maths, Physics, Mechanics, Electronics, Computing, Anatomy, Physiology, Cell Biology and Genetics (and that is only the edited list!).
We had the pleasure of hearing from two guest speakers; Leonard Fass, Academic Relations Director for GE Healthcare and Oliver Sexton from Imperial Innovations. Both presentations were really interesting, discussing the impact bioengineering has in medical industries and how students can launch their ideas and innovations in to the world of business.
Not only did we hear from the professionals, we also got to hear from some of the students. They discussed their projects and their career plans and also simplified bioengineering by using Iron Man as the analogy!
We also got the chance to test our knowledge with an interactive quiz. Did you know that the first non-friction artificial hip was invented in 1960's? In 1896 X-rays were invented and Insulin was first discovered in 1921. We were presented with images of the first brass tools engineered for surgery and saw future technologies designed to make medicine more readily available to the patient and more time-and cost-effective in treatment.
After the presentations students and employers mingled over refreshments and we had the opportunity to see some recently completed projects by final year students. The projects were further proof of just how diverse and complex bioengineering is. One project was about a component for a car, another about new technology for improved vision!
We got to meet over 60 students at the event. They were all so enthusiastic about their chosen degree and proud to be Bioengineering students. We asked a number of the students why they choose this degree and the majority commented that it was because it was such a diverse subject it gave them the opportunity to work on many different projects and have wider prospects upon completing their degree.
Gradcracker is now busy encouraging more employers of bioengineering students to advertise on our site.
Hannah Wade, Academic Field Engineer for National Instruments really enjoyed attending the event and said "It was informative and engaging, and it was great to hear so many engineers so passionate about their chosen subject area.
The event opened my eyes to the wide spectrum of engineering topics a bioengineering/biomedical engineering student covers (and as a result the incredible workload that they must learn to balance), along with the growing need for qualified engineers in this area.
Although National Instruments doesn't have a need specifically for bioengineers/biomedical engineers, based on the students I spoke with during the event, these students would definitely be a good fit academically for our engineering leadership programme."
