Previous ASME Award Winner
Recent Departmental Runner Up Awards
Capstone Design Projects
3D Printed Vacuum Assisted Delivery Pump
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 15
Amauris is a non-profit organization whose mission is to provide underprivileged communities with local manufacturing access for essential medical supplies. This project aims to create a vacuum-assisted delivery pump to provide addition traction support during complicated deliveries. To meet this vital need, the project's goal is to engineer and design a 3D printable, and easily assembled pump that is capable of meeting precise pressure requirements need for typical vacuum assisted delivery.
Robotic Petri Dish Gripper
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 21
Team 21 partnered with Tactus AI to build a robotic gripper for the company's humanoid "Lab Assistant" robot to automate Petri dish handling and analysis in understaffed microbiology labs. Soft elastomer pads with a stepped geometry successfully allowed a single actuator to selectively grip either the full dish for transport or only the dish base for bacterial imaging.
Feedback Enabled Thrombectomy Device
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 6
Team Members
Lucas Kramer
Vikram Tholudur
Hugo De Mendoza
Owen Hanenian
Current Thrombectomy procedures require surgeons to insert an imaging camera to check if a clot is cleared, resulting in significant wasted procedure time and increased patient risk. This project integrates a non-invasive feedback loop onto an existing thrombectomy device to solve this efficiency problem. By monitoring real-time motor current as a proxy for mechanical torque, the system detects clot engagement and clearance directly from the device handle and providing feedback.
Automated Column Washer
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 4
Dr. Gerry Boss at the UC San Diego School of Medicine is developing cobinamide, a Vitamin B12 analog. Evaluation of this medication relies on column chromatography. This process is labor-intensive, time-consuming, and prone to variability. To address these limitations, an automated device was developed to prepare up to 10 columns in under 20 minutes. The system accurately delivers >1 mL to each column, with a maximum variation of 0.2 mL between columns.
RadiCal - Remotely Actuated Radiation Calibration System
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 16
RadiCal is a remotely actuated radiation calibration and training system developed for the UC San Diego Department of Radiation Medicine and Applied Sciences (RMAS) under the sponsorship of Dr. Dan Scanderbeg. The system combines a shielded lead-steel chamber, remote source selection, and Bluetooth control to reduce operator radiation exposure while enabling flexible calibration and training procedures.
Point-of-Care Medical Device to Assess Parasympathetic System Function
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 5
An accessible device to assess sympathetic and parasympathetic balance, optimized for research in Sub-Saharan Africa. Heart rate variability, the variation in time between consecutive heartbeats, reflects the balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. The device examines HRV in response to two stimuli, deep breathing measured by a spirometer and compression of artery by automatic blood pressure cuff. Features both real-time display and wireless transmission of data.
Low-Cost Microsurgical Instruments
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 18
The practice of microsurgery is expensive and hard to access around the world, but even more so in low-to-middle income countries. This project's goal is to develop low cost instruments that retain core functionality while costing below $25. The microneedle holder, the jeweler forceps, and the dilator forceps were developed. They follow a hybrid material design, where the handles are 3D printed from resin and the tips were laser cut from stainless steel (except for the microneedle holder).
Robust Hybrid Kapitza's Pendulum
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 1
Sponsored by Dr. Jorge Poveda, this project developed a more robust Hybrid Kapitza’s Pendulum for UC San Diego ECE education. The previous design suffered from low oscillation frequency and limited durability. The redesigned system reduced moving mass through a new sliding shaft mechanism and improved stability using V-grooved rollers. Testing achieved a frequency of 16 Hz and durability exceeding 100 cycles, demonstrating significant improvement over the previous design.
GPS Base Station
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 19
Team Members
Nathaniel Santana
Karla Ballin
Omar Ramadan
Kylie Carmona
Estefany Martinez
This project designed a portable GPS base station enclosure for archaeological and environmental field surveys. The enclosure protects electronics from harsh environmental conditions, such as heat, dust, and water using IP54 rated sealing. Passive shading and active airflow from four vents, a heat sink, and a fan dissipate internal heat from electronics. Thermal simulations and physical testing verified that operation in harsh 45°C environments while maintaining portability for field deployment.
Hand for Humanoid Robot
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 3
Rural and lower-income hospitals lack access to advanced surgical systems due to high cost and size. This project designs a device for a humanoid robot that enables use of standard surgical tools, bringing minimally invasive teleoperated surgery to underserved settings. The device attaches to the robot's wrist, accepts interchangeable surgical tools via a click-in mechanism, and uses four actuators to control the instrument, improving equity in surgical outcomes.
Microgravity Drop Tower
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 23
Microgravity is a near-weightless condition similar to space, but bringing research to space is a tedious and often expensive process.
The Microgravity Drop Tower recreates instantaneous microgravity during free fall, providing a low-cost, on-campus testing site for biological and material samples.
The Microgravity Drop Tower recreates instantaneous microgravity during free fall, providing a low-cost, on-campus testing site for biological and material samples.
Child Safe Window Guard
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 17
Each year in the US, 8 children die and 3,330 are injured falling from windows. While existing window guards are effective at preventing these incidents, they introduce a critical safety concern in emergency situations. This project developed a child safe window guard that prevents children from falling out of windows, allows for easy removability in case of an emergency, integrates a childproof locking mechanism, and provides an aesthetically pleasing alternative to traditional window guards.
Medjaw Project
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 12
MedJaw is a fully 3D-printed physiotherapy device designed to restore jaw mobility in patients suffering from trismus, TMJ disorders, and post-surgical jaw stiffness — conditions that affect millions of people worldwide, with the best devices costing hundreds of dollars and only accessible in certain regions of the world. Being fully 3D-printed, MedJaw is extremely cost-effective and accessible. Patients can easily perform full-range physiotherapy exercises from the comfort of their home.
Continuous Passive Motion Device for Dynamic Knee Imaging in Small Animal Models
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 8
Team Members
Najmi Hanis
Aden Wong
Sujaan Mukherjee
Rachel McClow
Static imaging cannot capture the complex mechanics of moving joints, limiting orthopedic research. This project developed a compact, artifact-free continuous passive motion (CPM) device that fits within a 10 cm micro-CT scanner bore. Using a custom motor-driven crank-slider mechanism, the device safely and precisely actuates a rat knee during scanning. The final system delivered reliable, continuous motion at 0.5–2 Hz across multiple ranges of motion for hour-long scans.
Thoracic Lavage Adapter
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 14
Team Members
Michal Machniak
Kim Tran
Daniel Kim
Martin Campos
Thoracic lavage is an internal warming procedure used to treat patients with severe or moderate hypothermia. This method involves injecting warm saline solution from an IV bag into the patient's chest cavity area.
This project focused on creating an adapter that standardized the connection between IV tubing and chest tubing. The adapter also integrated a 3-way control valve, allowing for the use of a single chest tube during the procedure.
This project focused on creating an adapter that standardized the connection between IV tubing and chest tubing. The adapter also integrated a 3-way control valve, allowing for the use of a single chest tube during the procedure.
Hot Kidney Summer
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 9
Team Members
Miguel Chamu-Sosa
Kai Patel
Vince Bantad
Burhanuddin Mamujee
The purpose of the project is to refine, test, and iterate an ex vivo normothermic machine perfusion device
for the preservation and assessment of kidneys prior to transplantation. The new system allows circulation of warm, oxygenated packed red blood cells, allows the user to control perfusion parameters such as flow rate, pressure, and temperature with a centralized system, and reduces the mechanical footprint.
for the preservation and assessment of kidneys prior to transplantation. The new system allows circulation of warm, oxygenated packed red blood cells, allows the user to control perfusion parameters such as flow rate, pressure, and temperature with a centralized system, and reduces the mechanical footprint.
Design, Build, and Test of Mechanical Impulse Pyro Shock (MIPS) Test Table
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 11
ATA Engineering aims to combine their current theoretical analysis with physical testing to provide a one-stop shop for shock test and analysis. The goal was to design, build and test a MIPS Shock Table developing off of a pneumatic firing mechanism designed previously by a MAE 156 team in Spring 2025. The final design safely and repeatedly launches a 1 kg slug at impact velocities of 6-13 m/s, with only a single impact and recorded with ±0.5 m/s accuracy.
Maneuverable Intubating Stylet
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 2
The primary objective of this project was to create a rigid intubating stylet capable of causing deflection at the tip of an endotracheal tube (ETT). The stylet will have a controllable, flexible tip that allows easier guidance of the ETT along the trachea in endotracheal intubation. This maneuverability allows practitioners to adjust the stylet's curvature during insertion, thereby improving patient safety and the success rates of endotracheal intubation in difficult airways.
RFID-Enabled Cognitive Self-Training System for Mice
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 13
Team Members
Victor Perez
Hektoras Djabra
Farbod Haeri
Samuel Winters
The Jared Young Laboratory at UC San Diego trains mice on touchscreen tasks to study disorders like schizophrenia. Standard protocols isolate each mouse, which stresses the animals and skews data. Team 13 built a system that lets group-housed mice train themselves one at a time, with no researcher present. A clear tube links the home cage to the trainer, where RFID tags identify each mouse and a two-gate airlock admits one at a time, cutting training from 5 to 6 months to about 10 to 15 days.
Portable CO2 Monitor (CO2-Go)
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 10
There are currently no standardized quantitative methods for monitoring a patient’s post-anesthesia carbon dioxide levels during patient transport, leaving hospital staff reliant on subjective assessments that carry significant risk of complications. Thus, this project proposes a compact, portable device with an attached monitor screen that allows hospital staff to simultaneously monitor the patients’ EtCO2 levels while transporting them on a gurney.
Voice Activated Syringe Pump
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 2
A syringe pump integrated with a Voice Recognition Software in order for a single anesthesiologist to complete a regional nerve blocking procedure.
Biodegradable Battery Solution
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 4
Magvolts Energy aims to design a biodegradable battery in order to serve as an alternative to alkaline, lithium, and other precious metal batteries. The project's motivation is to develop the design and manufacturing method of their biodegradable battery design in order to demonstrate feasibility and implementation for commercial use.
Automated EEG Headset Validation and Characterization Fixture
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 5
Dry-electrode EEG headsets require consistent sensor-to-scalp force to deliver reliable brain monitoring without causing patient discomfort. This project developed a validation fixture to measure the force at each sensor node and verify that it falls within the 30 to 100 gram target range. The fixture used modular force sensing pods snapped into a 3D-printed mannequin head, with force measurements displayed on a PC to assess headset performance before patient use.
Tecture Creative Art Installation
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 6
Team Members
Team Member 1: Abdulla Zidan
Team Member 2: Anthony Mark
Team Member 3: Darsh Pawani
Team Member 4: Youngyen Lin
The objective of this project was to design, build, test, and document mechanically operated artistic prototypes. These prototypes would be a proof of concept of a technical design that Tecture could implement into their art projects with clients. With the knowledge of how these prototypes functioned, Tecture could implement their design and fabrication techniques into large scale mechanical art pieces with kinetic and interactable features.
3D Transmission Skull Setup
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 7
Our project investigates how ultrasound waves propagate in environments relevant to non-invasive brain imaging, where the skull can significantly distort and attenuate acoustic signals. To study this, we perform acoustic mapping by moving a sensor with 3D translation stages, allowing measurements across a grid of positions. The collected data is visualized as a heatmap, revealing acoustic behavior and illustrating how structures like the skull can affect ultrasound transmission.
Facilitating Safe Parental Holding of Extremely Preterm Infants in the NICU
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 20
The KangaArm is a robust mechanical system built to support critical medical equipment during skin-to-skin care of a preterm infant on the Bunnell Jet Ventilator. Key components include a ventilator clamp for secure mounting to the ventilator pole, a revolute joint and three ball-detent joints for adjustable positioning, and a vibration-dampening plate to hold the ventilator box attachment. These elements create a reliable, flexible, and ergonomic arm for supporting skin-to-skin treatment.
Built Well Torsion Tool
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 3
Team Members
Britney Rosas
Diego Murray
Michael Santoso
Sofia Vendituoli
The Built Well Torsion Tool is designed to be used in fitness and labor & delivery environments to provide strength training and aid during child birth. The device consists of a rotary module with two torsion springs and a damper to provide increasing resistance CW and CCW along with slow return to neutral using a rotary damper. There is a magnetic encoder sensor module attached with a LCD screen for data collection along with bedside & gym clamps, stationary & rotating handles for the device.
Pericardiocentesis Model
2025-2026 - Winter
Team: 1
This project presents a high-fidelity pericardiocentesis training simulator featuring a mechanically actuated, ultrasound-compatible beating heart. The system consists of a silicone heart model with a single continuous cavity and internal walls representing four-chamber anatomy, enclosed within a fluid-filled balloon that models the pericardial sac and housed in an operating box designed for repeated needle insertion.
Multi-Chamber-Camera Bioreactor
2025-2026 - Spring
Team: 22
A fully integrated platform for advanced stem cell research that allows users to precisely control electric and magnetic field stimuli to cells through a touchscreen interface and observe them for research into stem cell differentiation and regenerative medicine. The system contains four well subsystems that can be individually controlled and monitored over time.
Animal Care Processing Project (ACCP)
2024-2025 - Spring
Team: 42
The Animal Care Processing Project (ACCP) is sponsored by Dr. Keith Jenné, who has served as the Executive Director of the UC San Diego Animal Care Program and Campus Veterinarian since April 2023. The primary objective of this project is to automate the dumping procedure during the pre-sanitization process of animal care cages within the Centralized Research Service Facility at UC San Diego, using a grab-dump-load integrated automation machine to reduce health hazards for facility workers.
