<p>Hey, I'm having a difficult time deciding between the BME programs of JHU and Duke. I know they are both top-notch. What are the differences?</p>
<p>As a Hopkins BME grad and a Duke med student who has worked in the Duke BME department, I can definitely try to help. I don’t want to try to rush out a reply right now, but I’ll post something later today. In the meantime, you may want to take a look at some of my other posts about Hopkins BME</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/680101-questions-about-bme-major.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/680101-questions-about-bme-major.html</a>
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/900958-any-bme-students-i-can-talk-out-there.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/900958-any-bme-students-i-can-talk-out-there.html</a>
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/900493-jhu-bme-vs-harvard-bioengineering.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/900493-jhu-bme-vs-harvard-bioengineering.html</a>
<a href=“Cornell vs. Johns Hopkins - College Search & Selection - College Confidential Forums”>Cornell vs. Johns Hopkins - College Search & Selection - College Confidential Forums;
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064523653-post31.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064523653-post31.html</a></p>
<p>i’m in the same situation, except i get a bit more money from Duke. i’m interested as well.</p>
<p>Honestly, I think Hopkins is the pinnacle for BME departments world-wide. It sets the standard with curriculum and everyone looks at BME at JHU as the epitome of all BME programs.</p>
<p>I agree with WealthofInformation, and given the choice I was five years ago, I would definitely pick Hopkins BME again. I loved the program and the way it’s structured/run as well as the faculty, and I think I got an education that would have been hard to beat. That said, the Duke BME program is quite strong, and one of the few nationally that’s on a comparable level as Hopkins. I promise there’s a more detailed comparison to come, but pharmacology unfortunately took more of my time than expected last night.</p>
<p>For tanman:
A surgeon, a cardiologist and a pharmacologist are all captured by terrorists. The leader of the terrorists asks the surgeon: What do you do?
The surgeon replies I help save peoples lives by cutting out tumors and doing organ transplants. The terrorist then steps back and shoots the surgeon to death. The terrorist then goes up to the pharmacologist and asks: What do you do?
Before he can answer the cardiologist shouts No, first let me tell you what I do! The shocked pharmacologist looks at the cardiologist and says Are you crazy, hes just going to shoot you after you tell him.
The cardiologist responds: Better that than another pharmacology lecture.</p>
<p>Lots of differences between campus cultures and setting. Probably more significant differences than between BME offerings - both wll be strong.</p>
<p>Where will you be happier?</p>
<p>I would look at the course offerings at Duke and JHU respectively.</p>
<p>If you look at Duke, especially for the class of 2014, there are a lot of annoying introduction classes you need to take. For me, that’s a big turn-off. JHU is nice in the way that there is no core, but there is distribution requirements, so, for example, you’re required to take 18 credits of humanities. However, you can take whatever you want. </p>
<p>Design Team is pretty important as well. Basically, in design team, you actively take a part in the biotechnology industry by creating a product that has potential for licensing, patents, future research, and ultimately helping patients/hospitals. Hopkins pushes Design Team pretty strongly throughout your four years, even encouraging freshman to take it in the Spring semester. That’s what I’m doing now, actually. I’m not sure how much Duke does.</p>
<p>I would agree with wbwa that there are significant differences in campus culture and that’s definitely something major to consider, but in terms of the BME program, there are also a few differences:</p>
<ol>
<li>Like sozo91 mentioned, the Hopkins BME curriculum gets you involved in BME coursework/research as a freshmen. All freshmen take BME Modeling and Design, and then you are strongly encouraged to join a Design Team. Design Teams are groups of juniors and seniors working on some sort of biomedical design project as their senior design requirement. The projects are proposed by faculty members, biotech companies, physicians etc and you work closely with your mentor/client in developing your solution. It’s a great way to find out as a freshmen what BME really is and to get involved in BME research. I don’t believe Duke BME has any type of freshmen experience (though I may be wrong)</li>
<li>A lot of the basic science requirements are between the programs are essentially the same. The only significant difference is that the biology course required at Duke (Molecular Biology: Genes to Proteins) is in the Bio department while the one at Hopkins is in the BME department. At Hopkins, the courses in the Bio department were very memorization-heavy, while the BME course (Molecules and Cells) were presented in a more theoretical way - there was still a good deal of memorization but exam questions were often presented in a more quantitative, engineering-oriented way. </li>
<li>The physiology requirement: Duke requires 1 quantitative physiology course and gives you a choice of a couple courses. Hopkins requires 3 semesters of quantative physiology for all BME students and all BME students take these courses together. These courses were some of my favorite at Hopkins because they take the basic physiology that any bio major would learn, but study it from a very engineering-based approach. The majority of the homework assignments in these courses are programming problems, attempting to model different physiological systems. I think one of the coolest parts of the Hopkins BME program is the way the first two of these courses (Systems Bioengineering I and II, also called by its old name, Physiological Foundations of BME, or PhysFound) is taught. Unlike most undergrad courses were 1 or maybe 2 professors teach the class, the course is taught a lot more like medical school courses. Professors are brought in to give one or a couple lectures, and the professors who teach are the experts in that particular topic. The professors include BME faculty, other engineering faculty and faculty members from the School of Medicine. I think it’s really cool to be taught each topic by the people who are actually doing the research on the topic and who are the ones cited in our textbooks. </li>
<li>BME course breakdown - there are some differences here. While Hopkins BME gives you a limited number of required BME core courses and then sets you free to pick a concentration area and take the courses you want, Duke instead has a few more core requirements and a few fewer choices with your concentration requirements. Two caveats here: first, Duke and Hopkins are somewhat different in this regard, but the differences are not as drastic as some other schools which only allow 1 or 2 course in your BME concentration area. second, there are strong arguments on both sides of this argument (more core requirements vs more concentration area choices) - I really liked the way the Hopkins curriculum was setup because I could pick the area I liked and go into great detail within that area.</li>
<li>BME core courses: Beyond the physiology courses and the biology course previously mentioned, Hopkins has only 3 other required BME core courses while Duke has 6. What does this actually mean? Hopkins curriculum gives you a broad but shallow overview of the different areas of BME, while Duke requires a few more “basic engineering” courses. As a BME student at either school, you’ll take a EE-style Signals and Systems course, as well as a computer modeling course. At Hopkins, you’ll also take a Thermodynamics course while at Duke, all students take two courses in Biomedical Electronics as well as a Mechanics course and a MechEng course in Structure and Properties of Solids. While these courses are still offered at Hopkins, they’re part of the concentration area choices and are only taken by students interested in that particular field. </li>
<li>Concentration areas - Hopkins has a very open policy when it comes to your concentration area. There is a long list of courses in each of the concentration areas and you pick any 18 credits that you want (a certain number have to be 300-level courses). Duke has a few more “guidelines” for your concentration area. Each of the four areas has a “core” course and you’re required to take core courses for two different areas, and then pick a area, and take 2 more courses in that area. </li>
</ol>
<p>All-in-all, it may seem like I’ve pointed out a number of differences between the Duke and Hopkins BME programs, but in reality, they programs are pretty similar when compared to other programs out there. Both schools also have no shortage of research opportunities because of their medical campuses. I’m personally biased towards Hopkins and I think the biggest selling points (within the BME program) are the freshmen BME experience and the structure of the BME core program (the extremely cool physiology course and the freedom in terms of the concentration area). That said, I would strongly recommend visiting both campuses and seeing where you feel a better “fit”. Honestly, you can do great things at either school, and neither school is going to “keep you out” of the top med/grad/business/law programs or jobs. </p>
<p>Good luck! Feel free to reply or PM me if you have any questions!</p>
<p>Hi, thanks so much for your in-depth analysis of their BME programs, tanman. i think it really helped me to understand some of the finer differences between the two. and i am even more so torn by the choice i will have to be making. 
sorry to bother, but do you think you could you explain more about the differences in their pre-med advising, preparation, connections, and the like?</p>
<p>yes thanks for the details above - very clear (despite being a pain to type!)</p>
<p>It would also be great if somebody could please compare these two somewhat-infamous neighborhoods surrounding the schools. ARGH, this decision is PAINFUL.</p>
<p>I’m much more familiar with Hopkins, and can state with certainty that there is no basis for Charles Village (the neighborhood immediately to the east of the Homewood campus to be infamous. It’s a perfectly fine urban neighborhood. It is a middle to upper middle class neighborhood, filled with students (not just Hopkins students–a lot of Loyola, Towson, and UMd-Balto students live there as well), young professionals, and older, retired types. You won’t find a lot of families with kids because of the school situation. The neighborhoods to the north are even nicer. To the west is Hamden–which is an artsy, funky middle class neighborhood. The only issue is to the south, where Remingon is a middle class neighborhood with occasional issues. </p>
<p>As far as Duke is concerned, it depends on which campus. Freshman live on the East Campus which is surrounded, as far as I can tell, by a neighborhood very comparable to Charles Villages. Upperclassmen are on the West Campus, which because of its size seems largely insulated from any neighborhood except for the side by the Hospital and Med School. I’m not familar enought with that neighborhood to comment.</p>
<p>Bottom line seems to be that the neighborhoods aren’t all that different. There is, however, a lot more going on in Baltimore than in Durham. A lot more.</p>
<p>I think the point that they are different places is the key here. Baltimore is more east coast city living while Durham is a large college town.</p>
<p>I don’t think of Durham as a “college town.” Chapel Hill is a college town, in that not only is it totally dominated by UNC but the culture of the town is academic, intellectual, and rather upscale. Durham was a tobacco town although the industry has been largely decimated. While Duke is obviously a major presence and certain parts of town are dominated by Duke faculty and staff–unlike Chapel Hill, Durham remains relatively poor and working class. Durham is clearly the poor stepchild of the Triangle area compared to Raleigh and Chapel Hill. While I’ve never seen statistics on this, I suspect that most Duke faculty don’t live in Durham.</p>
<p>That’s fair - ^^</p>