Biomedical Acoustics

What is Biomedical Acoustics?

Biomedical acoustics is the study of how the properties of sound affect the human body. Biomedical engineers leverage acoustical properties in many ways to develop new technologies and improve medical care, ranging from advanced ultrasound techniques to new forms of hearing aids.

Areas of Focus

There are three main areas of biomedical acoustics research at the University of Rochester:

  • The mechanical interaction between ultrasound energy and biological tissues, including therapeutic applications of ultrasound.
  • Ultrasound imaging, including the development of novel strategies for using ultrasound to characterize the mechanical properties of healthy and diseased tissue.
  • Studies of hearing, including:
    • Cellular and molecular studies of the process of sensory reception in the inner ear.
    • The development of drug delivery devices for the inner ear.
    • Studies of the physiological responses of auditory neurons at several levels of the central nervous system in young and aged animals.
    • Behavioral studies of hearing related to sound localization and the processing of complex sounds.
Researchers looking at images and data of cochlear tissue, acquired using optical coherence tomography.

Harnessing Sound Energy

Biomedical Acoustics at Rochester

Work in biomedical acoustics at Rochester takes several different shapes, from understanding the inner workings of the ear’s cochlea to using ultrasound waves to pattern cells to form new blood vessels.

One highly interdisciplinary group conducting biomedical acoustics research is the Hearing & Balance Research Collective, which aims to discover better drug-delivery methods and improve mechanistic and functional understandings of the hearing, balance, and brain connection. Led by Laurel Carney, the Marylou Ingram Professor in Biomedical Engineering, this group of about 20 faculty members and labs from across the Hajim School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, School of Arts and Sciences, and University of Rochester Medical Center.

Meet the Team

Biomedical Acoustics Researchers

Meet the faculty at the forefront of biomedical acoustics research.

Interesting in doing research here as a graduate student? Check out our doctoral training faculty page for a list of biomedical engineering faculty who work with graduate students. 

Headshot of Laurel H. Carney.

Laurel H. Carney, PhD

Auditory neuroscience; neurophysiological, behavioral, and computational studies of hearing; signal processing for hearing aids

Headshot of Benjamín Castañeda.

Benjamín Castañeda, PhD

Development of Point-of-Care Technologies for resource limitted settings. Development of ultrasound-based imaging diagnostic techniques

Headshot of Diane Dalecki.

Diane Dalecki, PhD

Biomedical ultrasound, acoustics, lithotripsy, biological effects of ultrasound

Headshot of Vikram Dogra.

Vikram Dogra, MBBS

Photoacoustic imaging for medical diagnosis, application of high resolution ultrasound for bladder tumor detection and follow-up; high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) for hemostasis

Headshot of Marvin Doyley.

Marvin Doyley, PhD

Advanced ultrasonic and magnetic resonance imaging techniques

Headshot of Denise Hocking.

Denise Hocking, PhD

Regulation of cell behavior by the extracellular matrix

Headshot of Anne E. Luebke.

Anne E. Luebke, PhD

Role of cochlear outer hair cells in hearing and hearing loss, at both the molecular and systems levels

Headshot of Stephen A. McAleavey.

Stephen A. McAleavey, PhD

Development of novel, clinically applicable ultrasound imaging techniques

Headshot of Mohammad Mehrmohammadi.

Mohammad Mehrmohammadi, PhD

Develop novel, hybrid, and ultrasound-based diagnostic methods, and define the clinical utility of the developed technologies as it applies to detection, diagnosis, and therapy of various pathologies

Headshot of Jong-Hoon Nam.

Jong-Hoon Nam, PhD

Biophysics of inner ear sensory cells, cell mechanics

Headshot of Kevin Parker.

Kevin Parker, PhD

Medical imaging, digital imaging, halftoning, and novel scanning techniques using Doppler shift effects

Headshot of Deborah Rubens.

Deborah Rubens, PhD

Ultrasound sonoelasticity; 3-dimensional imaging; contrast agents

Headshot of Scott H. Seidman.

Scott H. Seidman, PhD

Vestibular systems, motor learning, physiological models, multi-sensory integration