Cardiovascular diseases are the #1 leading cause of death all around the world. To treat cardiovascular diseases in a minimally invasive way, interventional devices have been developed to travel through the human circulatory system to the lesion and deliver treatment. To evaluate the safety and efficacy of these interventional devices, an engineering bench-top testing platform simulating the human arterial system has been established in my lab. The goal of this research is to investigate the mechanism of action of an interventional device via bench-top testing. Specifically, the testing setup will be adapted to achieve this goal, an experiment will be designed and conducted, and the experiment data will be analyzed to draw conclusions and potentially provide insights for clinical applications.

Faculty Advisor: Yihao Zheng | WPI (Mechanical and Materials Engineering, Robotics Engineering, Biomedical Engineering)

Teacher Component: The teacher will first learn the fabrication and use of the bench-top testing platform for interventional devices. The teacher will have the opportunity to propose a research task based on the interventional devices available in the lab including, angioplasty, atherectomy, and thrombectomy. The teacher will then adjust the bench-top testing setup, design, and carry out a study. At last, the teacher will analyze the data and draw potential conclusions. There will be an opportunity to further write a research article for a conference proceeding or journal publication.