Book excerpt: In the past few years Biomedical Engineering has received a great deal of attention as one of the emerging technologies in the last decade and for years to come, as witnessed by the many books, conferences, and their proceedings. Media attention, due to the applications-oriented advances in Biomedical Engineering, has also increased. Much of the excitement comes from the fact that technology is rapidly changing and new technological adventures become available and feasible every day. For many years the physical sciences contributed to medicine in the form of expertise in radiology and slow but steady contributions to other more diverse fields, such as computers in surgery and diagnosis, neurology, cardiology, vision and visual prosthesis, audition and hearing aids, artificial limbs, biomechanics, and biomaterials. The list goes on. It is therefore hard for a person unfamiliar with a subject to separate the substance from the hype. Many of the applications of Biomedical Engineering are rather complex and difficult to understand even by the not so novice in the field. Much of the hardware and software tools available are either too simplistic to be useful or too complicated to be understood and applied. In addition, the lack of a common language between engineers and computer scientists and their counterparts in the medical profession, sometimes becomes a barrier to progress.