Dr. Gan Receives George Lynn Cross Research Professorship

Rong Zhu Gan

Dr. Rong Gan has received the George Lynn Cross Research Professorship, the highest research and creative activity honor given by the University to a faculty member who has demonstrated outstanding leadership over a period of years in his or her field of learning or creative activity. Join us in honoring Dr. Gan for this remarkable achievement!

Dr. Gan came to OU in 1999 after serving as the Director of Biomedical Engineering at Hough Ear Institute in Oklahoma City and has been a part of AME since. She says this is because of her strong foundation here at AME. She has a “good connection with the Health Science Center and the Norman Campus.” Dr. Gan said she also has a lot of support here from her mentors, the University, and the “excellent students.”

“No matter what kind of student, no matter their background,” Dr. Gan says, “you have to pay attention to them and guide them.” You have to, “know how to mentor them because they are so important to research.” Dr. Gan wants students to be motivated for their future because the future is, “totally in their hands.”

Dr. Gan says the George Lynn Cross Research Professorship is a huge recognition of accomplishment for her research and education, two things, Dr. Gan says, “are connected and can’t be separated.” She says researchers must-have, “100% confidence in their original area, but have to look for a new direction because there must be innovation to solve the problem.” Dr. Gan’s advice for researchers is to seek innovation, collaboration, and for them to publish their work. She says for people to, “always keep good motivation and to work hard,” for the benefit of future generations.

See the article below for more information about Dr. Gan’s research and awards:

With her strong background in biomechanics and implantable devices, Dr. Gan has developed a truly transformational, well-funded research program at OU in Biomechanics for Protection and Restoration of Hearing, including implantable hearing devices, dynamic properties of ear tissues, auditory function tests, and computational modeling of sound and blast wave transmission through the ear.

As PI for all of her funded research projects, Dr. Gan has built an exceptionally strong research group that simultaneously conducts physical experiments in animals and human cadavers as well as foundational 3D computational modeling of human and animal ears.

The ability to carry out all these research activities covering both basic and applied research, instrumentation, data acquisition, theoretical modeling, and device design and testing in one lab is Dr. Gan’s research strength. She uses biomechanics systems approaches as fundamental methods with the goal to develop innovative technologies for measuring sound or blast wave transmission through the ear and the 3D physics-based computational model of the human ear for an understanding of hearing and protection mechanisms, improving diagnosis of middle ear diseases, and serving as a tool for the design and evaluation of implantable hearing devices and hearing protection devices.

Dr. Gan’s research work has been mainly funded by highly competitive grants from Federal and State government agencies such as the DOD, NIH, NSF, OCAST, and the Whitaker Foundation. Particularly in recent years, Dr. Gan’s research activities have been extended into new areas of biomechanical modeling and measurement of blast injury and hearing protection mechanisms for U.S. military priority research. This innovative development is based on original concepts of normal sound transmission through the ear and stimulated by Dr. Gan’s scholarship in the areas of measurements in human cadaver and animal ears and the finite element modeling of sound transmission through the ear.

Dr. Gan’s research has resulted in numerous publications and led to breakthroughs in implantable devices, computational modeling, and therapeutics for hearing restoration with 4 patents (two pending approval). She is a world-class researcher, a truly exceptional scholar, and among the very best educators we have at the University of Oklahoma. Her research has a direct impact on human health in terms of restoring hearing and improving the quality of life for the 38 million Americans with hearing impairment and providing hearing protection for military personnel. The George Lynn Cross Research Professorship award is a recognition of her superb research productivity and remarkable contributions to biomedical engineering research and education at the University of Oklahoma.

Click here to find the Norman Campus Faculty Tribute Award article written about Dr. Gan.

Parisa Marashizadeh Receives Nancy Mergler and Bullard Dissertation Completion Fellowship

AME is proud to share that Parisa Marashizadeh, a Ph.D. candidate in Mechanical Engineering, has received the Nancy Mergler and Bullard Dissertation Completion Fellowship! This fellowship is awarded to doctoral candidates who are in the final phases of dissertation writing.

Marashizadeh is originally from Iran, where she received her master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Polytechnic University in Tehran in 2015. She started her Ph.D. program here at OU in 2017 where she began work with Dr. Yingtao Liu in multi-scale modeling of hybrid fiber composites.

Her work as a graduate teaching assistant at AME, “helped [her] to gain teaching skills essential to [her] academic career.” Marashizadeh also enjoys, “working with the kind and supportive staff, faculty members, and students.”

During her research, she has evaluated the interfacial properties of ZnO nanowires hybrid fiber-reinforced composite structures numerically at multiple length scales. The applications of fiber-reinforced composites have increased significantly in different engineering fields due to their outstanding properties, such as lightweight and high strength. For example, 50% of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner is made of fiber composites. The strength and toughness of composites greatly depend on the fiber-matrix adhesion (interface) properties through multiple length scales.

“With the [Nancy Mergler and Bullard Dissertation Completion Fellowship],” Marashizadeh says, “she has time in the last semester to, dedicate to completing [her] dissertation.” She says, “every Ph.D. student struggles with the last semester, it’s difficult to complete your dissertation, prepare your defense plan, and look for a PostDoc position.” She’s very grateful for the award and would like to thank Dr. Liu for supporting her. Marashizadeh plans to receive her Ph.D. in the Spring of 2022,  and afterward, she hopes to find a PostDoc position.

Marashizadeh’s advice to students is to, “fall in love with what you are doing and try your best because each of us can do a lot we just need to be focused and try.”

Below is a full summary of Marashizadeh’s research importance and accomplishments. Congratulations Parisa!

The applications of fiber-reinforced composites have increased significantly in different engineering fields due to their outstanding properties, such as lightweight and high strength. For example, 50% of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner is made of fiber composites. The strength and toughness of composites greatly depend on the fiber-matrix adhesion (interface) properties through multiple length scales. One novel approach to enhance the fiber/polymer adhesion properties is growing Zinc Oxide (ZnO) nanowires on the fiber surface. It is very critical for industrial companies to evaluate the impact of hybrid composites on the performance of the structures before considering them for production. However, due to the complexity of the theoretical and experimental analysis of such a hybrid structure, especially the nanomaterials, numerical analysis is required to understand this system’s efficiency on the performance of the composite.

In this research work, a numerical approach is developed to evaluate the enhanced properties of the hybrid composite structures by breaking the complicated system into multiple levels and investigate the properties of each level separately. There are four different length scales in the hybrid composites, which can be summarized as (a) ZnO nanowires with various diameters and lengths at the nano-scale, (b) the intermediate composition in which ZnO nanowires are grown on the fiber and embedded in the matrix (micro-scale), (c) the adhesion bonding between the fiber and the matrix (meso-scale), (d) the overall properties of the hybrid composite, the related failure analysis and performance of the structure at different loading conditions (macro-scale). Each of the mentioned length scales has its specific theories and properties that should be explored to evaluate the hybrid structure’s performance. Multi-scale modeling is developed in my research to make a bridge between the analysis at different scales to estimate the general behavior of structures containing materials at different length scales. The overall goal of multi-scale modeling techniques for hybrid composites is to combine the mechanical theories at different length scales and understand their static and dynamic behaviors under various loads and environmental conditions.

The dissertation elements and the completion plan is based on the steps in the multi-scale approach. According to the research plan, the dissertation is categorized into two main parts. The first part, which covers around 60% of the total dissertation, consists of the micro-scale, meso-scale, and macro-scale analysis. These three parts are completed, and the results are published in three journal articles and two conference papers.

The second part weighing around 40% of the dissertation, is based on the atomistic modeling and analysis of the hybrid composite materials. According to Marashizadeh’s research plan, the nano-scale analysis itself is divided into two sections. In the first part, the atomic structure of a single ZnO nanowire, polymer matrix chain, and Carbon fiber is simulated. The materials are assembled, and Molecular Dynamics (MD) simulation is employed to evaluate the adhesion strength between graphene and the matrix. This analysis part is completed, and a journal article has been prepared based on the obtained results. The article has been submitted and is under review. In the second part of the nano-scale section, the effect of multiple ZnO nanowires’ diameters and lengths on improving the interfacial adhesion between fiber and enhancement layer are being explored. She plans to complete this section by July 2021 and prepare another journal paper based on the outcome. Then, Marashizadeh will combine all the numerical analyses performed at different levels and develop a multi-scale framework to report the impact of grown ZnO nanowires on the properties of the hybrid composites.

 

Dr. Aman Satija Gives Seminar Over Development and Application of Laser Spectroscopy for Gas-Phase Diagnostics

Last Friday, Dr. Aman Satija gave a seminar over, “Development and Application of Laser Spectroscopy for Gas-Phase Diagnostics.” Dr. Satija is a Research Engineer at the Applied Laser Spectroscopy Lab at Purdue University.

Abstract: Laser diagnostics are employed in combustion and propulsion research due to their non-intrusiveness to the flow field, high-accuracy, and fast response time. Laser based techniques are used for measuring important flow parameters such as temperature, pressure, velocity and species concentration. Some laser methods, based on linear optical processes, such as absorption spectroscopy and particle image velocimetry have matured to an extent that they are commercially available and are being actively used in the industry. In this seminar, Dr. Satija will provide a survey of his research in quantitative non-linear spectroscopic methods and high-repetition rate diagnostics. He will: a) discuss the similarities and differences between various types of nanosecond coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) methods along with some applications b) present recent developments in chirped-probe-pulse femtosecond CARS for 5 kHz thermometry c) describe the principle of polarization spectroscopy and present its application towards measurement of minor species in reacting flows d) discuss progress of high-average power high-repetition lasers and present examples of high-repetition rate diagnostics in turbulent atmospheric and high- pressure combustion and e) comment on the challenges and opportunities of quantum modeling of nonlinear light-matter interaction in context of atoms and small molecules.

Bio: Aman Satija is currently a research engineer at the Applied Laser Spectroscopy Lab at Purdue University. His research interests include spectroscopy, photonics, combustion and fluid mechanics. His expertise is in the development of laser-based techniques and tools and their application to gas-phase environments. He has applied linear and non-linear spectroscopic techniques in a variety of applications including laminar flames, turbulent flames and plasmas. Aman received B.E in Mechanical Engineering from the Army Institute of Technology, Pune University in 2002, M. Sc. in Aerospace Engineering from Auburn University in 2007 and Ph. D. in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University in 2013.

Dr. Zhengwei Li Gives Seminar Over Advanced Manufacturing of Emerging Bioinspired Systems: From 3D Curvy Electronics to Living Machines

On Wednesday, we heard from Dr. Zhengwei Li, a Postdoctoral Fellow for Bio-Integrated Electronics at Northwestern University. He gave a seminar over, “Advanced Manufacturing of Emerging Bioinspired Systems: From 3D Curvy Electronics to Living Machines.”

Abstract: Grand challenges facing human society in the 21st century mostly emerge at the interface between human and machines. To efficiently tackle these challenges, the development of future real-world technologies will depend strongly on our understanding of the principles underlying living systems and utilizing these capabilities in forward design of synthetic systems. In this talk, I will present our recent experimental and theoretical studies on emerging bioinspired systems including, Design and Manufacturing of, 1) Artificial Compound Eye Camera, 2) Arbitrary 3D Curvy Electronics, 3) Biohybrid Valveless Pump-bots and 4) Pump-bots with Flow Loop Feedback powered by engineered skeletal muscle. Underlying mechanics theories, design and fabrication approaches, potential biomedical applications, and the future of biohybrid designs will be discussed. The successful investigation of these systems will not only boost our capability in developing new materials, devices and robotics that possess unprecedented functions and capabilities, but also inspire new technology development for applications toward solving real world problems in health, medicine and robotics.

Bio: Dr. Zhengwei Li is currently a postdoctoral fellow, working with Prof. John A. Rogers in the Center for Bio-Integrated Electronics at Northwestern University, where he works on the wireless electronics manufacturing for healthcare applications. He also had previous postdoctoral research experience in biomanufacturing, working with Prof. Taher Saif in the Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Dr. Li received his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering in May 2017 from University of Colorado Boulder, where he won the Outstanding Dissertation Award (one recipient each year across all different engineering disciplines). His primary research interests includes design and fabrication of biohybrid robotics (“Bio-bots”), 3D curvy electronics and soft functional materials.

AME Alumni Highlights: Dr. Ozgur Pulat and Victor Tran

AME is delighted to have such talented Alumni who continue to make us proud after graduation. This month, we’re highlighting Dr. Ozgur Pulat, who graduated with his Ph.D. from OU in 2007, and Victor Tran, who received his undergraduate and graduate degree from OU.

Ozgur Pulat, PhD

Current Position:  Engineering Manager, Projects
Business Line:  Subsea Production Systems
Group:  Control Systems
Company:  Schlumberger
Location:  Celle, Germany

I manage a team of Lead Engineers who deliver subsea production control systems to oil companies like BP, Chevron, Total, etc.  My career began in February of 2007 after I graduated from OU with my Ph.D.  I started as a design engineer in new product development, then led an emerging technology project to develop a production reservoir power generation device for completion systems.  I earned two US patents from this work and moved on to become a team leader, then a project manager, and now an engineering manager.  During my career, I have always emphasized proficiency in both technical skills and maintaining strong people skills.  I believe this is what has allowed me to grow in my career and find success in the various positions I have held. During my undergraduate years at OU, I became very fond of learning and research.  I spent 2 years as an undergraduate research assistant for Dr. Sutton working on the OU supergas product researching alternative fuels.  My love for Fluid Mechanics was found during my first course with Dr. Parthasarathy and grew into my research focus for my Ph.D.  Along the way, I made many friends with whom I still speak today.  I was also involved in the Engineering Club and the Formula Team.

During graduate school, I graciously accepted a GAANN fellowship working on research topics in the area of energy.  My fellowship led me to teach multiple courses like Engineering Dynamics, Fluid Thermal Lab, Fluid Mechanics Lab, and Solid Mechanics Lab.  I believe this is where my passion for teaching and leading first began.  This experience gave me the confidence to know that I could lead and teach people.  This confidence has brought me to where I am today.

One of my favorite memories as an OU student was attending the football games and the Engineers weeks that we used to celebrate.  All the fun culminated in the “Fluid Mechanics Lab” where we would celebrate with our fellow students and teachers.  It really was a great experience.

My graduate degree has really helped me in my career progression.  Working on a graduate research topic required me to learn how to take a complex problem, break it down into smaller problems, and educate myself on the topic.  Additionally, it taught me how to regularly communicate progress to my stakeholders, and communicate confidence in my progress and results.  All of these key lessons have served me very well in my career where I am constantly challenged with new topics that I may not know anything about technology.  Additionally, my graduate degree has given me a profile within my company where people know that I have these skills as I have been able to conduct independent research during my graduate education.  This gives people the confidence in knowing I have the right profile to be trusted with complex problems that are of high priority to my organization.

obbypulat@gmail.com

Victor Tran
Current Position: ISS Flight Controller

Undergraduate and Graduate Experience: BS and MS in Aerospace Engineering.

I started out as an engineer in Flight Test for Boeing. After a couple of years, I transitioned to my current job here at NASA at the Johnson Space Center, where I’ve been for the last six years. In my current role, I support real-time operations in the Mission Control Center (MCC) and mission planning for the International Space Station (ISS) program.

There are a lot of people that can be an expert in something, but not many can clearly and efficiently communicate their thoughts and ideas. My experiences in obtaining my master’s degree allowed me to further develop my critical thinking and communication skills. This has helped me throughout my career, as I’ve built upon these skills, to ensure mission success for any projects I’ve worked on or lead. This has provided me with more opportunities for growth professionally and personally.

One of my favorite memories at OU is getting Sam Bradford’s autograph my freshman year in the South Oval.

Learning doesn’t end when you are done with school. Always be driven to continue to learn and apply that knowledge to the improvement of your team and yourself. And no matter what task you’re given, give it your best effort and be open to feedback.

victor.h.tran@nasa.gov

Dr. Bin Xu Gives Seminar Over Physics-based/ Data-driven Diesel Engine Waste Heat Recovery and Hybrid Vehicle Propulsion System Energy Management for Fuel Efficiency Improvement

Dr. Bin Xu, a Research Assistant Professor for the Department of Automotive Engineering at Clemson University, gave a seminar on Monday, March 8 over “Physics-based/ Data-driven Diesel Engine Waste Heat Recovery and Hybrid Vehicle Propulsion System Energy Management for Fuel Efficiency Improvement.”

Abstract: For internal combustion engines, the engine efficiency is generally below 40% for gasoline engines and 50% for diesel engines. For a heavy-duty diesel engine, around 40-60% of energy is wasted as heat via exhaust gas, EGR cooler, and coolant. Waste heat recovery (WHR) techniques have the potential to achieve the fuel economy and emission reduction goals for its mature technology and high efficiency. Conventional modeling and power analysis in WHR system focus on static engine operating conditions, whereas engine experiences torque variation even at highway conditions. To overcome the research gaps in dynamic modeling, control and optimization over highly transient engine operating conditions, a series of systematic modeling, control, optimization and experimental validation work are conducted to understand the characteristics of the WHR system and maximize the waste energy recovery. According to dyno test result, 3% absolute break thermal efficiency improvement is achieved in a 13L diesel engine with the developed WHR system.

The automotive industry is in the pace of reforming from petroleum-dependent to renewable energy-dependent for better sustainability and environmental friendly goals. Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) is the first step towards the propulsion system electrification. With a given vehicle hardware, one key factor affecting the fuel consumption is the energy management of the engine and the electric motor, which could lead to 20% fuel consumption variation. Conventional energy management strategies (EMS) are either rule-based or model-based. Rule-based EMS lacks optimization and leaves large room for fuel saving. Model-based EMS like model predictive control depends on reduced order models, which require long time to build for the complex vehicle propulsion system and sacrifice model accuracy for short computation time. Model- free reinforcement learning (RL) based EMS is proposed to address the optimization concern of rule-based methods and reduced order model development concern of model-based methods. Parametric study is conducted to interpret the RL state/ action/ reward selection and their impact on fuel economy, which is supported by value functions and policy maps. An ensemble RL framework is proposed to integrate RL with conventional EMS methods for better fuel economy. Moreover, two warm start methods are proposed to reduce the learning time of RL as much as 68%.

Bio: Bin Xu joined the Department of Automotive Engineering, Clemson University in March 2020 as a Research Assistant Professor. Prior to coming to Clemson, Dr. Xu was a Research Scientist at the Stanford University. Dr. Xu received his B.S. degree from Hunan University China in 2013, Ph.D. from Clemson University in 2017, both in Automotive Engineering. Dr. Xu’s research focus on propulsion system modeling and control, particularly in the areas of physics-based and data-driven modeling, control, and fuel efficiency optimization. Over the past 4 years, Dr. Xu has published 31 peer-reviewed articles including 13 first-authored journal articles and his research have been cited 337 times in Google Scholar. Dr. Xu is the Guest Editor of SAE International Journal of Electrified Vehicles and a Review Editor of Frontiers in Energy Research. Additionally, Dr. Xu serves as the reviewer for 10+ journals in energy and transportation fields, such as Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Applied Energy, and IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems.

 

Dr. Elham Mirkoohi Gives Seminar Over Process Prediction and Optimization of Metals Additive Manufacturing

On March 5, Dr. Elham Mikoohi gave a presentation on, “Process Prediction and Optimization of Metals Additive Manufacturing.” Dr. Mikoohi is a postdoctoral scholar research associate in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology.

Abstract: In the past few years, the second wave of digital manufacturing – additive manufacturing– has received a technological breakthrough. Although additive manufacturing has the potential to revolutionize the way products are produced, the process prediction and optimization of additive manufacturing have not yet been in a place where the parts can be manufactured with high quality and performance, and it currently involves lots of trial and errors which would take months or even years to come up with the desired part performance with millions of dollars investments. To break through the technology bottlenecks, accurate and high computationally efficient frameworks are required to simulate the multi-physics aspects of additive manufacturing processes. In this seminar, Dr. Mirkoohi will present her research efforts focused on the development of low-cost physics-based computational framework to predict the key additive manufacturing attributes including temperature field, thermal stress distribution, residual stress distribution, and the microstructural evolution to be derived as explicit functions of the metal powder starting properties and additive manufacturing process parameters. She will show how these physics-based computational models can cooperatively work together in a small fraction of the time needed for finite element simulation or full-physics simulation. In addition, she will present a combined physics-based machine learning platform that is developed to assess the process maps to guide the process parameters in achieving desired part performance.

Bio: Elham Mirkoohi is a postdoctoral scholar research associate in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology, working with Professor Surya Kalidindi and Professor Aaron Stebner. She is also the executive coordinator of Novelis Innovation Hub at Georgia Institute of Technology. She received her Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology, where she was advised by Professor Steven Liang and Professor Hamid Garmestani, and B.Sc. and M.Sc. from University of Tehran and Oregon State University, respectively. Elham worked at Tesla Motors and the Boeing Company as a research intern and research assistant, respectively. Elham Mirkoohi’s convergence research spans mechanical engineering, materials science and engineering, and computer science. Her cross-disciplinary research focuses on modeling, monitoring, control, and optimization of precision manufacturing. She has authored more than 25 Journal and conference papers in top-ranked Journals and conferences in the field of advanced manufacturing. She also serves as a program committee of several conferences and as a reviewer for more than 15 Journals and conferences in her field.

 

Highlighting Devin Laurence

Devin Laurence received his undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering in May of 2018, he then obtained his master’s degree the following year. Since then, Laurence has continued his journey at OU by pursuing a Ph.D. with a research focus on cardiovascular biomechanics. He has earned many awards for his work including The National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and The American Heart Association/Children’s Heart Foundation (AHA/CHF) Pre-Doctoral Fellowship.

Devin with his current device in the Biomechanics and Biomaterials Design Lab (BBDL)

Laurence said Dr. Lee helped him to discover his interests in research during his junior year of undergrad. Laurence said he, “started to work with Dr. Lee and realized he did some exciting research.” He was interested in applying things they learned in class to aspects of the biomedical field. Eventually, he was hooked.

With the completion of his undergraduate mechanical engineering degree and his involvement in the accelerated master’s program, he was able to transition easily into graduate school, which allowed him to focus more on the biomedical side of mechanical engineering. As he began work in the Biomechanics and Biomaterials Design Lab (BBDL), he found his passion. He really liked how “you could pursue whatever you wanted because there was so much intellectual freedom.” He said, “you’re always motivated to search new avenues and get into stuff you probably never would’ve expected.”

Presently, Laurence is taking everything he learned in his mechanical engineering undergrad and applying it to biomedical systems. He, “mechanically characterizes the heart valve leaflets and then can do things like simulate the heart function or look at the different aspects of the leaflets.” Part of his dissertation work involves studying how the heart adapts to diseases. So “if you have increased pressure in your heart, how do these structures thicken or become stiffer in response?”

Laurence is “currently designing and constructing a novel planar biaxial bioreactor system (known in his lab as the BioBiax) to characterize the cell-mediated growth and remodeling of the tricuspid heart valve leaflets. The system includes two key components: (i) the planar biaxial testing component (shown in the picture above) and (ii) a flow loop to continuously supply cell media to the tissue to maintain cell viability (under construction). Throughout 2021, Laurence will use this system to characterize how the tricuspid valve leaflets respond to pathological conditions. The tricuspid valve leaflets will be mounted to the system, cyclically loaded/unloaded for 1-2 weeks to the pathological loading, and then characterized to understand how the leaflets have changed due to the pathological loading. Data from these experiments will enable them to establish a new mechanistic constitutive model that can predict the tricuspid valve leaflet mechanical behavior and consider the cell-mediated growth and remodeling response to the pathological loading. The new model then can be employed  in computer simulations to better understand the role of the cell-mediated growth and remodeling in congenital heart diseases, such as hypoplastic left heart syndrome, or in the recurrence of tricuspid regurgitation following the clinical repair in adult patients.”

Logo created courtesy of Ryan Bodlak

Laurence’s favorite part about OU is the people and opportunities. He said, “he really enjoys everyone in the department.” Collaborating with the BME department and the Health Science Center has been a great experience for him. He said, “it’s a really interesting hub that you wouldn’t expect.”

After he receives his Ph.D., his goal is to become a faculty member. He said, “it can either be doing a postdoc right after [he] graduates or getting a little industry experience first,” but eventually, he knows he wants to be in academia.

Laurence believes that students should not be afraid to try anything. “You never know what you’re going to enjoy or what doors are going to open up.”

Below is a full list of all the awards Laurence has received so far:

  • American Heart Association/Children’s Heart Foundation Pre-Doctoral Fellowship
  • National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship
  • Second Place Winner at 2020 SB3C Ph.D.-Level Student Paper Competition
  • First Place Winner at 2019 SB3C M.S.-Level Student Paper Competition
  • Thomas Milam, Sr., Endowed Fellowship
  • OU Alumni and Foundation Recruitment Fellowship
  • OU GCoE Ph.D. Recruitment Excellence Fellowship
  • First-Place Poster Award at the 3rd OU-OUHSC Biomedical Engineering Symposium
  • Grand Prize Recipient at Oklahoma Research Day at the Capitol

Highlighting Dr. Miller and Dr. Fagg’s Research Project: Progressive Locomotor Learning in Infants at Risk for Cerebral Palsy

Dr. David Miller and Dr. Andrew Fagg are working with researchers and children all over the country to develop a device called the Self-Initiated Prone Progression Crawler (SIPPC) that they hope will be a new treatment for cerebral palsy. The project is called, “Progressive Locomotor Learning in Infants at Risk for Cerebral Palsy.”

Pictured is a child on the SIPPC 3 developed during a NSF NRI grant in 2015. The PIs were: Andy Fagg, David Miller, Lei Ding, and Thubi Kolobe. The grad students from AME that worked on this were Michael Nash and Mustafa Ghazi, both of whom have since graduated (Ph.D. in 2018). Currently, Mustafa Ghazi, as a PostDoc is working on the current version of the SIPPC for the most recent grant. Photo by Hugh Scott.

The research project was given its first grant in 2013, and the researchers (including undergraduate, graduate, and Postdoc students) were ready to create the SIPPC. According to Dr. Miller, “people are at risk for cerebral palsy, but there isn’t a diagnosis that’s done in the age group [they’re] dealing with.” There are, “children at risk for cerebral palsy because they’ve had some sort of trauma either during the birth process or while in the womb.” It’s usually that they’re not moving normally. So, to test the children’s mobility, they evaluate two different groups on the SIPPC. One group has a set of infants that are developing typically, and the other group has infants at risk for cerebral palsy.

Researchers are working on different aspects of this project from coast to coast. In Philadelphia, they bring in and work with all participating patients. In California, they are developing a set of sensors that are protocol for random leg movements in the first few months of child development. Here at OU, they’re developing and testing the SIPPC, “and the plan is to send that off to Philadelphia.”

Pictured is a child on the SIPPC 3 developed during a NSF NRI grant in 2015. The PIs were: Andy Fagg, David Miller, Lei Ding, and Thubi Kolobe. The grad students from AME that worked on this were Michael Nash and Mustafa Ghazi, both of whom have since graduated (Ph.D. in 2018). Currently, Mustafa Ghazi, as a PostDoc is working on the current version of the SIPPC for the most recent grant. Photo by Hugh Scott.

The SIPPC has gone through several revisions. Currently, the group is on its fourth version of the motorized skateboard called SIPPC-4. It’s a motorized skateboard the kids can lie down on, but it measures all the forces of the infants. It has a force-torque sensor, wheel encoders, a few computers, and some cameras onboard. The information automatically goes to a person’s phone or iPad. It also gives an interface to a therapist, so they can control it by getting it out of corners or stopping it if the kid is crying.

“The standard mode is where the kid actually touches the ground and tries to crawl as the device amplifies and quantizes the child’s movements.” So even if they’re a little weak, they get the idea of exploring and having self-determination. There is also an automated learning component.  “Even if the child does not touch the ground, but they make the motions as if they are crawling,” the device will work with them. The kids wear a suit that contains several position sensors so the robot can measure the arm and leg positions and movements on the SIPPC.” This way the automated system can coordinate the robot’s movements with the child’s actions.

Dr. Miller said he’s, “hopeful that this research will, probably in the long term, provide some benefit to these subjects or others with a similar condition.”

AME Hosts Annual Graduate Program Meet and Greet

Saturday, February 20th, we hosted our annual AME Graduate Program Meet and Greet. The slides and Zoom video can be found below if you were unable to make it to the event.

Link to the Powerpoint presentation: Workshop for undergraduate recruitment – 1-14-2021

Link to the complete Zoom meeting: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nUjSXw3SP0KgbJhD-aM6b-nWuc3PZi5v/view?usp=sharing