<p>the e-mail i got, saying that i didnt get into BME, says:</p>
<p>"These programs provide similar (and for some students, superior) preparation for the rapidly growing and groundbreaking field of study where engineering and medicine converge."</p>
<p>what makes their BME program so good?</p>
<p>Sorry to hear you didn’t get into the BME program! </p>
<p>In response to your question, yes! BME at Hopkins is a very strong program in biomedical engineering, but if you have no interested in engineering, then the BME program is definitely not the best major for you. There are a number of other very strong science programs, including Neuroscience, Biophysics and Biology, and if engineering is your cup of tea, there are also some very strong BME-related engineering programs including Chemical and Biomolecular engineering, and Materials Science (which has a biomaterials track, and in which I took almost all of my senior BME electives).</p>
<p>How are the other science majors at JHU, tanman?
I got into BME, but I’m worried I won’t like it, so I want to make sure I can switch out of the program without a significant loss in quality.</p>
<p>The science majors are all strong, well-ranked programs, and they’re all strong in their own right (ie not just as a BME-backup). I’m not sure what your exact interests are, but a number of the departments including Physics, Biophysics and Neuroscience are considered some of the best around. Plus, if you’re interested in a bio-related field (which you probably are, considering you applied BME), you have a wealth of opportunities at the Hopkins East Baltimore campus where the med, nursing, and public health schools and the main hospital are located. You can get involved in research as a freshman (if you so desire) and there are a lot of opportunities, both organized and individually created, to shadow physicians, if you’re interested in pursuing medicine.</p>
<p>I personally loved the BME program, but every year there are a handful of students who realize it’s not for them and switch to another major (mostly to hard-science majors). I think you’ll get a really good feel for the program and what BME actually entails through the Freshmen design course and the optional design team experience (which I highly, highly recommend). </p>
<p>Feel free to ask or PM me if you have any other questions!</p>
<p>@tanman - so many different institutions draw the line between chem/biomol eng & BME differently. At JHU, what do you think are the fundamental differences between the two majors?.. (I didn’t get into BME, I’m just weighing my options)</p>
<p>When I visited as an admitted student, I asked one of the ChemBE professors (I believe the current chair) the same question. His answer (in pretty broad terms) was the ChemBE approaches problems starting from a molecular basis and working “up” while BME starts from a “big-picture” basis and works down. I think his answer reflects the terminology “biomolecular engineering” vs “biomedical engineering”.</p>
<p>In terms of concrete differences between the programs, both programs give you a basic introduction before setting you free to pick your own upper-level classes. Beyond what both majors require (lots of math, chem, thermo, physics), the required courses in ChemBE are (obviously) more ChemE oriented, with everyone taking Transport Phenomena, Kinetics and Seperations. BME core classes are a broader overview of engineering (or at least they’re supposed to be, I think they kinda lean to the electrical/computational side of BME more than the biomaterials/tissue engineering side), followed by a 1.5year series of three quantitative physiology courses, which take the cardiovascular and neurological systems and look at them from a mathematical perspective. </p>
<p>Once you get to the upper level classes (where you’re basically told to pick any X classes from a list), a lot of BME courses (including some of the BME core classes like the physiology class) are acceptable as upper-level electives for ChemBE majors, and vice-versa (I took a number of ChemBE and materials science courses for my BME major)</p>
<p>One thing that might be interesting to look at is the research going on in each department. While you can, as an undergrad, work in any lab in any department, the faculty research interests might give you an idea of how the courses they teach differ between the two departments.</p>
<p>Hope that helps!</p>
<p>Wow, thanks for the well-thought-out answer! It really helps a lot.
Just out of curiosity, around what proportion of the students in your BME program were pre-med?</p>
<p>I would say more than 50% started out thinking they were pre-med, but in the end, about a third ended up going to medical school. It’s not because the other can’t get in, but rather that they realize what they really want to do in life is do research or go into industry, so they end up going to grad school or getting a job. Our split ends up being about a third going each way (med school, grad school, industry)</p>
<p>I’d also like to know this… I’m BME and thinking about premed</p>
<p>@tanman thanks for your perspective! i really appreciate it!</p>
<p>thanks for good insight!</p>