For Miles Rosen, at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, the intellectual freedom he found at college has become a vehicle for his quest to continually question the scientific and social world around him. 

“The freedom of college academics is not being told something, but asking a question because you want to know the answer.  Questioning how things evolve or how they function allows you to propose your own theories and questions.  In this questioning there is an aspect of creativity and freedom that allows you to go after what you’re interested in.”

Miles is involved in research that is examining the use of a mechanical device to reduce the body’s core temperature. Nearly every August, as football practices begin under the sweltering heat, we hear stories about players over-heating and collapsing on the field. Our bodies have natural means of cooling, which in extreme situations, often fail us. One of those natural responses is through our hands and feet, where the skin is the thinnest. As blood passes through these extremities, it is cooled by the air and then circulated throughout our organs.

The danger of elevated core temperature is not just one that affects football players. People with Multiple Sclerosis, for example also experience physical problems resulting from elevated core temperatures.  And anyone coming out of surgery can experience the difficulties that come with abnormal body temperature while in recovery.  Miles’ work in this area of science has the ability to make strenuous activity safer and surgical outcomes for patients safer and more comfortable.

What Miles and his group of fellow researchers are trying to determine is how these problems can be regulated through a mechanical device. In the form of a glove, this device will combine pressure and reduce or elevate temperature to change the blood’s temperature at a faster rate. More than just engineering or biology — the researchers are using knowledge from diverse fields of science.

“My work with core temperature is appealing to me because it utilizes biology, physiology, and bioengineering,” Miles said. “I thought that it would be a good opportunity to explore many of my interests.”

Miles’ interest in diverse fields of science and his work on easing discomfort through the merging of medicine and other sciences has also given him new insight into the socioeconomic inequality that keeps the poor from accessing health care.  

“It is ridiculous to see how hard it is for people to get medical care or to see a physician,” he says. “I was speaking with a patient who was diagnosed with diabetes. His doctor gave him insulin, but this man lived on the street he didn’t have a refrigerator to store his insulin.” Miles sees his experiences with the homeless and in the free clinic as formative. They have instilled a desire to make science, like the device that he is working on, more practical and accessible to the general public, especially those who don’t always receive the best care.    

“Keeping an open mind was the best thing I could have done in college because it allowed me to explore many tracks I might have missed,” says Miles.  Science continues to raise questions and encourages creativity.  Miles Rosen has explored and used the intersections between those two to define his mission in life to help others with the knowledge he has gained.