Active Learning

Undergraduate researchers share their experiences as participants in the ME SPUR Program. ME SPUR, modeled after CU Summer Program for Undergraduate Research, enabled undergraduate students to work with mechanical engineering faculty on research that could be conducted remotely.

As ME SPUR participants, Kirsty Hodgkins, Evan Kirk and Paula Pérez worked with Professor Jana Milford to understand how reduced traffic, telecommuting and reduced industrial activity during Colorado's Stay-at-Home and Safer-at-Home orders have affected air quality with goals that the project would inform future strategies for improving air quality.

For three years, Air Quality Inquiry has been reaching K-12 students across rural Colorado. This year, Daniel Knight and his team extended the program across the globe to reach Public Lab Mongolia, a nonprofit whose mission is to make data available to the Mongolian public.

As an ME SPUR participant, Ryan Smith worked with Assistant Professor Nick Bottenus to use medical image data to develop 3D finite element models of the abdominal wall and perform various compressions to mimic clinical practice.

As an ME SPUR participant, Paul DiTomas worked with Research Professor John Pellegrino to perform analysis for scenarios of the minimum energy requirement for robotic missions that will be used in a review article about portable power devices for next-gen robots.

As an ME SPUR participant, Sydney Evans worked with Assistant Professor Kaushik Jayaram to develop a novel robot capable of sticking to and navigating virtually any surface, leveraging electrostatic attraction.

As an ME SPUR participant, Jonathon Gruener worked with Associate Professor Svenja Knappe to create a testing environment for highly-sensitive miniature magnetic field sensors with non-invasive brain imaging, space and industrial applications.

As an ME SPUR participant, Andrew Beiter worked with Assistant Professor Debanjan Mukherjee to develop an in-house library of models for arterial hemodynamics in human patients, using CT and MRI scans and microscopy image data. His summer research project was titled, Image-Based Modeling for Cardiovascular Systems.

As an ME SPUR participant, Julia Beattie worked with Professor Corey Neu to measure intranuclear mechanics. The goal was to provide a non-invasive framework to investigate the mechanobiological function of subcellular and subnuclear domains limited only by the spatiotemporal resolution of the image acquisition method.

As an ME SPUR participant, Justin Hall worked with Assistant Professor Carson Bruns to develop a desktop application that will allow scientists to control a robot that automates weighing and dispensing chemicals, running chemical reactions and purification.