Taking Undergraduate Education to the Next Level

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Taking Undergraduate Education to the Next Level

BME Major Design Projects - Stratton and Pagotto

Biomedical Engineering Student Design Projects Tackle Major Scientific Questions

9 April, 2012

Not many undergraduates get the chance to say that, as part of their curriculum, they're working on a cure for cancer. But for Rozita Abdola, 4 ^thyear Chemical Engineering major, and Mengqi Wang, 3 ^rdyear Electrical and Computer Engineering major, it's all part of the program—the Biomedical Engineering undergraduate program, that is.

As a major component of their Biomedical Instrumentation course work in the Undergraduate program at the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (IBBME), students of BME340 and BME440 were asked to execute major research projects over a three week span, the results of which were broadcast through a professional poster session held at the newly renovated IBBME teaching laboratories of the Lassonde Mining Building on April 4. This professionalization of the scientific process offers students an invaluable learning experience, both in terms of designing and executing large-scale research projects—and its public presentation.

"There has been a tremendous increase in the number of biomedical engineering/ bioengineering programs offering lecture courses," said Professor Dawn Kilkenny, one of the main evaluators of this year's presentations, "yet very few offer a lab component. Given that engineering is an applied field, the benefits of hands-on lab experience are clear."

But it's the scope of the experiments that make this project so extraordinary.

Unlike courses where the right answer is the only answer, the major design projects courses allow students to learn through trial and error—just like real scientists. Although the vast majority of the students were pleased with the outcome of their experiment, many noted the need to "significantly reduce the number of errors" made in their processes. Third year Biomedical engineering majors Tara Stratton and Andrea Pagotto, for example, looked at ways to amplify and tag DNA sequences of E. Coli bacteria, hoping to discover easier ways for scientists to test for the presence of this deadly bacteria in freshwater samples. "Our samples weren't conclusive enough," Stratton and Pagotto noted philosophically of the outcome of their research, "but the methods we used showed promise."

And this unique coursework has real-world implications.

Richard Gao and Om Bhatt, third year Engineering Science majors, studied the adverse effects of electrical fields on embryonic stem cells. Like others in the course, they noted a similar number of errors discovered over the span of the experiment. But their results were still on target. "Basically, don’t talk so much on your cell phone," Gao said of their findings, which saw many of the stem cells die off when exposed to amplified electrical fields similar to that of cellular phone technology.

For Abdola and Wang, though, frustrating results still hold value. Their project, an examination of "hela" or cervical cancer cells under stress, initially had a much broader scope—finding new ways to tackle the disease on the cellular level. "We're arriving at a better understanding of the hela cell line," Wang said. "And the information we're gathering can be used by other researchers."

These Biomedical Engineering undergraduates may not have discovered the cure for cancer—but that doesn't mean they won't.

BME Major Design Projects 2012 - Abdoli and Wang

BME 340 and BME 440 “Best Poster” Award, selected by external voting and Instructor/TA grading goes to: “Effect of common household neurotoxic and neuron generating substance on the development of nervous system in Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans)” by BME340 students Kasra Tajdaran & Jirapat Likitlersuang

Read more about IBBME's Biomedical Engineering Undergraduate courses.

University of Toronto Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering

Taking Undergraduate Education to the Next Level

Biomedical Engineering Student Design Projects Tackle Major Scientific Questions