Society for Biomaterials honors Rice student

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– December 21, 2001Posted in: News Releases

CONTACT: B.J. Almond
PHONE:
(713) 348-6770
EMAIL: balmond@rice.edu



SOCIETY FOR
BIOMATERIALS HONORS RICE STUDENT
Heungsoo Shin to receive award for
outstanding research


A research paper about
bone-tissue engineering has won a bioengineering graduate student at Rice
University the 2002 Graduate Student Award for Outstanding Research of the
Society for Biomaterials.


Heungsoo Shin will be
presented the award at the 28th Annual Meeting of the Society for Biomaterials
in Tampa, Fla., in April.


Shin is trying to
develop novel degradable biomaterials to treat bone defects. The synthetic
biomaterials are formed from a combination of molecules with repeating
structures. They serve as a temporary supporter for growth of bone-forming cells
while the bone is being regenerated and then degrade in a controlled
manner.


In his paper, Shin
describes how to make his biomaterials recognizable by cells in the body and
promote bone formation through signals communicated between cells and
biomaterials.


A native of Seoul,
Republic of Korea, Shin hopes to finish his Ph.D. in bioengineering at Rice in
May 2003. His adviser at Rice is Antonios Mikos, the John W. Cox Professor of
Bioengineering and Chemical Engineering.


More than 2,000
biomaterials scientists and engineers are members of the Society for
Biomaterials, which promotes materials research and
development.



Rice University is consistently ranked one of America’s
best teaching and research universities. It is distinguished by its: size-2,700
undergraduates and 1,500 graduate students; selectivity-10 applicants for each
place in the freshman class; resources-an undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio
of 5-to-1, and the fifth largest endowment per student among private American
universities; residential college system, which builds communities that are both
close-knit and diverse; and collaborative culture, which crosses disciplines,
integrates teaching and research, and intermingles undergraduate and graduate
work. Rice’s wooded campus is located in the nation’s fourth largest city and on
America’s South Coast.








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