CHRISTIANE Gumera was a sickly nine-year-old when she moved to the United States with her parents in 1988. Today, she is a scientist helping to develop materials that can help people regain the use of their limbs.

Gumera had originally intended to become a doctor, but she decided to take up chemical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology?with a minor in biomedical engineering?to help develop solutions to medical problems.

?As a child I often suffered from constant asthma attacks that put me to hospital,? Gumera said as she recalled her early years in San Andres, Manila.

?I knew then that I wanted to make an impact?to help people.?

Gumera is now pursuing a doctorate in biomedical engineering at Georgia Tech, and she is deep into developing polymers?materials like plastic, which are used to make food containers?to repair damaged human tissues.

She and her team, led by assistant professor Yadong Wang of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University, are developing polymers to regenerate damaged central nervous system cells, which are known as neurons.

The human body can repair minor injuries such as small cuts, but not damage to the large peripheral nerve or spinal cord, Gumera says. There is no treatment yet allowing a person to completely recover from a stroke, car accident or trauma because the central nervous system?s ability to regenerate is limited.

But Gumera and her team have developed polymers with molecules that may be implanted on a patient. The molecules would act as a transmitter and send signals to the damaged cells, encouraging them to heal and regenerate.

Medical research is stressful, but Gumera relaxes by playing competitive tennis. She also plays the piano.

?Right now I am working on Chopin?s First Ballade and Mozart?s Fantasy,? she said.

It also helps that she is married to a fellow scientist, Richard Cross, who has a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering and whom she met at MIT.

?He understands the nature of graduate work?that one must do research, have goals, and sometimes work nights and weekends,? Gumera said. Ric M. Pinca