Annual BME Poster Sessions Bring Undergrads, Grads Together

On March 1, posters made by undergraduate biomedical engineers lined the Grand Ballroom in the Student Union Memorial Center for the department's fifth annual BME Design Day.

The event was sponsored by W.L. Gore & Associates and featured a keynote presentation by Gore engineer Ryan Gapp – a 2014 graduate of BME's undergraduate program and a former UA Engineering Ambassador.

The 2017 winners were:

• First Place: Martin Galaz, senior, for "Mechanical Stimulation Apparatus for Engineered Heart Tissues"
• Second Place: Swati Chandra, sophomore, for "Intermittent Dosing with Sulindac Provides Effective Colorectal Cancer Chemoprevention in the Azoxymethane-treated Mouse Model"
• Third Place: Jeffry Granados, senior, for "Examining Extracellular Matrix Proteins in Healthy and Fibrotic Decellularized Kidney Scaffolds"
• Most Promising Research: Emily Evans, senior, for "Helminth Therapy as a Novel Treatment for Autoimmune Disease: Laboratory Viability of the Necator Americanus Human Hookworm"
• Most Creative Research: Amanda Koiki, senior, for "The Dance of Baseball: An Exploration of Aesthetics"

Joining BME Design Day this year was the UA Biomedical Engineering Graduate Interdisciplinary Program's Builders Day poster session. The graduate winners were:

• First Place: Loi Do, second-year PhD student, for "Analysis of Neurological Diffusion Weighted Magnetic Resonance Imaging Across a Lifespan: Rodent Model"
  Adviser: Ted Trouard
• Second Place: Jeff Watson, third-year PhD student, for "Glioma Resection Using Augmented Microscopy Guidance with Indocyanine Green Contrast"
  Adviser: Marek Romanowski
• Third Place: Vic Keschrumrus, third-year PhD student, for "Engineered Heart Tissues for Titin-Based Disease Modeling"
  Adviser: Henk Granzier

Photo of BME senior Amanda Koiki with her award-winning poster, "The Dance of Baseball: An Exploration of Aesthetics," courtesy of Mia Schnaible. Additional photos are available on the BME Facebook Page.