Alumni Involvement Opportunities

The “AmbuBox” device is based on the ambu-bag, a handheld ventilation device. (Andy Fell/UC Davis)

LOW-COST, PORTABLE VENTILATORS

Biomedical engineering Professor Tingrui Pan and Assistant Professor of Surgery Andrew Li are working with clinicians to create a simple, inexpensive ventilator. The prototype device consists of components already in hospitals including the ambu-bag, some 3-D printed components and a circuit board to control the pneumatic system. The device, named “AmbuBox,” is based on the ambu-bag, a handheld ventilation device. Squeezing the bag by hand pushes air into a patient’s lungs and provides the vital functions of a ventilator while being completely portable. The expensive ventilator systems that hospital use offer many more functions for specific high-needs patients, but by using a simplified device like the AmbuBox ventilator, doctors can provide basic functions for most patients while reserving more sophisticated equipment for patients who really need it. MEETING COMMUNITY NEEDS FOR COVID-19 TESTING

After graduation, biomedical engineering alumni Kyle Jacobs ’19 and Julia Loegering ’19 were looking for new ways to apply their engineering education as researchers in the lab of Nam Tran, associate clinical professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at UC Davis. Shortly after the start of the pandemic, Tran became the lab director charged with overseeing all COVID-19 diagnostics at UC Davis Health. His lab was tasked with fulling supporting UC Davis Health in meeting community needs for COVID-19 testing. Jacobs and Loegering functioned as support for drug studies on COVID-19 patients by collecting samples for clinical teams validating antigen and antibody COVID-19 tests and conducting studies that developed new diagnostic COVID-19 assays to address shortages and provide further testing resources to the Sacramento community.

8 UC DAVIS COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING Covid-19

A New Era in Engineering Design

By Aditi Risbud Bartl

On Friday, October 9, 2020, the College of Engineering kicked off the Engineering Student Design Center (ESDC) expansion with a groundbreaking ceremony and virtual celebration.

The ESDC expansion will more than double the current space in Bainer Hall to 23,000 square feet and allow students across all disciplines to discover the power of design through rapid prototyping, 3-D printing and an incredible range of physical and digital technologies. In particular, this expansion will provide students hands-on learning experiences and design-centric approaches to learning that are invaluable for their future careers.

“More than ever, we’re driven to provide a world-class learning environment, support innovation and entrepreneurship and set our students up for great success and leadership in their careers,” said Chancellor Gary S. May. “With this project, the future of engineering design education at UC Davis couldn’t be brighter: the expanded ESDC will truly be a game changer.”

Led by Diede Construction, Inc., the ESDC expansion will embrace forward-thinking styles of teaching and learning, with a strong emphasis on collaboration and teamwork. Through the Student Startup Center, which will be co-located in the ESDC, the college will grow and strengthen its culture of innovation and entrepreneurship. In addition, the Student Startup Center will provide resources, training and support for budding entrepreneurs—not only for engineering students, but for undergraduates across campus—and access to ESDC equipment.

“The ESDC expansion serves as the hub for our overall Engineering Design Ecosystem, which transforms how students learn design and provides a space for students to turn problems into creative solutions, learn to use cuttingedge equipment and design, build and prototype more effectively than they ever have before,” said Jennifer Sinclair Curtis, dean of the College of Engineering. “At the new ESDC, students will integrate the knowledge of engineering principles they receive in the classroom with hands-on experience. What’s more, when they graduate, they will impress employers and hit the ground running in their careers.”

Since 2015, the ESDC expansion project has been the college’s number one priority for undergraduate education and updating the college’s infrastructure. This effort is part of the university’s $2 billion “Expect Greater” fundraising campaign, which launched October 9, 2020 and is the largest philanthropic endeavor in the university’s history. The “Expect Greater” campaign will propel the university’s work to prepare future leaders, sustain healthier communities and bring innovative solutions to today’s most urgent challenges.

Learn more and follow the progress of the ESDC expansion starting January 2021 through the grand opening in fall 2022: https://design.engineering.ucdavis.edu/