Angad Singh, a freshman Biology major, and one of our SBU Innovation Lab staff, used our 3-D printers to create an adjustable wrist brace. He became interested in biology after taking an AP Biology course in high school. After hearing about the Innovation Lab on campus through a friend, he found his background in shadowing and research to be a great fit at the lab, bringing in new perspectives alongside working with new technologies. Singh was inspired by his uncle, a physician, who has many patients with difficulties concerning uncomfortable, and inconvenient wrist braces. One such issue was that they could not shower or bathe with it, and patients would need to wrap their arm in a plastic bag first. This unique wrist brace can be easily manipulated to conform to anyone’s hand for a more comfortable, custom fit, and eliminates the need to keep it dry. It is a very simple and affordable option, costing under $10, and can be made available in a relatively short period of time. Singh is currently working on improving a sizing scale, so that it can be scaled accordingly to fit hands of people of all sizes and ages. This Spring 2016 semester, Singh will be working on printing and constructing prosthetic hands. He says that, “In the field, prosthetic hands are very expensive – sometimes as expensive as $30,000, but using the technologies available at the iLab, creating a prosthetic hand costs as little as $50.”  The wrist brace is currently on display at our HSC table location.

The above is an image of the wrist brace while it is was being printed.

The following includes the steps Angad Singh took to making his 3-D printed wrist brace.

1) Print the brace with no support and no raft on about a 30% infill from:  http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:403001
*NOTE: This template is for the left hand. In order to print one for the right hand, it must be flipped in the program.

2) Once the brace has printed, remove it from the printer carefully, and place the brace in boiling hot water.

3) Place a paper towel or thin glove on the intended hand/wrist, and remove the brace from the boiling water using tweezers and place it on the wrist. Pat down the brace so it fits snugly.

4) Run your hand/wrist under cold water to solidify the brace. Once it has solidified, take it off your wrist and attach Velcro straps.

5) If it is not a perfect fit, a hot air drier can be used to touch up certain spots to adjust and achieve the best fit.

Feel free to contact the SBU Innovation Lab, or Angad Singh about any further questions regarding our adjustable, custom wrist brace!

Medical Daily, a website which covers the latest health news, scientific trends, and medical information, featured the Innovation Lab in an article. They highlighted the  medical devices that are being printed in the lab. Some of these devices include the prosthetic arm printed by lab intern Ellie Evans, over the summer, and Akshay Asok, the Innovation Lab’s technical lead, even printed out ear prosthesis, that amplify hearing.

Asok goes on to discuss the financial benefits for 3D printing medical devices, especially prosthesis. Lab member, Paul Phillipsberg, even discusses the brain wave technology he is working with,. His goal for this technology  is to make a drone fly perfectly with it. Yes, he wants to fly a drone using just his brain. 

3D printing holds many benefits for the future, especially to advance medicine.  Asok even touches on what else can be done with 3D printed prosthesis and brain wave technology.

Read the full article here. 

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Alysha Bullock.

The Innovation Lab would like to congratulate one of our own. Allisha Pavez, a Innovation Lab staff member and 3D print guru, was awarded the first ever Intelligent  Product Solutions Scholarship.

Allisha is a Junior studying mechanical engineering and University Scholar. She will be awarded an annual $2,500 scholarship until she graduates.

“By creating this scholarship, we hope to help support the education and careers of promising female engineering students,” said Mitch Maiman, president of Intelligent Product Solutions.  “Allisha is the first recipient of this award, and was selected as part of our commitment to supporting hard working, energetic and bright women in technology.”

To read more about Allisha’s career goal and interests, check out the IPS blog for the full article.

We are very proud.

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Alysha Bullock.

Paul Philipsberg, a biomedical engineering major on the pre-med track graduating this December 2015, is student working on one of the unique projects only found at the Stony Brook University Innovation Lab. Over the last few months (starting in September), he has been able to assemble a brain-controlled drone using a Mindwave headset, an Arduino board, a wireless module, Xbox 360 controller, and a quadcopter drone – all connected to a laptop.

 This drone is the Syma Quadcopter, shown turned off in this photo.

A Mindwave headset is a portable EEG (electroencephalogram) sensor that monitors brainwave signals. This is wirelessly connected to the laptop. The laptop is directly connected by wire to an Arduino board, and the Xbox 360 controller. When the sensor detects the brainwaves, it sends the information to the laptop. Brainwave signals and activity are measured as numerical values. Upon receiving these values, the computer checks the level of relaxation to set a different value for the throttle, and sends it to the Arduino board, where the wireless module communicates it with the quadcopter. To control the movements of the quadcopter, Philipsberg practices control of his current emotional states that affect the brainwaves. When calm, the quadcopter rises off the floor, and is capable of hovering if he maintains that composure. For this to be possible, these calm and excited states had to be defined. Values within a certain threshold were set to reduce drift.

  This is the Mindwave headset used to measure the brainwave signals.

It took Philipsberg several different versions to get to this point in his project. Before working with the quadcopter, he used a remote control toy car to test how it worked. Currently, Philipsberg is working on improvements. He is considering making changes using open VCI (a file extension) to refine its performance. Ideally, he would want the quadcopter to have more sensors, because it would be capable of balancing and controling movement better if it were “aware” of itself in XYZ space.

These are the some of the first components that Philipsberg worked with: a toy car, its remote, and an Arduino board.

Philipsberg sees potential in this project to build up to the technology necessary to making 3D gaming happening or wireless IP security cameras. It would need to be a joint effort of brain control and muscle control. Like the EEG sensor used, there is also one that is capable of detecting muscle activity and movement – the EMG, electromyogram. For 3D gaming, it would be necessary to include things such as a gyroscope, or an accelerometer. So far, this provides a potential answer to some of the environmental feedback necessary to make it work. For the security cameras, simple but distinct arm motions could be used to the control the way the cameras move. For example, moving your arm such as pointing in one direction could control the camera to point in that direction also. There are many possibilities to where Philipsberg could choose to branch out to.

Though Philipsberg has never worked with wireless modules or an EEG sensor before, he does, however, have experience working with Arduino, quadcopters, and LabVIEW (software used). This is currently his independent study project under Professor Baldwin and the Biology department. Philipsberg took up this project as a personal challenge while working in the Innovation Lab along with several other projects, but found this to be most interesting and relatable to the career he wants to pursue in neuropsychology. Philipsberg will be preparing to apply to graduate schools and medical schools after his graduation. He has plans to take the MCATs and to continuing working in this field after graduation.

Philipsberg giving a demonstration of his project. The quadcopter is beginning to hover a few inches above the floor.

 For more, you could view a video of this on our video page: https://you.stonybrook.edu/researchtech/videos/

On Monday, November 2, 2015 the Stony Brook Innovation Lab held the first ever Wolfie Tank. A spin off from the popular show Shark Tank, Wolfie Tank gave seven Stony Brook community members the opportunity to pitch their idea.product to a panel of expert judges.  The goal of the event was to promote an innovative and entrepreneurial spirit on the Stony Brook campus. With collaboration from our partners in College of Business, Division of Information Technology, IREP, VP for Economic Development, Long Island LaunchPad and ListNet, Wolfie Tank was able to provide current and future entrepreneurs with real life pitch experience to help with the next stages of development for  their idea/product.

The judges (shown above, excluding David Ecker) gave feedback to each presenter and spoke with them one on one during the networking section of Wolfie Tank.

The room was packed with over 140 people in attendance. Students, faculty, and outside companies were all in attendance.

Intellectual Product Solutions even created a video on Wolfie Tank 2015, showcasing some of the presenters and judge Derek Peterson.

Interested in Wolfie Tank? Make sure to save the data for next year’s Wolfie Tank 2016 on November 7th in Student Activities Center Ballroom B.

For more pictures from Wolfie Tank 2015 and information on other Innovation Lab events, visit us at www.stonybrook.edu/innovationlab or like us on Facebook @sbuinnovationlab.

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Alysha Bullock.

Remember as a kid when you used to color in your coloring book? The appeal was either the characters in the book or the fact that you just got a new box of Crayons. Exciting.

Well, things have changed a little since then; recently Disney designed a augmented reality coloring book that allows individual’s to view their work in 3D with the help of a tablet.

Disney has created a new software that takes the image of the character in the coloring book and maps the colors applied by the artist to display a pre-made 3D animation of the character. When developing this product, the developers conducted tests where one can view the coloring book page through an app and watch the character move around in an augmented reality 3D space on the page. Developers choose to use a tablet as the means of viewing the augmented reality because they rely so much on a tap and swipe interface, which means that babies and young children can operate their media devices and navigate through this coloring book.

A cool feature of this app is that it has developed a way of reading the entire recognized image on a curved surface, such as the interior pages of the coloring book. This app does not only have to recognize the boundaries of the object, but the boundaries of the drawing itself, including the colors the crayons apply, even if the page is moving around. Pretty neat, right?

But it gets even better. The image on the page doesn’t show the character from all angles, but with the app and a tablet, you can move 360 degrees around the animated character. Each of the characters from the coloring book were created in 3D modeling software and animated, then, each surface pixel on the model was assigned a corresponding pixel space on the 2D image in the coloring book. Thus, if you color the front of your elephant’s pants blue and the app makes the back of his pants blue as well. Presumably if you decided to color the pants with polka dots, the 3D image would be mirrored to make a full, polka-dotted pants pattern.

You can even boot your app and watch your character get colored in real time. Although, experiments with this have shown that the images created are not 100% accurate to the artist of the characters, the test subjects loved the feature.

Below is a video of the coloring book and app:

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Christopher Tasso.

Director of Research Technologies and Innovation, David Ecker, is pleased to announce that Morgan Kelly will be taking on a new role as Student Manager this upcoming Spring 2016 semester. The current Student Manager, Samiha Shakil, will be training Morgan for this position.

Morgan Kelly, an undergraduate senior studying Technological Systems Management with a specialization in Mechanical Engineering first joined the staff in September of 2014. At that point in time, the Innovation Lab was not born yet. On the team, she was the Technical Assistant, and became one of the original student staff behind the creation of the Innovation Lab – from a concept to a recognized, functioning name, and location on campus. Previously, as her position title implies, Morgan has worked on the more technical aspects of the lab. She focused on 3-D printing and taught other students. As the new Student Manager, Morgan will become more integrated in other parts of the processes such as “the more original part of coming up with things”. From the first day, walking into her job interview not fully comprehending the job description she was going for, until where she has helped bring the Innovation Lab to now, she has been a fundamental part of the lab’s origins. She says, “It will be interesting to tweak everything after becoming a part of how it was first established”.

Samiha Shakil, also an undergraduate studying Engineering Sciences, is on her victory lap to her Bachelor’s at the end of this Fall 2015 semester. As a student staff member and current Student Manager of the Innovation Lab, Samiha has a contributed greatly in many positive ways towards the creation to the SBU Innovation Lab. She started working in the October 2014, primarily running various workshops with her love of teaching others.Also an original member of the students that breathed life in the Innovation Lab, Samiha has witnessed and been an active part of the lab’s rapid progress as the lab evolved from a plain room with a 4-person student staff to an inviting, fun space with over 15 students working this semester. On top of all the work that Samiha has contributed this semester with planning events and working with fellow student staff members, she has still continued to stay involved in the lab’s weekly workshops – her favorite part of her job. She shares that, “We only had one workshop a month last semester, and we hardly had any attendees, but this year we have one every week and we’re getting 40+ people attending!” Samiha is currently waiting on a few responses from manufacturing companies to confirm her plans for after graduation, and we thank her for all that she has done.

 In the picture above, Morgan Kelly (left) and Samiha Shakil (right) are speaking as the MC’s of Wolfie Tank 2015.

This past Monday, October 19th, 2015, the Innovation Lab participated in the 12th International Conference & Expo on Emerging Technologies for a Smarter World (CEWIT2015). The conference, originally known as the International Conference on Cutting-Edge Wireless & Information Technologies, is the premier international forum on the applications of emerging technologies in infrastructure, healthcare, and energy, which are three of the most critical components of a smarter global environment. This conference is organized by the New York State Center of Excellence in Wireless and Information Technology (CEWIT) located at Stony Brook University in New York. The conference was located in the Melville Marriot in Long Island, NY.

In order to be featured at this year’s CEWIT expo, the Innovation Lab, like all participants, had to submit an abstract describing their technical contributions highlighting end-to-end technical solutions, applications and systems. The Innovation Lab presented lab member Kelly Smith’s silk screen project, where she made tote bags using the silk screen and sewing machine, Samiha Shakil and Alysha Bullock’s  project where they were able to create a fabric using arduino technology,  the prototype bathrooms high school students, Drew Kaplan and Shakeel Faizy, created with the 3D printer for cerebral palsy patients (link to blog post covering it here), and Allisha Parvez’s 3D printed scientific models of new horizon satellites.

During the expo, the I-Lab had a table set up where they handed out business cards, had a 3D printer on display, handed out vinyl-cut Innovation Lab designs, and answered all questions about what we do here at Stony Brook University’s Innovation Lab.

Below are some photos taken of the team and their table at CEWIT 2015:

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Christopher Tasso.

Researcher Meg Schwamb wants to transfer some of the general public’s Facebook time towards helping her research the planet Mars, specifically geysers on Mars.

Meg Schwamb is encouraging everyone to take part in the citizen science test, known as Planet Four. This test asks individuals to draw circles around what looks like geysers to them around Mars. Schwamb believes that the “wisdom of crowds” often tends to be more accurate than information provided by experts and algorithms.

Schwamb’s project is specifically focused on the south pole of Mars, an area that is coated in water ice, carbon dioxide ice and geysers. She believes that if we can understand this region of Mars better, and what exactly is going on with the geysers, we will also attain a better understanding of Earth and the atmosphere of Mars.

The images Schwamb is using come from Nasa’s  Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which is a multipurpose spacecraft designed to conduct reconnaissance and exploration of Mars from orbit.

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Christopher Tasso.

This past Wednesday, September 30th, 2015, The Innovation Lab had their very first IP (Intellectual Property) policy workshop!

Allison Singh, an experienced IP lawyer, came in to answer all questions concerning IP policy. Singh has worked with Perfumania Holdings, Inc. and Quality King Distributors, Inc. Singh has also authored Getting Over Not Getting In- A College Rejection Guide, and Rearranged!

At the workshop, Singh spoke about trademarks, copyright, patents and answered questions/listened to proposals considering Wolfie Tank.

Here are some pictures from the workshop:

Originally posted on SBU Innovation Lab Blog by Christopher Tasso.