Profile Bridging Disciplines By Michael Pousner
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r. Robert M. I Nerem is a selfdescribed late bloomer, so much so that he scored at the fourthgrade level on an eighthgrade standardized mathematics examination in his hometown of Evanston, 111. His math teacher, however, took him aside and said, "I know you're smarter than that, and I've made special arrangements for you to take the test again." This time, Nerem scored at the 12th-grade level, and
began a stellar academic career. "My teacher believed in me, and she basically turned me around by getting me to believe in myself—that I wasn't a 'C student, but an 'A' student," remembers Nerem. A dark-haired man of 55 who looks you straight in the eye as he talks, Nerem has never forgotten the lesson from his math teacher. He values his teaching at Tech, particularly his undergraduate course on convective heat transfer and the challenge it offers for similarly turn-
The Nerem File Born—Evanston, 111. Education—BS, University of Oklahoma; MS and PhD, Ohio State University. Family—Wife, Marilyn; he has a grown son, Robert "Steve" Nerem, and a grown daughter, Nancy Chambers. Quote—"Some of the key research issues today are ones that fall between traditional disciplines—in my case between biology, medicine and engineering. Hot areas come and go, but we definitely see today the interfacing between two or three disciplines." Professional Interests—Research interests include biofluid mechanics, cardiovascular devices, cellular engineering, vascular biology, and atherosclerosis. He enjoys teaching both graduate and undergraduate classes. Leisure Activities and Interests—Playing tennis and exploring faraway lands, acquiring artifacts that line the walls of their home. Persons most admired—My mother and father; Mrs. Wilbur, an eighth-grade math teacher who "turned my life around"; Professor Y. C. Fung at the University of California, San Diego, who is the "father of my discipline." \
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GEORGIA TECH • Fall 1992
ing other young lives around. An Institute Professor at Tech, Nerem was chairman of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Houston when he was named in 1987 to fill the Parker H. Petit Distinguished Chair for Engineering and Medicine in the School of Mechanical Engineering. "What attracted me to Tech was not so much the chair, though that was frosting on the cake," he remembers. "There was also a sense of an institution that had its act together as far as bioengineering goes. Many universities say they support bioengineering, but it's a fragmented effort. Here, there was the willingness to really support it." His academic career— what he calls his "journey"—has been marked by taking on ever-greater responsibilities in an attempt to broaden beyond the field of aeronautical engineering, in which he has his PhD. His research has taken him to the frontier of the bio-medical field and into an interdisciplinary region where engineering, medicine and science coexist. It is part of his ongoing effort to study blood flow to see how it influences maladies like heart disease and arteriosclerosis. Nerem notes that certain arteries can be dis-
eased and certain ones are not, and the same goes for regions of the same artery. He believes this localized pattern is dictated by the interaction of blood flow with the biology < >f the vascular wall. "We think that by understanding how the blood flow influences vascular biology, we can better understand vascular diseases and disorders and the therapeutic measures to treat them," he explains, his words flowing in torrents. Nerem is working on a long-term goal to combine growing, living cells and extracellular matter in a laboratory to make a living blood vessel. Nerem's office on the third floor of Wei>er Space Science and Technology Building has a ceramic model on the wall depicting velocity fluctuation in aortic blood flow, and a picture of a fiberblast cell undergoing division. r
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hen Nerem was an aeronautical engineer at Ohio State, NASA sought his consultation regarding the problem of vibrations on the Saturn rocket launcher. NASA wanted a consultant on a medical school project to study the vibration's effects on human physiology. "It was a window on biology and medicine, and thinking about it from an