Center for the Engineering of Living Tissues (GTEC)

Partnership with HBCU Consortium Improves Diversity in Tissue Engineering

The ranks of scientists and engineers on university faculties and in industry still do not reflect nearly enough the talent available within underrepresented minority groups in the U.S. This is especially true of new fields such as tissue engineering, in which students from smaller schools do not have access to the necessary research opportunities and facilities. One of the NSF's important goals is to change this situation.

The Georgia Tech/Emory Center (GTEC) for the Engineering of Living Tissues formed a partnership with the Atlanta University Center (AUC), a consortium of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in the city of Atlanta, to educate a new generation of African-American tissue engineers through involvement in research.

The partnership works to achieve this through several avenues. First, it provides seed grants to Morehouse School of Medicine junior faculty for collaborative research with GTEC faculty. The partnership funds structured research internships in the GTEC laboratories for AUC undergraduate students and provides advisors and support for these students' matriculation to Georgia Tech for engineering degrees. It also supports research internships for AUC faculty in an effort to provide research stimuli, use of state of the art equipment, and inclusion in research publications.

A full-time program coordinator has offices at both the AUC and GTEC and actively recruits and advises interested faculty and students. This effort is expected to enhance the already existing 3/2 dual-degree program between Georgia Tech and the AUC by bringing students into an interesting and more comfortable research environment that promotes further academic pursuit.

Also, AUC faculty will enhance their teaching perspectives through their work at GTEC labs and can use what they learn in their own classrooms and provide opportunities for collaborations among a more diverse population of the academic community. This will help GTEC involve more minority faculty and students in programs that address tissue engineering.

Two junior faculty at the Morehouse School of Medicine have been awarded seed grants and are collaborating with the GTEC Cardiovascular Substitutes research thrust. Also, six AUC students applied for summer research internships for the summer of 2004.

To learn more about this topic:
Contact the Georgia Tech/Emory Center for the Engineering of Living Tissues (GTEC) site at http://www.gtec.gatech.edu/newsletter/september2004/center.html.

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The GTEC/AUC partnership provides a collaborative
research environment.

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Last modified: February 2, 2005