Biomedical Engineering, B.S.

First Year

Second Year

Third Year

Please note: The third year of the program varies depending upon which semester the student chooses to take away following The Arch Summer Semester classes. Please note the following differences in curriculum:

• If students are going to be away during the Fall semester of their junior year, they should take the listed courses for each term and any courses under the Fall Away Track for year three of their program.
   
• If students are going to be away during the Spring semester of their junior year, they should take the listed courses for each term and any courses under the Spring Away Track for year three of their program.

Fourth Year

The minimum number of credit hours for the degree is 128.

HASS Core Program: School of Engineering Requirements

Undergraduate students must have an area of focus in their HASS studies that is accomplished by completing an approved 12-credit depth concentration, known as the HASS Integrative Pathways.  Some students will satisfy a modified version of this requirement.

The HASS Integrative Pathways were created to enhance students’ HASS Core curriculum by bringing intentionality and depth to the requirements. The themes of the pathways vary in their intentionality; some are interdisciplinary, while others focus on a single discipline, providing students with significant options for their coursework. In addition to providing a more in-depth focus to the HASS Core, many Integrative Pathways can be transformed into minors with relative ease.

The complete list of pathway titles, descriptions, and associated courses can be found https://info.rpi.edu/hass-pathways/pathways-topics. Information about compatible minors can also be found on this page.

Core BMED Courses

All of these courses are required for a BME degree and they need to be taken for a letter grade. No substitutions with other courses offered at Rensselaer are allowed.

• BMED 2050 - Programming for BME Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 2100 - Biomaterials Science and Engineering Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 2300 - Bioimaging and Bioinstrumentation Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 2540 - Biomechanics Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 4010 - Biomedical Engineering Laboratory Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 4200 - Modeling of Biomedical Systems Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4250 - Biomedical Transport Phenomena Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 4260 - Biomedical Product Development and Commercialization Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4500 - Advanced Systems Physiology Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 4600 - Biomedical Engineering Design Credit Hours: 3
• ECSE 2010 - Electric Circuits Credit Hours: 4
• ECSE 2410 - Signals and Systems Credit Hours: 3
• ECSE 4090 - Mechatronics Credit Hours: 3
• ECSE 4480 - Robotics I Credit Hours: 3
• ENGR 2300 - Electronic Instrumentation Credit Hours: 4
• ENGR 2350 - Embedded Control Credit Hours: 4
• ISYE 4330 - Design of Experiments Credit Hours: 3
• MANE 4030 - Elements of Mechanical Design Credit Hours: 4
• MANE 4240 - Finite Element Method Credit Hours: 3
• MANE 4500 - Modeling and Control of Dynamic Systems Credit Hours: 3
• MANE 4670 - Mechanical Behavior of Materials Credit Hours: 3
• MANE 6480 - Health Physics and Medical Aspects of Radiation Credit Hours: 3
• MTLE 2100 - Structure of Engineering Materials Credit Hours: 4
• MTLE 4050 - Introduction to Polymers Credit Hours: 3
• MTLE 4250 - Mechanical Properties of Materials Credit Hours: 4
• MTLE 4470 - Biology in Materials Science Credit Hours: 3
• MTLE 4720 - Applied Mathematical Methods in Materials Credit Hours: 3

BME Technical Elective

Four courses need to be taken to satisfy the BME Technical Elective requirement. These courses need to be 3 or 4 credit hour courses and they must be taken for a letter grade. The BME Technical Elective courses can be chosen from a list maintained by the Biomedical Engineering Department, or they can be any formal 4000-level BMED course, i.e., no “Studies in BME”, “Topics in BME” or research courses. At least two of the four BME Technical Elective courses must be 4000-level or higher. It is not possible to take the same course at the 4000- and 6000-level, nor is it possible to get credit twice for a course (once as an elective and once as a concentration course). BME Technical Electives can be taken to either add depth or to add breadth to the degree.

• BMED 4410 - BioMEMs Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4440 - Biophotonics Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4450 - Drug and Gene Delivery Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4460 - Biological Imaging Analysis Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4470 - Biostatistics for Life Science Applications Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4480 - Biomedical Data Science Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 4490 - Artificial Intelligence for Biomedical Applications Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4510 - Mechanobiology Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4540 - Biomechanics II Credit Hours: 4
• BMED 4550 - Cell Biomechanics Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4580 - Biomedical Fluid Mechanics Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4590 - Medical Imaging Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4650 - Intro to Cell and Tissue Engineering Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4660 - Muscle Mechanics and Modeling Credit Hours: 3
• BMED 4670 - The Biology of Systems Credit Hours: 4
• CHEM 2250 - Organic Chemistry I Credit Hours: 3

Footnotes

¹ Placement of humanities and social science electives can be varied with free electives. 

²    For a list of courses that satisfy the Professional Development – Technical Issues & Solutions requirement, refer to the link “Professional Development Courses” on the Registrar’s “Academic Planning” web page. It should be completed before the capstone design course.

³ BMED 4010  may be taken in either Spring Year 3, Fall Year 4, or as part of the Summer Arch.

⁴  The minimum total credit hours of free electives is twelve (12), with no restrictions on the included number of 3 and 4 credit hour courses.

⁵ Capstone is a writing-intensive course.

⁶ ENGR 1400  may be taken as alternative to ENGR 1200 . This course may be taken either semester.

⁷ ADMN 1030   Arch Exploration & Planning is a zero-credit course that may be taken in the second-year fall or spring term (or possibly first year for ACCEL students); satisfactory completion is a graduation requirement.  Another graduation requirement is satisfactory completion of an ILEA 4400  Arch Away experience, usually in fall or spring third year