Abstract :
Dr. Semahat Demir is the Program Director for Biomedical Engineering at National Science Foundation (NSF). She has lead and participated in 10 other NSF and interagency funding programs. She was the solicitation coordinator for Interagency Opportunities in Multi-Scale Modeling in Biomedical, Biological, and Behavioral Systems (NSF # 04-607). At NSF, she received two awards: Program Officer Excellence Award and Director´s Award for Collaborative Integration. Before joining NSF, Dr. Demir has held the positions of professor of Biomedical Engineering at the Joint Biomedical Engineering Program of University of Memphis and University of Tennessee, Expert Scientist and Consultant (for the Bioinformatics) for The Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey, Technical Manager and Medical Laser Engineer for Messerschmidt Bolkow Blohm and Rodenstock in Turkey, and Research and Development Engineer in the X-Ray Division of the Medical Engineering Center of Siemens Company in Erlangen, Germany. Her academic research expertise is computational modeling of bioelectricity in cardiac cells and bursting neurons. She has developed simulation-based teaching and learning resources including the interactive cell modeling resource, iCell. Semahat Demir received her BS degree in electronics engineering from Istanbul Technical University, MS degree in biomedical engineering from Bosphorous University, and second MS degree, and PhD degree in electrical and computer engineering from Rice University and postdoctoral training at Biomedical Engineering Department, Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Demir has held leadership roles at IEEE EMBS, BMES, ASEE BED, and SWE. She served on the governing boards of 6 technical organizations including IEEE EMB AdCom, ASEE Bioengineering Division and SWE. She is an AIMBE fellow.
