The Institute of Biological and Medical Engineering (IIBM UC), was founded in January 2016 as the first interdisciplinary academic unit of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile which is dedicated to research, academy, industry, through an intergrated point of view between technology, health and science. This interdisciplinary dynamic is based on a collaborative team work, inside and out of this institution.
It belongs to the faculties of Engineering, Medicine and Biological Sciences, and it is conformed by professors, researchers and students from different fields and academic backgrounds, including engineering, physics, biology, chemistry, biotechnology, and multiple specialties of medicine.
The IIBM is a collaborative space to generate knowledge would causes impact and benefits over the country and society. First, via the application of fundamental principles of engineering and the concept of engineering design to different areas of medicine and biology; and, in the other hand, via using cells, living organisms and the principles of biology to solve specific issues of engineering, medicine and other disciplines.
The institute manage one academic undergraduate program, the Major in Biomedical Engineering, and two graduate programs, Master and Ph.D. in Biological and Medical Engineering, providing a strong educational training to the students with an interdisciplinary, collaborative spirit and entrepreneurship emphasis.
Currently, the IIBM is headed by Dr. René Botnar and has nineteen professors who are developing cutting-edge research in the fields of brain machine interface, biomedical images, biofilms, quantative physiology, protein engineering, biophysics, computational biology, synthetic biology, biomechanics and biomedical devices.