The Franche-Comté Higher Engineering Institute offers an innovative engineering course that meets a real need for engineers whose expertise sits at the interface between the sciences and medicine.

The special feature of the course is its dual focus on both technology and medicine, making it unique in France and rare in Europe. Engineering and life sciences are taught by scientific teaching staff and through collaboration between Besançon University Hospital, companies in the biomedical sector and major research bodies, such as the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the French Medical Research Council (INSERM).
The ISIFC has developed an innovative teaching concept in the form of the virtual company Biotika which allows its students to immerse themselves in the corporate world and develop innovative projects within it.

ISIFC students undertake internships in national and international companies where they learn how to deal with regulatory affairs and quality issues. The ISIFC prepares students for the employment market and participates in the development of specific know-how in the design of biomedical devices in FRANCHE-COMTÉ.

Engineering and biomedical applications
3 options:

• Instrumentation and microsystems
• Biomechanics and materials
• Cell and tissue engineering

BIOTIKA: A virtual company and very real products…
…through which all students learn about how a company is organized and the process of designing and launching biomedical products on the market.

Inventory of the products developed by BIOTIKA:

• Design of a new version of a flexible endoscope awarded prizes by OSEO, a French organization supporting innovation and growth of SMEs, in May 2006
• Simulators for training surgery interns and for clinical investigation
• Development of a low-cost multi-articulated hand prosthesis
• Artificial saliva distribution device for people suffering from dry mouth
• Visiotika, an ocular and infrared environment control system
• Foot mapping
• Physiotika: A predictive measuring device for cardiovascular risk

20,000 students a year

Besançon is one of three faculties in France associating a pharmacy department with a medicine department.

The Medical Sciences and Pharmaceutical Research and Training Unit welcomes more than 3,200 students each year and offers courses in medical degrees, higher university diplomas, vocational bachelor's degrees and master's degrees. Recognized specialisms include cell and tissue engineering and biology, neurosciences and imaging instrumentation as well as computer science.

Students benefit from a particularly stimulating educational environment: 27 research units, the proximity of the FEMTO -ST Institute, a laboratory classified A+ by the Higher Education Directorate and French Federal Institute of Research: Cell and Tissue Engineering and Biology (IBCT – IFR 133) which consists of 10 research structures within the UFC, INSERM and Besançon University Hospital. 

• 2,400 students
• 140 foreign partner universities
• 5 engineering departments
• 450 graduates a year
• 1 apprenticeship-based electrical
engineering course
• UTSEUS - Sino-European University of Technology in Shanghai

The National Engineering Institute in Mechanics and Microtechnology, the only graduate engineering school in France dedicated to microtechnologies.

A national engineering training centre specializing in systems engineering and mechanical and mechatronic microsystems.

• More than 900 students
• 247 graduates in 2008
• 4,600 engineers in employment
• 44 partner universities around the world
• 8 joint degrees: Germany, Spain, Italy, Japan, China, Brazil, Morocco
• An apprenticeship-based engineering course: "Specialization in mechanical and microtechnology production systems"
• 1/3 of the course on industrial placement: engineering placement and engineering project
• 1 master's degree in Industrial Engineering and Innovation
9 optional specializations in the third year, including one specific to medical technologies: "Microsystems and Health".