GENDER MINORITIES IN BIOENGINEERING
Building A Sense of Community
Graduate and Undergraduate Student Organization
Gender Minorities in Bioengineering (GMBE) has significantly increased their involvement both on- and off- campus this year. Our student body has greatly expanded as a result of the inclusion of undergraduate students and postdoctoral researchers in bioengineering. Our activities this year focused on developing community, creating mentorship opportunities for our undergraduates, outreach to female K-12 students in San Diego, and finally expanding professional networking and development for both undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral researchers.
To build a sense of community within our organization, we have been hosting on campus social events, such as picnics, study sessions, and game nights and recruiting at the graduate student organization fair. Next year, we are planning several new initiatives to further expand our member base and better prepare our members for future gender-relevant challenges.
We have created a mentorship program called Big Sis-Little Sis Mentorship Program that matches a UC San Diego undergraduate student to a UC San Diego graduate student to provide guidance in navigating academics in college and beyond. To incentivize mentor-mentee participation, we created a point system rewarding mentor-mentee pairs that meet individually once a month and also attend GMBE events. We further host monthly mentorship activities such as a workshop on how to get the most out of the Big Sis-Little Sis program and a tote bag painting event.
In terms of professional development, we hosted a series of career-focused workshops in collaborations with BEGS, including mock PhD program interviews for undergraduate students applying to graduate school. To increase professional opportunities for women and our members, we started a new tradition: Gender Minorites in Bioengineering Networking Night. In this event we gathered 100 graduate students, undergraduate students, postdoctoral researchers, faculty, and professionals from local companies to build connections and bridge UC San Diego students into the next stage of their careers. Networking Night consisted of games, booths hosted by our corporate sponsors, and a keynote speech delivered by Dr. Mary Canady, founder of Biotechnology Networks.
Additionally, in an effort to inspire youthful girls to pursue bioengineering careers we have built a collaboration with the Girl Scouts of San Diego to allow us to bring local girl scout troops on tours of UC San Diego labs followed by extra educational material. This year we toured 3 labs in the Sanford Consortium and gave a talk on how to start preparing for college.
ENGINEERING WORLD HEALTH
Connecting Technology to Global Health
Engineering has never been focused on technology. It has and always will be focused on people and their wellbeing. The most innovative piece of technology will fail compared to a simple piece of technology properly integrated into the community it’s serving. At Engineering World Health our goal is to connect technology to the global health issues that most need it. In practice, this means that we host yearly student-run project teams, which focus on issues from water quality to parasite diagnosis.
Applications to our project teams are in Fall, and over the rest of the academic year these teams work on researching, prototyping, and testing their ideas in preparation for a submission to the international Engineering World Health Design Competition. The projects teach students both engineering skills ranging from 3D printing to building websites, and also give students a chance to learn about the realities of designing technology for different cultures and knowledge levels. To give you a sense of what these teams are like, we’d like to present you Inside Engineering World Health.
Anesthesia Vaporizer
This project aims to address the inadequate resources to provide anesthesia to people in low-resource communities. Normal anesthesia vaporizers rely on compressed gas and electricity which are difficult to obtain in these settings. They are also prone to breaking due to fluctuations in energy grids, as well as due to a lack of knowledge on how to maintain these machines. Our idea on how to address this issue is to create a low-cost drawover vaporizer. Drawover anesthesia vaporizers operate on the patient’s breathing instead of relying on compressed gas containers. These low powered vaporizers can be made with a heating device and a chamber to contain the anesthesia as it goes through its phase transition. A breathing circuit and values will be designed and built along with the machine.
External Fixation
With an increase in urbanization and use of motor vehicles in low resource communities, this project aims to address the spike in the number of bone fractures caused by road accidents. In particular, tibia fractures are particularly common. When these injuries are left untreated, conditions rapidly deteriorate and the possibility of making a full recovery soon vanishes. There are two common treatment methods: internal fixation of the bone, and conservative treatment using traction tables and splints/casts. The implants required for internal fixation are often only available piecemeal, and doctors are often over-eager to jump into such a surgery. Conservative treatments are meanwhile left to people unqualified to perform them as they are viewed as simple. Due to poor infrastructure and hygiene conditions, minimizing the trauma of surgery is essential to the quality of treatment. External fixation provides an alternative to internal fixation—it is relatively safe, minimally invasive, and often provides better end results.
Low Cost Sterilizer
This project aims to address how in surgery, infection control is a challenge. Hospitals in low-resource communities lack adequate decontamination and sterilization equipment, particularly autoclaves. Additionally, a lack of understanding of proper disinfection protocols often contributes to contaminated surgical equipment and greater risk of infection for patients. Our idea on how to address this is a low-cost steam autoclave. This can allow for effective sterilization of equipment in a clinic or hospital setting. Our device can be made with a modified pressure cooker or similar equipment, and it can utilize temperature or pressure sensors to ensure proper sterilization. The design aims to be portable and simple-to-use.
Thyroid Symptom Checker
Our final project is in partnership with another student-organization here at UCSD, Project RISHI. In the village of Vemavaram, India, iodine deficiency, excess salt and oil in foods, and high concentrations of fluoride in drinking water are believed to be causes of thyroid disease. These conditions can lead to hypothyroidism, which is linked to obesity, fertility issues, joint pains, and cardiovascular disease. Current treatments typically involve hormone therapies that require regular monitoring. However, lacking regular access to medical professionals, villagers in Vemavaram must travel to the city of Chilakaluripet to visit a doctor. Our symptom monitoring web application would allow new users to log their symptoms and gain insight into a potential diagnosis, provide links to educational resources, or to help gauge the need to visit a medical professional. The software would also provide patients currently being treated for thyroid disease with a way to monitor their symptoms without the need to make the trek to the nearest health care center.