FAC U LTY
IN MEMORIAM
J. David Hellums
8
R ICE E N GIN EERIN G
J. David Hellums, the A.J. Hartsook Professor Emeritus in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and of Bioengineering, former dean of the George R. Brown School of Engineering at Rice University, and a pioneer in biomedical research, died June 26 at the age of 86. “David was instrumental in developing the whole bioengineering effort at Rice,” said C. Sidney Burrus, the Maxfield and Oshman Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering and former engineering dean. “First there was the artificial heart project, then the bioengineering lab within chemical engineering, and finally the Department of Bioengineering within the school of engineering.” Hellums was born in Stamford, Texas, on Aug. 19, 1929. He earned a B.S. in chemical engineering in 1950 from the University of Texas at Austin, spent three years as a process engineer with the Mobil Oil Co., another three years as a statistical services officer with the U.S. Air Force, and returned to Austin to earn his master’s degree in chemical engineering. He joined the Rice faculty as an assistant professor of chemical engineering in 1960 and received his Ph.D. the following year from the University of Michigan. Hellums’ research in the 1960s shifted increasingly to biomedical applications. In 1964, Rice President Kenneth Pitzer called a meeting with Hellums, five other engineering professors and Dr. Michael E. DeBakey of the Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) to discuss plans for devising an artificial heart. One year later, surgeons at BCM implanted a working model in a patient, with the artificial pump moving blood from the left atrium to the aorta. In 1968, Hellums became a founding member of the Biomedical Engineering Laboratory at Rice, and later its director for 10 years. He became a full professor in 1968, and from 1970 to 1976 served as chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering. From 1980 to 1988 he was dean of engineering. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1998.