Motivation

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Engineers use mechanical models of soft tissue to design prosthetics or synthetic grafts that can seamlessly mesh with the patients skin.

However these mechanical models are complicated, and constructing experiments to accuratly replicate the boundary conditions the model requires special consideration. As part of a larger experimental program to characterize the bi-axial stress response of soft tissues, my work involved desiging a tensile clamp that would mitigate the stress sheilded regions of rigid clamps perpendicular to the stress direction.

The attached final poster presents my work on the design of a fishook pulley system to transfer tensile loads to the specimen that avoids the stress sheilding effects of rigid clamps. The poster was presented at a final public research symposium at the end of the semester.

While this was my first introduction to research and I enjoyed the process, I learned that I do not have the stomach to handle organic components for a living.