[Note: A high resolution photo of John Wikswo is available here.]
John P. Wikswo, Gordon A. Cain University Professor and professor of biomedical engineering, has been named a Fellow of the IEEE (originally the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers).
According to the IEEE, the award recognizes “unusual distinction in the profession and is conferred by the board of directors on a person with an extraordinary record of accomplishments in any of the IEEE fields of interest.” Wikswo is being honored “for contributions to understanding electromagnetic effects on materials and biological tissues.”
He is one of 295 senior members of IEEE that the board of directors named as Fellows effective January 1, 2008. Of those, 183 are from the United States.
Wikswo also holds the titles of A.B. Learned Professor of Living State Physics, professor of molecular physiology and biophysics, professor of physics, and director of the Vanderbilt Institute for Integrative Biosystems Research and Education.
His research includes the study of the electrical properties of cardiac tissue during stimulation, propagation, and recovery from electric shocks of varying intensities; the electrical behavior of intestinal smooth muscle; and the development and application of micro- and nano-scale devices that monitor and control single biological cells and small populations of interconnected cells. He has worked extensively on the magnetic inverse problem, which involves inferring a description of a distribution of magnetic sources from measurements of their fields.
Wikswo received his B.A. degree from the University of Virginia in 1970 and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees, all in physics, from Stanford University in 1973 and 1975, respectively. He joined the Vanderbilt University faculty in 1977.
The IEEE fellowship is the latest in a string of awards Wikswo has received. He is also a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, the American Heart Association (AHA), the Council on Basic Cardiovascular Sciences of the AHA, the Biomedical Engineering Society, and the Heart Rhythm Society. He has been a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow, an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, and an NSF Predoctoral Fellow. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and many professional societies.
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