A meeting of the Bioengineering Consortium (BECON) was held on Wednesday, December 20, 2000, from 3-5 PM in Room 151 of Building l on the NIH Main Campus. The following text describes the proceedings of this meeting. Action items are italicized.

1. Update on OB³ and the Bioengineering Institute (Dick Swaja) –The institute bill was passed by Congress on Friday, December 15 and awaits the President’s signature.



2. BECON 2001 Reparative Medicine Symposium (Chris Kelley and Lore Anne McNicol) – Dr. Gail Naughton from Advanced Tissue Sciences has accepted the offer to be the symposium’s keynote speaker. An ad for the symposium will appear in the Friday, December 22 issue of Science magazine.



3. Nanotechnology Activities (Jeff Schloss and Eleni Kousvelari) – The final report from the 2000 Nanotechnology symposium is available on the web, http://grants.nih.gov/becon/nanotechsympreport.pdf.



4. Bioengineering Reviewers (Mollie Sourwine) – A list of potential bioengineering reviewers is being compiled for use by CSR when arranging study sections



5. Bioimaging Initiatives (Dan Sullivan) – We are making an effort to update the bioimaging website.



6. Bioengineering Materials and Applications (BEMA) Roundtable Meeting (Dick Swaja and Mollie Sourwine) – Dick Swaja and Mollie Sourwine attended the Dec 4-5 BEMA meeting. BEMA will be hosting their first annual 1 ½ day meeting in June (no date set) entitled "Barriers to Innovations in Biomaterials". In October, BEMA will hold a one-day meeting focusing on research needs and directions in biomaterials.



7. Whitaker Bioengineering Education Summit Meeting and NIH/NSF Collaboration (Dick Swaja and Mollie Sourwine) – The Whitaker Foundation held a Bioengineering Educational Summit from December 8-10 that was well attended by bioengineering administrators and faculty members. The summit focused on educational needs and curriculum design for bioengineering programs. Several areas were identified where NIH and NSF could provide training, funding or resources.



8. BRP Grantee Meeting (Dick Swaja) - The BRP Grantee meeting is scheduled for Friday, March 23.

The next BECON meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, January 17, from 3-5 PM in Room 151 of Building 1 on the NIH Main Campus. A preliminary agenda will be issued about a week before the meeting. Please transmit suggested agenda items to Dick Swaja or Mollie Sourwine.