John P. Wikswo, Gordon A. Cain University Professor and professor of biomedical engineering, has been named a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
According to the IEEE, the award recognizes “unusual distinction in the profession and is conferred by the board of directors on a person with an extraordinary record of accomplishments in any of the IEEE fields of interest.” Dr. Wikswo is being honored “for contributions to understanding electromagnetic effects on materials and biological tissues.”
Wikswo also holds the titles of A.B. Learned Professor of Living State Physics, professor of molecular physiology and biophysics, professor of physics, and director of the Vanderbilt Institute for Integrative Biosystems Research and Education.
His research includes the study of the linear and non-linear electrical properties of cardiac tissue during stimulation, propagation, and recovery for threshold- and defibrillation-strength shocks; the electrical behavior of intestinal smooth muscle; and the development and application of micro- and nano-scale devices for instrumenting and controlling the single biological cell and small populations of interconnected cells. He has worked extensively on the magnetic inverse problem, which involves inferring a description of a distribution of magnetic sources from measurements of their fields.
Wikswo received his B.A. degree from the University of Virginia in 1970 and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees, all in physics, from Stanford University in 1973 and 1975, respectively. He joined the Vanderbilt University faculty in 1977.
The IEEE fellowship is the latest in a string of awards Dr. Wikswo has received. He is also a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, the American Heart Association (AHA), the Council on Basic Cardiovascular Sciences of the AHA, the Biomedical Engineering Society, and the Heart Rhythm Society. He has been a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow, an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, and an NSF Predoctoral Fellow. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and many professional societies.