Previous ASME Award Winner
Recent Departmental Runner Up Awards
Capstone Design Projects
KangaMove Parental Skin-to-skin Contact Support
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 7
The KangaMove is designed to support parents during skin-to-skin contact by providing stability for equipment and accessories while holding their child. The posable arm integrates seamlessly with vital NICU equipment, including Jet Ventilator auxiliary components, ventilator tubes, and IV lines. By securing these essential connections, the KangaMove alleviates concerns about tube displacement, allowing parents to focus on bonding with their infant.
Unmanned Aerial Systems Hybrid Powertrain Testbed
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 3
Team Members
Daniel Cruz-Espada
Jason Holtkamp
Joud Bukhari
Kenneth Su
Shivharsh Kand
Ziad Gari
A testbed designed to evaluate the thermal behavior of PCB stators and rotors for hybrid drone powertrains. Built for modularity, it allows controlled testing under various operating conditions, providing critical insights into heat dissipation and airflow dynamics. Its adaptable framework supports iterative testing of different rotor designs and stator configurations, enabling the refinement of cooling strategies for improved efficiency.
GA - Foam Shell Culling Station
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 1
Team Members
Tobin Boshaw
Matthew Pope
Collin Huang
Samuel Hasegawa
Kenny Ochoa
Brandon Lopez
This project designed, built, and tested an automated Foam Shell Flow Culling Station for inertial fusion energy (IFE) research at General Atomics. The system inspects and sorts delicate foam shells (3–6 mm) in a submerged fluid environment, using a converger, sensor-camera module, and diverter. It improves inspection speed, ensures safe handling, and enhances research efficiency, supporting the advancement of IFE as a clean, sustainable energy source.
Automated Cognitive Touchscreen Training System for Mice
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 8
Mental illnesses are a rising problem that must be addressed through thorough studies. Researchers can draw parallels in behavior between mice and humans, making mice an appropriate medium of study. Training these mice is a rigorous and long process. To reduce the burden on researchers, we formulated an automated system, reducing the training time while improving data analysis and visualization. The system administers training tasks and rewards, collects data, and visualizes metrics.
Endovascular Device for Rapid Blood Clot Removal
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 12
Our project aimed to create a safer & more efficient endovascular thrombectomy device for dialysis patients, which are susceptible to blood clots. Unlike existing devices that risk tip breakage & require multiple procedures, our design incorporated a novel non-driven tip mechanism to enhance safety & reliability. The device features a three-speed drive unit and to evaluate its performance, we developed a vascular testbed with a camera-based clot quantification system to uphold safety standards.
Sample Throughput Optimization for Thermal Desorption Spectroscopy
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 15
Team Members
Ethan Greene
Jamie Lee
Saul Rios
Leo Serbinov
Vedanth Talla
Brayden Wong
The PISCES Lab, as part of UC San Diego's Center for Energy Research, performs Thermal Desorption Spectroscopy (TDS) on the wall materials of nuclear fusion reactors with the goal of improving the performance and longevity of these materials. The PISCES Lab's current TDS system has low sample throughput as the chamber must be opened to exchange samples. This project’s motivation was to develop a sample loading system that increases the number of samples that can be tested in a single day.
Acoustic Modem Integration onto Wave Glider USV
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 16
Our team was tasked with designing and manufacturing a pressure vessel (PV) to house ROAM electronics for enhanced communication on the NIWC Pacific Wave Glider USVs. This PV integrates with the existing (PUMS) sensor system. Key design elements include the internal mounting of electronics, a pressure vessel enclosure, a hydrodynamic dome, external mounting connections to attach the PV to the tow cable, and mounts for two transducer components for acoustic communication.
Outdoor Low Power Measurement Equipment Enclosure (ENTS Enclosure)
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 11
Team Members
Fayza Elshafie
David Fisher
Michael Gonzalez
Benny La
Elliot Snyder
UCSC and UCSD researchers developed the Environmentally NeTworked Sensor (ENTS) to make environmental research more versatile and cost-efficient. The need for a low-cost, waterproof, and reproducible enclosure to house the ENTS node during deployment prompted Ph.D student Steve Taylor to sponsor an MAE 156 project. A PVC and 3D printed enclosure were developed. With components to increase waterproofing, secure the node, and allow for ENTS functionality, both designs met the project requirements.
LightLok - Burn Prevention
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 13
In the operating room, a light cord sends light into a surgical instrument but its tip reaches dangerous temperatures and is a hazard. LightLok is a single-use attachment for lowering the surface temperature of the light cord tip that prevents burns from occurring. LightLok consists of a cap with a fused silica lens hinged to a base clamp that efficiently diverges light and automatically closes when the light cord is not in use.
Halo Helmet Platform
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 9
Protective helmets safeguard the head in high-impact sports but offer limited neck and spinal protection, increasing injury risk in high-speed crashes. As extreme sports grow, better safety solutions are needed.
This project introduces a helmet-integrated roll cage that redistributes impact forces away from the head and neck. Anchored to the upper body via a harness, the system disperses forces more effectively, reducing the risk of traumatic brain and spinal injuries.
This project introduces a helmet-integrated roll cage that redistributes impact forces away from the head and neck. Anchored to the upper body via a harness, the system disperses forces more effectively, reducing the risk of traumatic brain and spinal injuries.
OceanWell Multistage Water Filtration System
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 10
The purpose of this project is to create a device that can be used by engineers at OceanWell to test multiple unique combinations of filters ranging from 5 to 500 microns for different types of source water.
Automated Graphene Transfer
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 14
This project, sponsored by Professor Oscar Vazquez-Mena of the NanoEngineering department, aimed to expedite the graphene transfer process by utilizing a fully autonomous tank system with feedback from a conductivity probe.
Material Transfer Cleaning
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 2
Genentech’s manual wipe-down process for disinfecting barrels is time-consuming and ergonomically challenging. This project automates this with a semi-autonomous system for easy loading and unloading. Barrels move via an omnidirectional ball conveyor, where a misting system loosens debris before top, side, and bottom brushes ensure thorough cleaning. Operators control each cleaning substation via a control panel, enhancing efficiency, consistency, and ergonomics within Genentech’s workflow.
Endoscopic Multiload Clip Applier
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 5
This project developed a robotically-assisted multiload clip applier designed to close blood vessels during heart and lung surgeries. The device moves titanium clips from a cartridge into a pair of applier jaws which compress to close a clip, a process that can be repeated multiple times via an internally integrated reloading mechanism. The device fulfills the primary objective of enabling surgeons to apply multiple clips during endoscopic procedures without necessitating instrument extraction.
Flow Enabled Energy Generation Device
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 4
Team Members
Ashley Campbell
Maime Grace Barnard
Gabrielle Scott
Markus Gokan
Justin Kwak
The flow of ions in salt water over a charged surface results in formation of an electrical double layer (EDL). Over long channel lengths, this results in a measurable electric potential difference. The objective for this project is to use this principle to develop a solid state transducer to generate electrical energy from ocean wave and flow dynamics.
Automated Tracheal Cuff Pump
2024-2025 - Winter
Team: 6
Procedures such as tracheostomies make use of tracheal tubes to apply oscillatory pressure onto stents. These tubes require long hours of manual syringe pumping which makes certain procedures difficult. The product consists of an automated pump system with advanced ASDR controls and a website UI to review and download system behavioral data.
Syringe Pump for Tissue Expander
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 23
A motorized syringe pump that uses a stepper motor with a lead screw to move the plunger of the syringe, all enclosed within a frame. The pump has the option to move forward, backward, and hold position per the user's will. To prevent unintended travel, the limit switch can effectively stop the movement during the procedure, giving the user ample time to change the moving direction. On top of everything, it is 39% less expensive than comparable syringe pumps on the market!
Automated Wire Feeding and Crimping Machine
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 30
Team Members
Aaron Grandbouche
Jack Saade
Christian Brueggeman
Jonathan Lane
Daven Ng
UCSD Project Team 30 has been retained by Performant Advanced Manufacturing to develop an innovative and cost-effective solution to automate the manufacturing of custom wire harnesses for small-scale mechatronics.
Wavetank
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 17
Team Members
Frank Pham
Justin Le
Alexander Yeh
Ian Tom
Hans Millan
Professor Saha is collaborating with Professor Hao on a research focusing on the understanding of small-scale physical processes at the atmosphere–ocean interface. The sponsor’s goal is to obtain a device that produces effective deep water waves that allow for the study of wave-droplet interactions. The designed wave tank has the capacity to consistently generate custom 1-D deep water waves with wavelengths ranging from 5-105 mm, frequency from 4-63 Hz and amplitude from 0-5 mm.
Kinematic Design and Prototyping of Sealed Portal for Commercial Sterilization Machine
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 12
The main goal of this project is to ensure a consistent and reliable machine design that will sterilize shopping carts to reduce the amount of viruses passed around in everyday life. For this quarter, the team focused on designing and testing the kinematics of a “tilt-up” door for the machine. The team created the support frame for the component and attached light fixtures, hinges, and arm supports to allow for proper movement when the door opens and closes.
Random Positioning Machine
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 26
Team Members
Andrew Copeland
Manuel Figueroa
Nicholas Maekawa
Nicholas Ratto
Vladimir Rubtsov
Our sponsor desired a machine capable of reproducing microgravity conditions, necessitating the development of a Random Positioning Machine (RPM). Currently, conducting experiments on biological samples under microgravity requirements is extremely costly and time-consuming. A two-axis nested frame design was developed with fixtures to mount a variety of sample types and achieve an integrated acceleration of 0 m/s^2.
Oxygen Rescue Catheter
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 10
When the lungs are severely damaged due to physical trauma or from infection they cannot provide oxygen through the blood to the entire body, and medical intervention must occur to save the life of the patient. The oxygen rescue catheter is an inexpensive, not overly invasive method of transporting oxygen into the bloodstream, bypassing the lungs entirely and allowing the red blood cells to absorb oxygen via microbubbles within the veins themselves.
Sub Sea Sonics
2023-2024 - Winter
Team: 11
Sub Sea Sonics looked to tackle communication issues that come with deep sea fishing. Fishermen had no reliable and cost effective way of logging the dropped positions of their fishing gear. This not only made fishing difficult but allowed some to fish in endangered locations. Team 11 designed a system that can log the telemetry of fishing gear and that can operate under high sea pressures. This device consisted of a pressure vessel, tracking electronics, software, and a battery system.
Kidney Transplant Pump
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 16
The kidney is placed in a sealed transparent chamber with tubing and blood drainage openings, on a perforated stainless-steel platform for monitoring. Perfusate flows to an external reservoir, recirculating nutrient-rich blood cells via a peristaltic pump, simulating natural blood circulation. An oxygenator mimics lung function, while a heating system maintains temperature. Integrated sensors monitor flow rate and pressure, ensuring conditions meet specifications.
Neuroscience Accessory for Mice Brain Transverse Hippocampus Section
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 11
Team Members
Diego Gonzalez
Elise Rehder
Griffith Nguyen
Sandra Naranjo-Heredia
Sydney Tom
Our design is based on the existing buffer tray for the Leica VT1000S Vibratome along with the addition of a rotating stage with various angles for sectioning up to 45 degrees, which was done to simplify the sectioning process.
KickEase Pediatric Swim Trainer
2023-2024 - Winter
Team: 7
The KickEase is a pediatric swim trainer that is worn around the knee, and limits excessive knee flexion in order to promote the development of proper muscle memory for flutter kicking. The final design of the KickEase consists of four major components: a fabric body, restraining hinges, attachment straps and internal grip pads. These components are layered on top one of another and fastened using Chicago screw and snap fasteners.
Single-Cell Microfluidic Chip Design and Fabrication
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 8
Team Members
Conor Archdeacon
Theo Emery
Wesley Huszarik
Spencer Martin
Trevor Matthews
Microfluidics devices were designed and fabricated to study single cell interactions between coccidioidomycosis and neutrophil at large scales. High efficiency rates were reported, providing valuable data driven insight towards developing cost effective research tools and treatments for Valley Fever. Cell immobilization techniques were considered for extended time scale imaging.
Solar Cell Lamination Automation
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 7
Perovskite solar cells can revolutionize solar energy technologies but their instability and degradation under environmental conditions pose obstacles for commercialization. An in-line system increases production via constant output and less human labor. Components include a heating system, motorized roller machine, and elastomers for each cell. It maintains a perovskite cell at 150°C and 4 MPa of pressure while passing through the system.
Precision Jacket for Photoacoustic Imaging
2023-2024 - Winter
Genetically Modified Mosquito Incubation Box
2023-2024 - Spring
Team: 13
Team Members
Emily Inthavong
Emily Weiner
Keileina Honda
Matthew Amankonah
Samantha Stampfl
The goal of this project is to create a mosquito suppression box that allows for the development of genetically modified mosquito eggs so that the sterile male mosquitoes can easily exit the box while the flightless female mosquitoes are contained.
