Indeed they can be, say a group of scientists and designers led by Harvard University biomedical engineer, Dr. David Edwards.

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"I don't think it represents the creation of an artificial life form, " said biomedical engineer James Collins at Boston University.

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If it pans out, "this enables us to rapidly customize implants for whoever needs them, " said Cornell biomedical engineer Lawrence Bonassar, who co-authored the research published online in the journal PLoS One.

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Biomedical engineer, network systems and data communications analyst, home health aide: those are the top three career fields expected to hire workers between now and 2018, says a story tucked into The New York Times Education Life supplement last Sunday.

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Green, who has been practicing for two decades, and a UM colleague, biomedical engineer Scott Hollister, had been working for years toward a clinical trial to test the splint in children with pulmonary issues when they got a phone call from a physician in Ohio who was aware of their research.

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Since quitting his day job as a biomedical research engineer, he spends every day organizing and cataloging hundreds of samples in ways that make sense to him.

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