By Aarah Sardesai | Intern
Baylor’s newest academic addition, the Biomedical Engineering Program, is only in its first year, but it’s already bringing a wave of freshmen who say the major offers something they couldn’t find anywhere else on campus — a blend of engineering rigor, medical purpose and early opportunities to work on problems that matter.
Launched under the School of Engineering and Computer Science, the program is designed to prepare students for careers in medical device design, biomechanics, imaging and graduate study in medicine or research. Faculty such as Dr. Jonathan Rylander, a lecturer in mechanical engineering, described it as a natural fit with Baylor’s mission to combine innovation with service.
“Engineering is a vocation where you can take those gifts and actually leverage it to do good for people,” Rylander said. “You take biomedical engineering specifically, and it’s just enhanced because the thing you’re creating or doing research on, the person has a face, they have value, they’re creation of God.”
In addition to faculty support, this program also has many freshmen excited.
Spring freshman Matthew Tanaka said he entered Baylor as a general engineering major, leaning toward environmental engineering.
“I honestly loved biology as a subject, and I really wanted to do something that would let me make an impact around that, but as I spent more time at Baylor, I learned about biomedical engineering, and it seemed perfect for me,” Tanaka said.
For him, the most exciting part of watching Baylor’s first BME cohort take shape is the sense of discovery.
“It’s a whole new field for me,” Tanaka said. “I’m really interested to see what the principles of biomedical engineering actually look like in practice. It feels like we’re watching a new program being piloted right in front of us.”
Even though he isn’t officially a BME major — at least not yet — he’s already looking at the courses he would take. Tanaka said the major offers classes about things he wouldn’t have had access to under other engineering tracks.
Another freshman’s path began even earlier. Even before Baylor announced the standalone major, Natalia Bricio Camacho from Guadalajara, Mexico, was already searching for a place where engineering and medicine intersected.
“First things first, I was initially attracted to Baylor because I heard it was a really great space for biomedical engineering,” Bricio Camacho said. “I started looking into bioengineering, and I heard Baylor had bioinformatics. I wasn’t completely sure what that meant, but it caught my attention.”
Bricio Camacho soon discovered Baylor’s engineering degree with a biomedical concentration, and that was enough to convince her to join even before a dedicated BME major existed.
For both students, the launch of the BME program sparked a mix of excitement and self-thought.
Tanaka was excited by the idea of a new major, but he said it didn’t necessarily clarify his own path; it expanded it. For him, the launch of the new major signaled that Baylor was ready to invest deeply in a field he cared about.
“It made me really excited,” Tanaka said. “Seeing that Baylor is building a new program from the ground up made me want to explore more.”
That exploration includes the possibility of switching to the major himself. While he’s still deciding, he said the new curriculum’s strengths are hard to ignore.
“The electives are epic,” Tanaka said. “There’s so much biology, so many in‑depth classes about medical devices and biosensors. It’s stuff you don’t get anywhere else.”
For Bricio Camacho, the new major didn’t change her degree plan, but it made her more confident that she had chosen the right university.
“Learning about the new degree helped me explore and compare what each pathway might look like,” Bricio Camacho said. “That’s actually part of the reason why I understood that my current path is exactly where I need to be.”
As a student entering Baylor with a lot of credits, switching to a new major intended for incoming freshmen gave her a big problem when it came to scheduling. Though Bricio Camacho will remain in her own major, she said she hopes to take some of the new classes as biomedical electives in the future.
For both Bricio Camacho and Tanaka, the drive to engineer medical solutions is fueled by a desire to serve, one of Baylor’s values. For Bricio Camacho, the spark was lit in elementary school by a book about the “miracles of science.” She grew up obsessed with the behind-the-scenes lab work of pioneers like Louis Pasteur.
“If you study the human body, it’s another kind of machine,” Bricio Camacho said. “If we can understand how it works internally, then we can learn how to use and improve it properly — and ethically — to do even greater good.”
Tanaka’s motivation is even closer to home. His sister has cerebral palsy and relies on a Vagus Nerve Stimulator to control seizures. Watching the impact of that technology firsthand inspired him to pursue a career in medical devices or research, potentially working with faculty such as Biomedical Engineering Professor and Director Dr. Brent Craven.
“Growing up with her made me feel inspired by the technology that she and the world have,” Tanaka said. “I want to improve it.”
Regardless of whether they are part of the new major or the concentration, the students view themselves as part of a larger community in the School of Engineering and Computer Science.
“Diversity of thought leads to greater ideas,” Bricio Camacho said. “There’s mechanical engineering with a biomedical concentration, electrical engineering with a biomedical concentration, and all of those are pointing in the same direction. All of us are working toward a similar goal, which is to put a little grain of sand into this amazing field.”
As the BME program launches its pilot class, students aren’t waiting to make an impact, either. Bricio Camacho, along with her friend, are currently in the initial stages of building Baylor’s first biomedical engineering club.
Whether through a new degree or a refined concentration, Baylor’s newest engineers are excited to pilot a large change for biomedical engineering at the university.
