My philosophy has been to understand the basic mechanisms of disease at the microvascular level rather than treatment of the disease. As a Bioengineer I have applied physical sciences and engineering principles to biomedicine to create new knowledge and to use this knowledge for understanding human diseases and improving health care. I have used my research to translate this knowledge from bench to bedside. To just treat a disease with medication is of importance, but of even more significance is an understanding of the microvascular mechanisms that fail when a tissue or organ is diseased. Dedication and hard work best describe my work habits. The success of my research endeavors came about only because I never gave up on a research project due to its difficulties or failures. My passion for the microcirculation is evident, since I have remained in the Microcirculation Laboratory (University of California, San Diego) for nearly fifty years. I have made seminal contributions to a wide range of areas including hypertension, shock (sepsis, hemorrhagic) and developing technologies for treatments for understanding human diseases and improving health care (breath analysis, novel techniques for identification of proteins in tissues). I have maintained long-standing collaborations with other research laboratories and was the recipient of two prestigious microcirculatory awards. In 1980 I was awarded the Malphigi Gold Medal Award, by the European Societies for Microcirculation and the Lafon Award, by the European Societies for Microcirculation in 1994. In 2006 I was made a Special Invited Professor at the Institute of Microcirculation in China (Peking Union Medical College, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences). I am the author of numerous manuscripts and multiple patents have been awarded to me for treatments of shock and Type 2 diabetes and the development of technology (breath analysis) for the diagnosis of the onset of shock. My current research is understanding how digestive enzymes escape from the gut in aging and how to minimize the leakage of digestive enzymes and maintain the mucosal layer in the small intestine. Since digestive enzymes are unable to distinguish tissue from food, they break down collagen and destroy many receptors on cell membranes, such as the insulin receptor which leads to Type 2 diabetes. Of special interest in the most recent manuscript was the observation of elevated levels of trypsin in the brain and skin of aged rats and its prevention by administration of a protease inhibitor to the drinking water. The ramifications of this study are numerous. Many illnesses and diseases associated with aging could in part be linked to leaking digestive enzymes over time. Dementia (neuron destruction) and skin wrinkles (collagen degradation) are prime candidates for our basic hypothesis.