Blood pressure is one of the most important signs of health, especially during surgery, when it can change very quickly. Today’s tools either squeeze the arm every few minutes or require placing a small tube directly into an artery—neither option provides a simple, comfortable way to measure blood pressure continuously. Our lab is exploring a new non-invasive method called Arterial Pressurography, which gently senses the pulse on the skin above an artery to estimate blood pressure continuously without a cuff or needle. The goal of this project is to investigate the basic physical principles behind Arterial Pressurography. Participants will help build a medical simulator, test pressure sensors, and analyze pulse-wave data to understand how continuous blood pressure can be measured safely and effectively. 

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

Teacher Component: The teacher will help build a medical simulator that produces skin-level pulse signals similar to those created by real blood pressure. They will then improve and test an Arterial Pressurography device on this simulator to measure how skin pressure reflects internal blood pressure. The project includes hands-on construction, sensor testing, and computer-based data analysis to understand the relationship between external pulse measurements and true internal pressure. The teacher will gain experience in both practical engineering and basic modeling while contributing to the development of a non-invasive blood pressure monitoring method.