Greg W. Burgreen This is Me

Education

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1. 1. www.asaio.net

   www.asaio.net/index.php?src=ge - [Cached]

   Published on: 4/29/2006   Last Visited: 3/7/2007

   Greg Burgreen, PhD Associate Research Professor Mississippi State University

2. 2. Newswise

   www.newswise.com/articles/view - [Cached]

   Published on: 2/1/2005   Last Visited: 2/1/2005

   Mechanical engineer Greg Burgreen, an authority in computational fluid dynamics, is concentrating on the “complexities of blood flow” as part of a Jarvik Heart/University of Maryland project to design implantable ventricular assist devices for children.
   
   “You may have the most efficient (heart) pump in the world, but if itâ€s damaging the blood, you have to start over,” said Burgreen, an associate research professor at the SimCenter (simulation center) of the universityâ€s ERCâ€"formerly the Engineering Research Center.
   
   He said the latest Jarvik heart pumps used in adults are only the size of D-cell batteries, but still create blood-flow problems in children because of their smaller body size and limited blood volume.
   
   “Our aim is to miniaturize an adult-size pump for use in a child or infant,” he said. “However, at that size, the rotor or turbine inside the pump would have to turn at 24,000 RPM, just like a (food) blender. You want to make sure the blood is not being damaged.”
   
   Despite the enormity of the challenge, he said researchers hope to design a pump no larger than the size of an AA battery for childrenâ€"and about half that size for infants. “But,” Burgreen cautioned, “thereâ€s a limit to what man can do through engineering to replicate what our Creator has done perfectly.”
   
   Reared near Huntsville, Ala., and a 1981 East Limestone High School graduate, he came to MSU two years ago after eight years with a University of Pittsburgh medical research team.
   ...
   Burgreen, a former Griffith colleague at Pittsburgh, is participating in the project through a $100,000 subcontract--utilizing the computer simulation resources and high-quality grid generation technology of Mississippi Stateâ€s ERC SimCenter. The center is directed by mechanical engineering professor David Marcum, who earlier collaborated with Burgreen during his pump research at Pittsburgh.
   ...
   Burgreen received bachelorâ€s and masterâ€s degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Alabama-Huntsville before earning a doctorate in the discipline from Virginiaâ€s Old Dominion University in 1994. It was while at ODU that he became close friends with fellow student James C. Newman III, now an MSU associate professor of aerospace engineering who helped lure Burgreen to Starkville.
   
   “My primary interest is to optimally design fluid-contacting surfaces,” said Burgreen, explaining that he formerly helped design airplane wings at NASAâ€s Langley Research Center before turning his research attention to heart pumps.
   
   “At Pittsburgh, I spent eight years learning about the complexities of blood flow in a biomedical device,” he said. “During that time, we literally went from a napkin sketch to a finished, implantable prototype.”
   
   A number of U.S. companies are developing various kinds of mechanical heart pumps, including at least five teams working on pumps for kids. Over the years, Burgreen has consulted for several of them, including California-based Thoratec Inc. and its subsidiary, Nimbus Inc.; Vascor Inc. of Pittsburgh; MedQuest Inc. of Salt Lake City, Utah; and Cardianove Inc. of Montreal, Canada. All are major players in the design and development of rotary blood pumps.
   
   Essentially, Burgreen creates mathematical algorithms and applies computational fluid dynamics to blood-flow models, providing new computer software tools to help perfect smaller and more efficient artificial hearts.
   ...
   Burgreen said he currently is developing a “new generation simulation software” that can be broadly applied to integrate design and analysis research across diverse disciplines such as computer-aided design, computational structural mechanics, turbulence modeling, heat transfer and multi-component fluid flow.
   
   “Weâ€re distilling 10 years of trial and error, successes and failures, and drawing it together into a package we think will be revolutionary,” he said. “The MSU SimCenter has the critical mass of research expertise and facilities to pull it off.

3. 3. AP Wire | 05/19/2004 | Mississippi engineer helps create world's first artificial heart for babies

   www.sunherald.com/mld/thesunhe - [Cached]

   Published on: 5/19/2004   Last Visited: 5/19/2004

   But in six months, Mississippi State University engineer Greg Burgreen hopefully will have designed the prototype of an artificial heart small enough for children to use. "It will be the size of a AA battery with an even smaller model for infants," Burgreen said.
   
   New York-based Jarvik Inc. hired Burgreen as part of a research team that will spend at least three years creating an artificial baby heart. Jarvik had already created a thumb sized heart for adults.
   
   "The cost of developing an infant heart was too high for a private manufacturer because the market is much smaller," Burgreen said. Then the National Institute of Health offered Jarvik a $5 million grant to produce such a device.
   
   The average cost to produce an artificial heart prototype is $20 million, Burgreen said.
   
   Burgreen will handle the project's first phase at he university's SimCenter, a cutting edge computer simulation lab. The computers can translate dry numbers and stress tests into vivid graphics to show Burgreen how the heart will perform inside an infant's body.
   
   "They are as amazing as what comes out of George Lucas's Industrial Light and Magic," said Burgreen, referring to the special effects studio of "Star Wars" movie director Lucas.
   
   The biggest risk an artificial heart poses to an infant is blood damage, Burgreen explained. Artificial hearts contain small turbines.
   
   "They have blades just like a food blender's," he said. The blades must turn at 24,000 revolutions per minute to pump blood for an infant. If they accidentally tear the membrane around red blood cells, the bloodstream can become contaminated with toxins.
   
   MSU computer models will analyze how well blood cell membranes withstand the heart that Burgreen designs.
   
   "The models take numerical data and literally draw me a picture," Burgreen said.
   ...
   Burgreen used his skill to design jet wings for NASA. He was a consultant for numerous firms that design heart pumps.
   ...
   "The artificial heart is the Holy Grail for fluid dynamic engineers," Burgreen said.