Innovation in Southern Cal: MD Students + Engineering PhD’s

Here at USC, innovation is certainly a high priority.  USC’s breakthrough HTE (Health, Technology, and Engineering) program combines Keck School of Medicine (USC’s medical school) with Viterbi School of Engineering PhD students for a four year program that will churn out biomedical device innovators by the dozens.  As non-intuitive as it sounds, it’s quite rare for medical schools to interact with engineering departments, but the administrators of HTE persevered to make it happen, with strong backing from presidents of both schools.  The NCIIA’s E-team grant readers are sure to be flooded with applications from this group!

Just in time for winter break, USC students have been presented with lots of food for thought.  Students heard from Josh Makower, biomedical entrepreneur responsible for Stanford’s BioDesign program, Exploramed biomedical device incubator, as well as numerous companies started within Exploramed.   The week prior, students and faculty were presented with a symposium focused on facilitating translating advanced biomedical technology research into commercial applications.