training (four four-month work terms in Industry) but also in terms of pedagogical innovations. As soon as students enter the faculty of engineering, they work on an integration project (problem-based learning). These projects expose students to more than lectures—the socalled common core of a traditional university program— that may appear disconnected from each other. This revolutionary pedagogic approach has produced spectacular results in terms of the quality of training, enhanced design ability, teamwork synergisms,
Industry requires biotechnological engineers
improved interpersonal relationships, and the development of problem solving skills. This integrated approach is absolutely essential to consolidate the biotechnological engineering discipline and to eliminate the biology-engineering barrier.
blockbusters recently, and the protein therapeutics market is expected to reach US$57 in 2007. According to the firm Lias and Fogerty (2001), the issue of supply and demand has become so acute that it is predicted that some 20-40 products currently in development may wind up “shelved” rather than on the shelf due to the lack of production capacity. The need for biopharmaceutical processes exceeds the present capability. All the data show the demand for
20 L’Actualité chimique canadienne
The educational programs must be directly related to Industry’s needs. Several segments of the bio-industry are relevant to the future biotechnological engineers. One such segment is the biopharmaceutical and drug delivery system companies. The proportion of new biologic-based therapeutic products is increasing with respect to chemical therapeutics products. Several biopharmaceutical products have been
mai 2004
biotechnological engineers trained to manage bioprocesses. Another segment involves the industrial biotechnology companies that develop non-medical products. This segment comprises agribusiness and food companies that used to employ more classical engineers (biochemical or agricultural). Environmental biotechnology companies also belong to this segment. The new biotechnological engineers will be valuable resources for these companies because of the integrated training in biology and engineering. The third segment pertains to companies related to biomaterials and the tissue engineering sector. These companies develop novel biomaterials and bioproduct design. They use structure-functional properties, modifications, bioconversions, reactions, and catalysts. They perform property measurements and performance evaluations. As the biotechnological engineers master the interaction between materials and living organisms, they become well trained to work on processing design, control, and scale-up. The last segment is related to biomedical instrumentation companies engaged in the production of internal or external artificial organs—especially the organs where mass or momentum transfer phenomena play an important part. Creating a new discipline may present some drawbacks for the hiring of new graduates. Industry will need to learn what a biotechnological engineer is—just as it understands what chemical engineers and biologists are. That is why the biotechnological engineering program was developed with industrial partners. These industrial partners are regularly updated on the curriculum’s development. Another area of concern is that biotechnological engineers may be too narrowly trained and too application oriented. As explained previously, the biotechnological engineering program is a science-based program that should ultimately alleviate a narrow perspective. The goal of the training is to prepare a generalist engineer who is able to manage the evolution of the biotechnology industry. The breadth of knowledge of tomorrow’s biotechnological engineers will be an important advantage.
Concluding remarks The intellectual core of the biotechnological engineering program at the Université de Sherbrooke has been defined by keeping