Sasha Portnova received the Department of Mechanical Engineering Outstanding Research Award during her undergrad graduation ceremony. Congratulations to Sasha for a most deserved award for her dedication to individuals with impaired upper limb mobility and perseverance in custom-fit, affordable orthoses. Next year Sasha will head to Northwestern University to continue her studies in Mechanical Engineering. Go Biomechanics and go Sasha!
News
Sasha Portnova featured in video – UW Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Congratulations to Sasha, a member of our lab who will be graduating this spring. Her work was chosen to be featured by UW’s Undergraduate Academic Affairs.
To watch the video follow this Youtube link or connect on Facebook (filmed and edited by Bryan Nakata).
“At the University of Washington, undergraduates like Sasha Portnova research issues that can impact the world. Portnova, a senior in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, uses her research to help solve the difficulties individuals with spinal cord injury may face. Growing up in Kazakhstan, Portnova was discouraged from studying engineering, which was viewed as a more typical male subject. After coming to the U.S. and enrolling in the University of Washington, she discovered her passion for engineering and helping others. This passion led her to began working on her project – a wrist assistive device for individuals who have lost hand movement. The 3-D printed device assists in hand movement for an estimated cost of $15. In addition to being cost-effective, the designs will be available online via open source for anyone to print their own. Along the way, she has presented her research to multiple conferences including Posters on the Hill in Washington D.C. After graduating this spring, Portnova’s next steps include obtaining a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering. She plans to use her passion for research to help others, specifically veterans.” – UW Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Work by Dr. Steele and Ben Shuman featured in The Daily news post
The team found that of the 473 children who had undergone surgery in their current study, those with higher Walk-DMC scores prior to surgery had better treatment outcomes, even after factoring in age and prior treatment.
The Daily, of the University of Washington, posted an article about Dr. Steele and Ben Shuman’s recent work on predicting cerebral palsy treatment outcomes based on motor modules, or muscle synergies. This work is in partnership with Michael Schwartz at Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare. An excerpt from the article is below. To read the article in full, click here.
Congratulations Michael Rosenberg, on your selection to join the TL1 Summer Program!
Michael Rosenberg has been selected among a very competitive group of applicants to join the TL1 Multidisciplinary Predoctoral Clinical Research Summer Training Program for 2016. The training and program is funded by NIH.
Through the TL1 program’s interdisciplinary clinical and translational research experience, Michael will gain skills and development tools to help advance his research career.
The program focuses on enabling students to work with teams conducting research in the laboratory, in clinical/translational health care settings, and in the community.
Congratulations, Michael!
Walk-DMC – Kat Steele and Michael Schwartz are featured in GeekWire
GeekWire, a national technology news resource, has featured Dr. Steele and Dr. Schwartz‘s Walk-DMC in a special series focused on community issues and innovative solutions to societal challenges. Lisa Stiffler reports on the analysis that is used to create Walk-DMC, an assessment tool that uses routinely collected electromyography (EMG) data to identify which kids are the strongest candidates for surgery — and to help develop alternative treatments for children needing a different solution.
“It’s a very complex problem,” said Steele, who is a co-author of a paper explaining the Walk DMC metric published this month in the journal Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology. “You can have two individuals who are walking visually nearly identically,” she said, “but how they’re controlling that motion can be very different.”
To read the full article, click HERE.