My Mentor!

By last week, I had already gone on six research interviews so I started to think about who I wanted to ask for a mentorship. One of my interviews had been absolutely incredible and definitely stood out above the rest, because I felt like I could gain a lot of knowledge from that professional. He also specializes in prosthetics, which is exactly the field I see myself pursuing in the future, because it allows me to directly help other individuals and make the difference I want to make in their lives. So, last Friday I sent out a mentorship request email, and it was honestly one of the scariest things I've ever had to do before. I really wanted to have this professional as my mentor, and I spent the entire weekend constantly checking my email, hoping to have a reply in my inbox. I knew that it usually takes about a week to hear back about a mentorship, so I wasn't necessarily worried when I still hadn't heard back from him on Monday. Then on Wednesday morning, I checked my email in the middle of my ISM class and saw that I had an email notification. I was shaking as I opened the email, but when I saw the words "I would be honored to be your mentor..." I was so excited and couldn't believe it! I can't wait to start my mentorship experience, and I look forward to everything that's still to come in this amazing journey! Over Thanksgiving Break, I want to finish my display board, write interview assessments for all my research interviews, and complete another research assessment so that I'll be ahead of the due dates calendar.

My Speech

This week in ISM, I had my Research Speech and my sixth research interview with a professional. First, I finished up my powerpoint, which would be the visual during my speech, and then I started to practice going through all my slides while timing myself. I didn't really want to simply memorize the speech, because I'll never become a better public speaker that way and there's only so many minutes worth of speaking that a person can memorize. Since this speech needed to be between ten and twelve minutes long, I just wrote myself an introduction and conclusion to memorize, and the rest I based off my slides and the audience's interest as I was talking. The day of my speech, I wasn't nervous at all, surprisingly. I had practiced giving my speech several times the night before, so I knew exactly what I wanted to highlight and had a general idea of all the information I included on the slides. As I was talking, I felt much more confident than I had when I gave my first speech, I was talking at a normal speed, and I didn't stutter or use many filler words at all, so I felt really proud of all the progress I have made so far already in ISM. The other major component of the week was my research interview with an instructor at UT Southwestern. The interview went really well, and I learned so much information about prosthetics and the life of a biomedical engineer. This upcoming week, I will finish another Interview Assessment and start working on my display board in preparation for Research Showcase!

Research Speeches

This week in ISM, I focused on updating my portfolio and preparing for my upcoming research speech. I printed off all my research assessments, interview assessments, and weekly reports, because I hadn't gotten the opportunity to do so for a few weeks now. At this point in my ISM journey, I'm really starting to feel the stress of balancing all my AP classes with the rigor of ISM itself. Especially this past week, I had several tests and quizzes, so it's becoming extremely difficult to put forth my best effort in everything I'm currently involved in. I'm learning just how important it is to manage my time wisely, keep organized, and stay ahead of all of my assignments and homework. Another aspect of this week was working on my research speech, which I'm actually presenting early next week. Because this speech must be between 10 to 12 minutes and I've never given a speech that long, I've been a little nervous about how it will go. I'm planning on organizing my speech into two components: one about the independent research I've done and another about the research interviews with professionals that I've had so far. Because most of my classmates don't know much about the field of biomedical engineering, I hope to share all the knowledge I've gained so far in this program and continue to improve my public speaking skills. This upcoming week, I want to practice my research speech, write another interview assessment, and begin my original work.

Research Interview #4

My fourth research interview was with Dr. Robert Eberhart, who is a Professor Emeritus at UT Southwestern. Dr. Eberhart spends most of his time advising advanced students working on their Master's Thesis and junior faculty members. 

To read my analysis, click here.

Research Interview #3

I had my third research interview with Dr. Shashank Sirsi, who teaches at the University of Texas at Dallas and specializes in image-guided drug delivery for neuroblastoma.

To read my analysis, click here.

Research Interview #2

My second research interview was with Mr. David Wilson, who is part of the teaching faculty at UT Southwestern. Mr. Wilson spends most of his time in the clinic, assessing patients with acute trauma, mainly for lower extremity prosthetics.

To read my analysis, click here.

Bionics

As I delve deeper into the field of biomedical engineering, I still find myself most interested and fascinated by prosthetics. So this week, I chose to focus my research on a subset of prosthetics: bionics. I selected an article highlighting the progress that has been made so far within the field of bionics, and the development of the new i-limb, which is more functional, compact, and longer-lasting than previous models.

To read my analysis, click here.

Targeted Muscle Reinnervation

Through a research interview, I learned the name of a prominent and successful biomedical engineer, Todd Kuiken. As I researched Mr. Kuiken online, I saw that he had given a TED Talk on a prosthetic arms that "feels," which was built using the principles of Targeted Muscle Reinnervation. Therefore, this week I found an article discussing what Targeted Muscle Reinnervation is and how it works.

To read my analysis, click here.

Original Work Proposal

We started off this week in ISM by discussing and sharing original work ideas, because our original work proposal is due next week. In small groups, we looked at some of the examples from last year, so that we could get a general idea about what was expected of us. Then, we took turns sharing any ideas we had currently about our own original work. At first, I had absolutely no clue what I wanted to do, because biomedical engineering is such a diverse field that covers several different topics. However, the more I thought about it, I realized that I wanted to research something to do with prosthetics, possibly the various designs and do a case study on them. When it was my turn to share, my group helped me strengthen my idea and gave me great advice about how I could make the research even more beneficial by targeting a specific group. After combining the suggested ideas with my own, I finally came up with the perfect original work idea. For my original work, I'm going to highlight what's really important about a prosthetic for the patients, and I'll then try to determine what helps the users get the most satisfaction from such a device. I will show a focus group, which will be individuals who use prosthetics at a clinic or hospital, different prosthetics designs and ask them to rate each one for several categories. These categories will include looks, comfort, daily use, design, and functionality. From these ratings, I will analyze all the data to see what the optimal prosthetics design would be, so the patients' needs are met and the aspects they value the most are present in the device. This upcoming week, I will complete my original work proposal, write interview assessments, and prepare for my research speech, which is in a week!