Adapted from Tommaso Lenzi’s “Building Bionics: How technologies are going to enhance the human body and end physical disability,” this year’s William R. and Erlyn J. Gould Distinguished Lecture on Technology and the Quality of Life, delivered at University of Utah’s J. Willard Marriott Library on March 29, 2023.
The University of Utah has a long history of medical breakthroughs. The first bionic arm was created at the U in the 1970s. And the first artificial heart was implanted at the University of Utah in the early 1980s. Today, we continue this legacy of life-changing technologies.
From a very young age, I knew I wanted to be an engineer. I’ve always had a drive to understand how things work and how to fix them. I discovered the true power of engineering in college and graduate school. Engineers are problem solvers. With millions of people living with physical immobility, I can’t think of a more important problem to solve.