Glossary
Biomedical Engineer Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential biomedical engineer terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key biomedical engineer vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in biomedical engineer training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- 510(k)
- FDA clearance pathway.
- ABET
- Engineering program accreditor.
- Biocompatibility
- Safe in the body.
- CAD
- Computer-aided design.
- Clinical trial
- Study in people.
- Design controls
- FDA design process rules.
- DHF
- Design history file.
- FDA
- Food and Drug Administration.
- FE exam
- Fundamentals of Engineering exam.
- ISO 13485
- Medical device quality standard.
- PE license
- Professional Engineer license.
- Risk analysis
- Finding hazards.
- Specification
- Detailed requirements.
- Validation
- Did we build the right thing?
- Verification
- Did we build it right?
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Biomedical Engineer practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Biomedical Engineer training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.