Josette Vigil, Mechanical Engineering major, and Dr. Tim Becker, Associate Professor of Practice, Department of Mechanical Engineering<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nThe extension of classroom-to-lab learning was important to Vigil. \u201cIt\u2019s allowed me to apply a lot of the things that I\u2019d learned in the engineering program to something I was more interested in. Being able to see an application of knowledge from my degree was really exciting to me. It was what made me stay in the lab,\u201d she says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Becker echoed the importance of student involvement in research. \u201cThe most beneficial part from my perspective is to give the students that real-world experience. We try to make it applicable, what you\u2019re learning in class to what you might do in the real world, but there\u2019s so many different things that you can do as an engineer. There are so many different opportunities, it\u2019s hard to give students that hands-on experience in the classroom,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This real-world research experience for students extends beyond future career opportunities and closely parallels the cutting-edge development of their models, algorithms, and other lifesaving work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cJosette\u2019s project is a good example because she\u2019s actually using real scans, from patients that we get from the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix. She\u2019s analyzing them to understand the size of their aneurysm, and what device might be the best fit for treating that aneurysm. NAU may not have a medical school, but we work directly with residents and neurosurgical fellows at Barrow,\u201d Becker notes. Real-world application in the lab shows researchers like Vigil what they can achieve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The lab\u2019s researchers get additional opportunities for direct contact with medical providers and regulators through regular dialogue with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and face-to-face conference discussions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a conference where I try to take all my students, even my undergrads. Josette has been there as well. At the conference, all the neurosurgeons come together and say, \u2018This is the patient I worked with three months ago. And this is what I tried, and it worked great.\u2019 And another one says, \u2018This is what I tried, and it did not work.\u2019 We get all these great ideas as engineers and say, \u2018I think we can make that better.\u2019 We can also talk directly to that neurosurgeon and say, \u2018We were thinking about this kind of system. Do you want to work with us and see if we can come up with a better way to treat this?\u2019\u201d Becker says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Vigil has gained valuable experience from these projects, combining her engineering degree\u2014from coding to machinery\u2014with human impact. \u201cIf someone took a CT of my brain, they could make a model based off it. It\u2019s not cheap, but it can be done, which I think is incredible because it just takes a few grams of plastic to create. It\u2019s not gold. It\u2019s not a precious metal that we\u2019re using. But it is so valuable in this sphere of treatment and patient care.\u201d Ultimately, Vigil\u2019s research translates to the development of bright futures: her own, and that of the stroke patients whose care she\u2019s helped to improve. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Josette Vigil, an NAU Mechanical Engineering major, applies bioengineering to advance medical device science.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":570,"featured_media":3712,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[220,217,62,219,63,221,218],"class_list":["post-3705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science-discovery","tag-3d-printing","tag-bioengineering","tag-ceias","tag-devices-lab","tag-mechanical-engineering","tag-stroke-victims","tag-undergraduate-symposium"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/570"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3705"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4096,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3705\/revisions\/4096"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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