Jianyi Zhang, M.D., Ph.D.Jianyi Zhang, M.D., Ph.D., chair of the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Department of Biomedical Engineering, was recently inducted to the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering College of Fellows.
Election to the AIMBE College of Fellows is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to a medical and biological engineer. The College of Fellows is composed of the top 2 percent of medical and biological engineers. College membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions to “engineering and medicine research, practice, or education” and to “the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, making major advancements in traditional fields of medical and biological engineering, or developing/implementing innovative approaches to bioengineering education.”
Zhang came to UAB in 2015 as chair of the BME Department, which is a joint department between the UAB’s School of Engineering and School of Medicine. He also is the Michael and Gillian Goodrich Endowed Chair of Engineering Leadership.
Zhang was nominated, reviewed and elected by peers and members of the College of Fellows for “leadership in the fields of cardiac injury and regeneration, and training of the new generation of biomedical engineers.” He was one of 156 who were inducted during a formal ceremony at the AIMBE Annual Meeting at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C., in March.
While most AIMBE fellows hail from the United States, the College of Fellows has inducted fellows representing 30 countries. AIMBE fellows are employed in academia, industry, clinical practice and government. AIMBE fellows are among the most distinguished medical and biological engineers, including two Nobel Prize laureates, 17 fellows who received the Presidential Medal of Science and/or Technology and Innovation, 158 inducted to the National Academy of Engineering, 72 inducted to the National Academy of Medicine, and 31 inducted to the National Academy of Sciences.