{"298171":{"#nid":"298171","#data":{"type":"news","title":"BioEngineering Day - A Day of Firsts","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EChris Ruffin, the longtime academic advisor for the BioEngineering Graduate Program (BioE), died last summer, leaving behind a lot of friends who remember the positive spirit he brought to the job every day. That spirit was rekindled by the throng of students, faculty and staff at the first ever BioE Day (Monday, May 12), and it was felt keenly by Patricia Pacheco, who knew Ruffin well.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cHe had 100-plus students to work with, but he treated all of us like we were individuals, really went above and beyond to make sure everything went smoothly for every student who came in,\u201d says Pacheco, inaugural winner of the \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/bioengineering.gatech.edu\/hg_news\/290301\u0022\u003EChris Ruffin Graduate Leadership Award,\u003C\/a\u003E announced at BioE Day.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EPacheco is a fifth year Ph.D. student in Todd Sulchek\u0027s lab, has a string of honors and awards behind her, including: an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, Goizueta Foundation Fellowship, NIH-Georgia Tech Biomaterials Training Grant, and the Georgia Institute of Technology Presidential Fellowship.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EShe\u2019s also been a busy participant in the Graduate Leadership Program, which gets to the heart of the Ruffin Award. Among other things, she\u2019s served as Education and Outreach co-chair for the Bioengineering and Bioscience Unified Graduate Students (BBUGS), ambassador and interim vice president of the Georgia Tech Salsa Club, been a mentor to other students, and has been active on the Bioengineering Graduate Student Advisory Committee (BGSAC) and the Latino Organization of Graduate Students.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ESo basically, she does Ruffin\u2019s legacy proud, according to Robert Butera, bioengineering professor and former program director for BioE (2005-2008), who says, \u201cit\u2019s totally appropriate to name a graduate student leadership award after Chris, because he wasn\u2019t just a staff person, he was a leader. Running the BioE program is an important task, with a lot of moving parts, and it required him to interface with all the participating schools and their own rules and cultures. He made it look effortless and easy.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Ruffin Award, like BioE Day, was invented and defined by students in the BioE community. \u201cThey made the nominations, set the criteria,\u201d says Butera, who was asked at the last minute to be the award presented, and notes that Pacheco \u201cplayed a critical role in motivating other students and pitching in to volunteer and help lead student organizations.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAndr\u00e9s Garc\u00eda, current BioE program director, was approached in the spring by students who wanted to create a special day focused on the BioE community, before anyone really was sure what shape it would take. Grad students Jessica Butts and Katie Hammersmith, the BioE co-chairs, originally figured on a program that would last a couple of hours, but as the idea developed, \u201cwe realized we had enough programming to make it a whole day,\u201d says Hammersmith.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe morning began with rapid-fire presentations by students (Ph.D. student Jenna Wilson, from Todd McDevitt\u0027s lab and an NSF-IGERT Stem Cell Biomanufacturing Trainee and GAANN Fellow, won this award). The poster presentation contest was won by Ph.D. students Tom Bongiorno (Todd Sulchek\u0027s lab) and Lauren Priddy (Bob Guldberg\u0027s lab). Bongiorno, also an NSF-IGERT Stem Cell Biomanufacturing Trainee, also\u0026nbsp;won the award for outstanding paper. Jonathan Newman (Steve Potter\u0027s lab), who earned his Ph.D. in 2013, won the outstanding thesis award. Julie Champion, an assistant professor in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and a member of the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Biosciences, was named outstanding advisor.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cSince it was the first year, we weren\u0027t sure what to expect for the turnout, but it ended up being very well attended. We are really looking forward to the event growing in future years,\u201d Hammersmith says. \u201cWe were impressed with the attendance by programs outside of Petit Institute who came to inform students about the many opportunities to enrich their graduate education as well as the high-quality presentations by students.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThere was a cookout, there were games, the highlight being the faculty-student water balloon toss \u2013 the winners were assistant professor J. Brandon Dixon and grad student Josh Hooks, i.e., they were the last team standing (dry). But a major unifying theme to the first BioE Day had to be the Ruffin Award\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cI knew Chris, knew him really well, and what kind a person he was,\u201d Pacheco says. \u201cSo, I\u2019m very honored.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":[{"value":"The first BioE Day showcased faculty and student presentations, community-building games and several new awards, including the first annual Chris Ruffin Award."}],"field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EFirst BioE Day showed student presentations, community-building games and several new awards, including the first annual Chris Ruffin Leadership Award.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"The first BioE Day showed student presentations, community-building games and several new awards, including the first annual Chris Ruffin Award."}],"uid":"27224","created_gmt":"2014-05-17 10:31:35","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:16:26","author":"Megan McDevitt","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2014-05-17T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2014-05-17T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"298181":{"id":"298181","type":"image","title":"Patricia Pacheco","body":null,"created":"1449244552","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 15:55:52","changed":"1475894998","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:49:58","alt":"Patricia Pacheco","file":{"fid":"199464","name":"patricia.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/patricia_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/patricia_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":43694,"path_740":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/patricia_0.jpg?itok=aXnu46av"}},"298201":{"id":"298201","type":"image","title":"Julie Champion Lecturing","body":null,"created":"1449244552","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 15:55:52","changed":"1475894998","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:49:58","alt":"Julie Champion Lecturing","file":{"fid":"199466","name":"img_4640.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/img_4640_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/img_4640_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":1623191,"path_740":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/img_4640_0.jpg?itok=rBBwxXvT"}},"298211":{"id":"298211","type":"image","title":"BioEngineering Day - A Day of Firsts","body":null,"created":"1449244552","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 15:55:52","changed":"1475894998","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:49:58","alt":"BioEngineering Day - A Day of Firsts","file":{"fid":"199467","name":"image_0.jpeg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/image_0_0.jpeg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/image_0_0.jpeg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":801942,"path_740":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/image_0_0.jpeg?itok=ke2wsvFm"}},"298191":{"id":"298191","type":"image","title":"Brandon Dixon","body":null,"created":"1449244552","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 15:55:52","changed":"1475894998","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:49:58","alt":"Brandon Dixon","file":{"fid":"199465","name":"image_5.jpeg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/image_5_0.jpeg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/image_5_0.jpeg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":334099,"path_740":"http:\/\/tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/image_5_0.jpeg?itok=PP7xSLWT"}}},"media_ids":["298181","298201","298211","298191"],"groups":[{"id":"1292","name":"Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience (IBB)"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[{"id":"569","name":"bioengineering"},{"id":"93491","name":"Chris Ruffin"},{"id":"497","name":"Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39441","name":"Bioengineering and Bioscience"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EJerry Grillo\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003ECommunications Officer II\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022ibb.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EParker H. Petit Institute for \u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022ibb.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EBioengineering and Bioscience\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}