Meetings

Most Mondays, 4:30 - 5:30 p.m., in Foege N130
Summer quarter time: 4:40 - 5:40 p.m.
For details, please see the schedule for the current quarter.

Instructors

Your laboratory advisor
and
Christopher Neils
Office: Foege/BIOE N310E
Phone: 206-685-3021
Campus mail: Box 355061
E-mail: cmneils@u.washington.edu

Course Summary

Bioengineers are engineers trained to be leaders in finding new ways to prevent, diagnose, and treat disease and improve the lives of the sick and healthy. BIOEN 481-482, the required 12-credit Bioengineering senior project course, assists in the transition from student to engineer by providing training in design and experimentation in a laboratory setting. This course facilitates successful design experiences for undergraduates, serving as the capstone of an undergraduate education in Bioengineering.

Projects may be conceived by individual students or may be developed in collaboration with experts at the UW or in industry. Each student project may stand alone, or may be part of a larger research and development project.

Course structure and grading
BIOEN 482 is an independent study course, in which the student is registered under one faculty advisor. Students may be co-advised, but registration remains under one advisor and the two faculty are required to coordinate and agree upon the grading. The faculty member under whom the student is registered actually submits and signs for the grade. Each student receives a grade of "N" or "No grade yet" for quarters before the report is finished. When the report has been finished, the faculty advisor assigns a grade that replaces all of the N grades.

The BIOEN 482 grade is based on performance of the entire design project, completion of a written report, and creation of a poster (display and submission details will be provided in class). The report will include technical details, results, design decisions made by the student, and assessments of economic and societal implications. The report is a requirement for graduation. It is customary, but not required, that this paper is completed by the end of the last term in BIOEN 482. The BIOEN 482 syllabus contains a grading rubric that is applied by the individual advisor or co-advisors as the case may be.

Students are required to make progress on the projects each term. Acceptable progress is defined by the expectations of the faculty advisor, and will depend on the project itself as well as the hurdles encountered therein. Meeting at least monthly with your faculty advisor is highly recommended, to show the progress that you have made.

A committee of faculty members approves each capstone proposal prior to enrollment in BIOEN 482. This ensures that each student is proposing a sufficiently rigorous design project, providing quality control and consistency across the department. A faculty committee may also analyze selected reports as part of an annual capstone course review. Neither the review of proposals nor the review of reports affects any course grade, and neither is based on the BIOEN 482 grading rubric.

There is also a weekly group meeting associated with BIOEN 482, which includes all of the seniors and is led by an instructor under whom the students are not registered. This instructor provides help with writing and presentation, along with good counsel in the event that the student hits a snag in lab and doesn't know how to deal with it. This instructor does not grade BIOEN 482, however.

A podium presentation outside of BIOEN 482 will be required for students in departmental honors. Options include the Mary Gates Symposium held each May, the BIOEN 509 seminar, and specially scheduled presentations that are advertised for University-wide attendance.

Handouts

Bioengineering undergraduate handbook including capstone report format starting on page 11.

Tips for writing the various sections of an article for publication

Recommended reading
Strunk & White, Elements of Style

Other links
New journal that prints reviewers' comments.

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