Chemical Engineering was one of the founding departments when the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering was established in 1982. The BS degree in ChE was followed by the MS and PhD programs in 1988. I joined the department in 1989 as the 5th tenure/track faculty member when we had 6 graduating seniors and approximately 5 graduate students. The numbers of faculty members and graduate and undergraduate students expanded during the 1990s. With the increase in interest in bioengineering, both nationally and by faculty and students in our department, the department developed the MS and PhD degrees in biomedical engineering in the year 2000. Dr. Teng Ma was hired as the first faculty member with a specific focus on the emerging area of tissue engineering. Dr. Ma was a chemical engineer by education with research in this new field. In this talk, I will discuss my personal reflections on my experiences in chemical and biomedical engineering while providing context to the developments in the field and the close connection between chemical and biomedical engineering. I will also highlight some of the accomplishments of my students and collaborators.

Speaker: Bruce R. Locke, Distinguished University Research Professor and Chair 

Bruce R. Locke is a Distinguished University Research Professor and the Chair of the Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering where he has been a faculty member since 1989. He earned his B.E. with double major in Chemical Engineering and Environmental and Water Resources Engineering from Vanderbilt University in 1980, M.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Houston in 1982 and his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from North Carolina State University in 1989. He performed studies on ultrafine aerosol particles at the Research Triangle Institute in the Research Triangle Park between his MS and PhD studies and is a registered professional engineer. He served as Associate Provost at Florida State University (2012-2018) and he was the Interim Dean of the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering (2015-2016).