2013 Undergraduate Design Project Competition in Rehabilitation and Assistive Devices and Travel Support for Attendees with a Disability, June 26-29, 2013, in Sunriver, Oregon

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PI: Maletsky, LorinProposal Number: 1322657The Bioengineering Division (BED) of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers hosts the annual Summer Bioengineering Conference (SBC). The 2013 SBC, to be held June 26-29, 2013 at the Sunriver Resort in Sunriver, Oregon, will be the 15th installment of this conference. This request to NSF is to provide support for the 2013 Undergraduate Design Project Competition in Rehabilitation and Assistive Devices and travel support for participants and attendees with disabilities. The primary objectives of the competition are to expose more students to rehabilitation needs and support projects in this area as well as to help develop future researchers and engineers in this area. All technical presentations will be two-page extended abstracts and compiled in a CD format, distributed to all registrants. The primary purpose of this conference is to promote state-of-the-art research, collaboration, and scientific discourse in the broad field of bioengineering with a focus on cutting edge biomechanics encompassing molecular to tissue and organism-level approaches. This conference highlights and encourages student participation to advance the education and career aspirations of these future leaders of bioengineering. To make the conference more accessible for people with disabilities, we are also offering a travel award for these individuals and will make appropriate accommodations at the conference as needed.Intellectual Merit: The design projects are rigorously reviewed using a series of criteria and projects need to be sufficiently developed to be considered in one of the top six finalists. For the finalist presentations at the conference, each team will present their design to the audience and must be able to answer questions. The finalist team members who attend the conference will also be able to participate in an extremely high quality scientific and intellectually stimulating interdisciplinary meeting. It is the premiere meeting for bioengineering with a focus on biomechanical engineering. The main topics to be highlighted at the conference include biosolid mechanics, bio-fluid mechanics, cellular and molecular mechanics, functional tissue engineering, biomedical device design and rehabilitation, bio-heat and mass transfer, and bioengineering education. In particular, this year we have chosen as our theme, Translational Research. Our selections of the plenary speaker, workshops, and highlighted sessions will serve to inform, educate and inspire our attendees about the importance of and pathways for translating their technologies. The winners of the Lissner and Mow Medals and the Fung Young Investigator Award will make scientific presentations.Broader Impact: The rehabilitation design competition will bring students from across the country to a meeting who might otherwise not have an opportunity to attend an international research conference. In addition to the direct impact this conference will have on the mainstream bioengineering community, it serves an important cross-fertilization role. We will have in attendance bioengineers, engineers from other disciplines, cell and molecular biologists, biochemists, biophysicists, and other scientists participating in the meeting. In that manner, this conference will have a much broader impact than if it were to be attended by just the biomechanics community. Most importantly, we expect that more than 50% of the attendees will be students and postdoctoral fellows. This will provide a broad impact for the current times as well as for the future, as these students will benefit by participation in the meeting and through the material presented by the plenary speakers, workshops, and challenges. Through the CD containing technical proceedings and conference web site, information presented at the meeting will be available to multiple societies and to the public at large.