Master of Engineering in Surgery and Intervention Program - School of Engineering | School of Engineering

At the Intersection of Healthcare and Engineering

Over the past several decades, dramatic breakthroughs in biomedical science have been witnessed within laboratory research, but the ability to translate those discoveries and make new discoveries has been a challenge and has been often characterized as the bottleneck of clinical translation.

After all, what good is the best new treatment if it never makes it to the patient?

At Vanderbilt University, we believe that the fundamental constraints associated with clinical translation can be dramatically improved with training engineers and physicians to be intimately familiar with the technical skills, clinical understanding, and leadership ability to guide impactful inception of novel technology-based platforms into medical procedures.

Vanderbilt University offers a new graduate engineering program that will equip engineers and physicians to improve translation of technology for surgery and intervention

In response to this need, Vanderbilt University School of Engineering, in partnership with the Vanderbilt Institute for Surgery and Engineering (VISE), has launched a Master of Engineering in Surgery and Intervention (ESI) program — a niche, rigorous engineering graduate program that will prepare the next generation of engineers to address challenges and envision solutions at the interface of engineering and medicine. In addition, the master of engineering program serves MD trainees and MD graduates who are seeking to build skills as physician inventors.

The degree is a 30-credit hour program designed to enhance training in the domains of engineering for surgery and intervention with extensive exposure to clinical domains. ESI core skill sets available for training are:

Surgical robotics, instrumentation, and medical devices
Surgical/interventional machine learning, data science, and AI
Disease & treatment modeling, planning, and simulation
Interventional imaging, image processing, and image analysis
Intraprocedural localization, navigation, and guidance
Intraprocedural visualization and assessment
Interventional therapeutics, biomaterials, and drug delivery
Therapeutic monitoring and decision support
Digital health, wearables, and IoMT

To learn more about our Master of Engineering in Surgery and Intervention program, connect with our team today!

vuse.esi@vanderbilt.edu

Why Vanderbilt?

Decades of investment in engineering, surgery, and intervention research with world-class faculty
An intensive and supportive immersion experience with ~20 clinical specialties
An unparalleled integration of engineering (VUSE/VISE) and clinical (VUMC) resources
Extensive experience in commercial realizations among cadre

VISE SOLD Vanderbilt University’s strong history of and commitment to interdisciplinary work and the close proximity of its Medical and Engineering Schools makes it the ideal institution for advancing the state of the art in this field. In conjunction with VISE, the School of Engineering provides a transformative infrastructure that facilitates this interdisciplinary work and creates an environment in which traditional boundaries are eliminated. In fact, Vanderbilt University is one of the only universities to offer such a ground-breaking program.

This type of program is highly valued and needed within industry – Vanderbilt University is uniquely qualified to offer it

The current and emeritus members of VISE have been performing trans-institutional work for almost four decades within the domains of surgery, intervention and engineering. This relationship is unique to Vanderbilt and has been maintained by the passion of the members devoted to this domain.

Over these four decades, this cadre has had the singular vision to see Vanderbilt as world leaders in this unique field. The VISE faculty firmly believe that what we have already accomplished thus far is only a fraction of what is possible, and continued investment into this domain will revolutionize the future of medicine. The focus of VISE and the Master of Engineering in Surgery and Intervention program is exactly to advance these types of technology platforms for the discovery, development, and deployment of new treatment systems, devices, and solutions.

Qualifications

We understand that navigating the graduate school admissions process can seem challenging. To simplify the process for you, we’ve outlined some of the requirements below.

Applications must be submitted online, but to help you understand the admissions criteria, here are some of the basic requirements:

Online application
Academic performance in previous degree program(s)
Resume or CV
Three letters of recommendation
A statement of purpose
TOEFL/IELTS/DET score (if applicable)

An admissions committee with representative faculty from the involved departments will evaluate all applications. Admission will be competitive and students will be selected on the basis of their scholastic preparation and intellectual capacity.

Our program reviews applications on a rolling basis starting August 1 each year. Application deadlines are November 15 for Spring semester and May 15 for Fall semester incoming cohorts.

Apply Now

ESI Program Curriculum

Students who pursue this degree commonly hold a bachelor’s degree in a conventional engineering discipline (e.g., mechanical, electrical, or biomedical engineering) or computer science. However, the program is also adaptable to other STEM areas as well (e.g., neuroscience, physics, mathematics, etc.). If you have questions, be sure to send inquiries to vuse.esi@vanderbilt.edu.

With regard to program structure, the Master of Engineering in Surgery and Intervention has three tracks: the innovator track, the inventor track, and the visionary track. Each track is 30 credit hours and consists of core course work and electives — learn more about these three tracks below:

Innovator Track

The innovator track program is an accelerated one-year⁺ program specifically structured to enable students who are constrained by career path timing such that extended multi-year study is not possible. The goals of the program are to quickly provide enhanced skill sets with rigorous study, as well as provide important exposure to many clinical domains. This track sequence is (i) Fall Semester I - Spring Semester I - Fall Semester II, (ii) Spring Semester I - Fall Semester I - Spring Semester II, or (iii) Fall Semester I - Spring Semester II - Summer Session I/II.

Typical curriculum for the innovator track:

Fall Semester

ESI: Methods

Professional Development*
(e.g. ENGM 6500)

Elective

Spring Semester

BME 6301 ESI: Provocative
Questions

Elective

Fall Semester or Summer Session

ESI: Design I (first half)

ESI: Design II (second half)

*Note: There are several professional courses in the School of Engineering that would satisfy this requirement. This can be satisfied in Fall or Spring and is done in consultation with the student’s adviser and program director.

Inventor Track

The inventor track program is the same 30 credit hour program spread over two years of concentrated study and deep immersion. This track is structured to enable students who have recently graduated with a bachelor’s degree or who are seeking to pivot domain spaces to spend focused time gaining skill sets within the engineering and surgery/intervention domain. This extended structure allows students to spend additional time inside the Vanderbilt innovation ecosystem and the VISE research and design environment to assist in novel inception and invention of unique platform technologies advancing surgery and intervention. This track sequence is Fall Semester I - Spring Semester I - Fall Semester II - Spring Semester II.

Typical curriculum for the inventor track:

Fall Semester – Year 1

ESI: Methods

Professional Development* (e.g. ENGM 6500)

Elective

Spring Semester – Year 1

BME 6301 ESI: Provocative Questions

Elective

Fall Semester – Year 2

Elective

ESI: Design I

Spring Semester – Year 2

Elective

ESI: Design II

Visionary Track

The visionary track program is a one-year program for physician-inventors who wish to pursue the M.Eng. in Surgery and Intervention in addition to their MD degree. The visionary track is available to residents, fellows, and attending physicians who have already completed their MD degree, and is also approved as an MD-M.Eng. dual degree program for medical students attending Vanderbilt University's School of Medicine, which is completed during a gap year between M3 and M4. Up to 6 credit hours for surgery clerkship or medicine clerkship from the MD degree can be transferred into the 30-credit hour M.Eng. program.

Typical curriculum for the visionary track of the master of engineering in surgery and intervention program:

Fall Semester – Year 1

ESI: Design I (first half)

ESI: Methods

Elective

Elective or Professional Development* (e.g. ENGM 6500)

Spring Semester – Year 1

ESI: Design II (second half)

BME 6301 ESI: Provocative Questions

Elective

Elective or Professional Development* (e.g. ENGM 6500)

Course Descriptions
Within the master of engineering in surgery and intervention, there are five required core courses: one clinical translational immersion course, one core methods course, one professional development course, and two design project courses. The remainder of the degree involves five additional electives that support a central area of engineering skills development for surgery and intervention.
⁺ Substitution of core components may be possible in consultation with the Program Director.
ESI – Immersion:
- BME 6301 — Engineering in Surgery and Intervention: Provocative Questions
  - This course is designed to provide an in depth clinical immersion with a scaffold design involving ten or more physicians from a variety of medical specialties discussing disease and dysfunction background, and the most common and challenging procedures, interventions and treatments in their practice. In addition, the clinical cadre propose provocative questions for added discussion to encourage creativity and lateral thinking. Accompanying didactic lectures relate basic engineering principles to associated procedural medicine topics.
ESI – Methods⁺(examples of satisfying courses are below, not a complete list):
- Devices: CS 5230 — Internet of Medical Things
  - The course covers foundational topics for designing Internet of medical things (IoMT) solutions including systems (devices, interoperability, and integration), algorithms (data design, feature engineering, and time series machines learning), and commercialization (regulatory pathways and entrepreneurship). Case studies motivate challenges, solutions, and future opportunities in IoMT system and algorithm design to de-risk commercialization from concept to market adoption. Upon completion, students will be prepared to engage in commercially-viable IoMT research and development.
- Guidance and Delivery: ECE 5370 — Engineering for Surgery and Intervention
  - Students will gain expertise in a breadth of technical topics of interest in engineering in surgery and other medical interventions, with focus on both theory and project experience. Topics will include interactive data visualization and analysis, image acquisition and reconstruction, registration and optical tracking, image processing, machine learning and deep learning, and bio modeling.
- Digital Health & Data Science: CS 5262 — Foundations of Machine Learning
  - Theoretical and algorithmic foundations of supervised learning, unsupervised learning, and reinforcement learning. Linear and nonlinear regression, kernel methods, support vector machines, neural networks and deep learning methods, instance-based methods, ensemble classifiers, clustering and dimensionality reduction, value and policy iteration. Explainable AI, ethics, and data privacy.
- Image Processing & Image Analysis: CS 6357 — Open Source Programming for Medical Image Processing
  - This hands-on course introduces students to the open-source libraries, tools and techniques for solving medical image analysis problems in research, commercial and clinical settings. The topics will include open-source libraries for addressing visualization needs that arise in medical image analysis, as well as open-source cross-platform software as development based for advanced work. This course will also use best practices, such as version management, needed for generating reproducible results.
- Imaging: BME 7420 — Magnetic Resonance Imaging Methods
  - MR techniques to image tissue for clinical evaluation and research. RF pulses, k-space trajectories, chemical shift, motion, flow, and relaxation. Derivation of signal equations for pulse sequence design and analysis. Course includes hands-on experimental studies.
- Modeling: BME 7310 — Advanced Computational Modeling and Analysis In Biomedical Engineering
  - By the end of this course, the student will understand the details of how to model different biological systems and some of the most current topics in modeling today. Additionally, a sound understanding will be developed between the mathematics of models and their physiological counterparts for future work in biomedical simulation, imaging, and therapeutic/surgical guidance. The student should gain a firm grasp of numerical methods for the solution of partial differential equations at the course conclusion.
- Robotics: ME 5271 — Robotics
  - History and application of robots. Robotic mechanical architecture, mobility analysis of linkages, rotations and rigid body transformations and their parametrizations. Homogeneous coordinates of points and lines, exponential coordinates of rotation and twist coordinates, direct and inverse position analysis of serial manipulators and elimination theory. Serial robot statics and compliance, motion interpolation/path planning, instantaneous kinematics and Jacobian formulations. Lagrangian dynamics of serial robots, and motion control.
Professional Core⁺:
- ENGM 6500 — Engineering Leadership and Program Management
  - Students will learn to apply core principles of leadership and program management as engineering professionals. The course will cover strategic planning, people management, staffing, compensation, business process improvement theory, business interruption, leadership styles, emotional intelligence, negotiation and ethical business practices.
Design Core:
- Six credit hours of BME 7899 are required
  - Students in this course are immersed in an intensive design project working with both clinical and engineering mentors that is focused at cutting edge solutions to contemporary surgical and interventional problems using their enhanced skills in engineering design acquired over the course of their training program.
Electives:
- The remaining 15 credit hours will be chosen from a number of electives. While not a complete list, some possible elective courses available are:
- BME 7110 Laser-Tissue Interaction and Therapeutic Use of Lasers
- BME 7140 Fundamentals of Biomedical Optics
- BME 7310 Advanced Computational Modeling and Analysis in Biomedical Engineering
- BME 7410 Quantitative Methods in Biomedical Engineering
- BME 7425 Physical Measurements on Biological Systems
- BME 7450 Advanced Quantitative and Functional Imaging
- BME 8901 Special Topics – Bioacoustics and Ultrasonic Imaging
- BME 8901 Advanced Drug Delivery
- BME 8901 Special Topics - Synthetic Biology and Cell Design
- BME 8901 Special Topics – Computational Genomics
- BME 8901 Special Topics – Neuroengineering
- BME 8901 Special Topics – Analysis of Brain Networks
- BME 8901 Special Topics – Wearable Technology
- BME 8901 Special Topics – Optical Device Development
- CE 5999 Special Topics - Probabilistic Digital Twins
- CS 5249 Projects in Virtual Reality Design
- CS 5255 Numerical Methods for Computer Science and Engineering
- CS 5260 Artificial Intelligence
- CS 5267 Deep Learning
- CS 5891 Special Topics – Algorithms for Decision-Making
- CS 5891 Special Topics - User Interface
- CS 5891 Special Topics - Network Analysis in Healthcare
- CS 5891 Special Topics - Machine Learning and Natural Language Processing in Healthcare
- CS 5891 Special Topics – Reinforcement Learning
- CS 5892 Special Topics – Formal Methods: Safe and Trustworthy AI
- CS 6352 Human-Computer Interaction
- CS 6355 Intelligent Surgical Robots
- CS 6357 Open-Source Programming for Medical Image Analysis
- CS 6360 Advanced Artificial Intelligence
- CS 6362 Advanced Machine Learning
- CS 6363 Statistical Foundations of Machine Learning
- CS 6367 Representation Learning
- CS 6378 Cyber-Physical AI
- CS 8395 Special Topics – Machine Learning for Dynamical Systems
- CS 8395 Special Topics - Deep Learning in Medical Image Computing
- ECE 5257 Control Systems
- ECE 5284 Integrated Circuit Technology and Fabrication
- ECE 5353 Image Processing
- ECE 5354 Computer Vision
- ECE 5356 Digital Signal Processing
- ECE 5363 Applied Statistical Machine Learning
- ECE 5475 Error Analysis in Safety Critical Systems
- ECE 6303 Nanophotonic Devices
- ECE 6311 Systems Theory
- ECE 6356 Intelligent Systems and Robotics
- ECE 6357 Advanced Image Processing
- ECE 8395 Special Topics – Analysis of Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging
- ECE 8396 Special Topics - Biomedical Microdevices
- ME 5236 Linear Control Theory
- ME 5259 Engineering Vibrations
- ME 5263 Computational Fluid Dynamics and Multiphysics Modeling
- ME 5272 Applied Robotics
- ME 5273 Bio-Inspired Robotics
- ME 5275 Finite Element Analysis
- ME 5280 Advanced Dynamics of Mechanical Systems
- ME 5284 Modeling and Simulation of Dynamic Systems
- ME 5890 Special Topics - Biomechanics of Human Movement
- ME 5890 Special Topics - Materials Selection for Manufacturing
- ME 5890 Special Topics - Energy Storage Systems
- ME 8323 Micro/Nano Electromechanical Systems
- ME 8331 Robotic Manipulators
- ME 8351 Adaptive Control
- ME 8352 Non-linear Control Theory
- ME 8353 Design of Electromechanical Systems
- ME 8364 Nanophotonic Materials
- ME 8391 Special Topics – Optimization and Optimal Control

Engineering in Surgery and Intervention Faculty

Throughout the ESI program, students work closely with Vanderbilt faculty to build solutions to key real-world clinical and engineering problems facing modern surgery and intervention.

Industry Educational Advisory Board

Our Master of Engineering in Surgery and Intervention program works closely with industry and our industry educational advisory board to ensure our graduates learn in-demand skills that will deliver real-world impact.

Stephen Aylward, PhD

NVIDIA

Steven Boronyak, PhD

AtriCure

Shikha Chaganti, PhD

Siemens Healthineers

Steve Chen, MBA

Roche

Rachel Clipp, PhD

Kitware Inc

Jarrod Collins, PhD

Inari Medical

Josephine Granna, PhD

Stryker

Rebekah Griesenauer, PhD

DANNCE.ai

Brandon Harrison

Staubli

Steve Hartmann, PhD

Medtronic

Brandon Hoffman, MBA

Nissha Medical Technologies

Christopher Jarrett, PhD, MBA

Salesforce Inc., Healthcare and Life Science

Petr Jordan, PhD

Onc AI

David Leong, PhD

Analogic

Michael Mellor, MS

Analog Devices

Srivatsan Pallavaram, PhD

Abbott Neuromodulation

Morgan Ringel, PhD

Johnson & Johnson MedTech

Jim Stefansic, PhD, MBA

OmniBuds, Inc

Jaime Tierney Stanton, PhD

RIVANNA

Elizabeth Vasconcellos, MS

ClearPoint Neuro

Jay West, PhD

THINK Surgical, Inc

Jing Zhao, PhD

Medtronic

Since the program's inception, our alumni have 100% placement rate in the Surgical and Interventional domain space within one year of graduation.

28%
Industry
18%
Startup
18%
Academic Research
9%
Nonprofit Research
9%
Consulting
9%
Project Management
9%
Capital Investment & Strategic Management

Contact Information

For inquiries and more information, please contact:

Program Directors:

Jon Heiselman, Ph.D.
Research Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering
jon.s.heiselman@vanderbilt.edu
615-322-1936

Michael Miga, Ph.D.
Professor of Biomedical Engineering
mike.miga@vanderbilt.edu
615-875-8386

Program Manager:

Michelle Bukowski
michelle.bukowski@vanderbilt.edu