Vanderbilt University Mechanical Engineering

Congratulations to Dr. Nibraas K. on the successful defense of his dissertation on Monday, July 27th! Dr. Khan's work developed a general framework that integrates wearable sensing with explainable AI, with applications spanning both healthcare and sports. His research focused on analyzing real-world, ecologically valid data collected outside the laboratory, where noisy and incomplete data present significant challenges. He is the 28th Ph.D. graduate from the Robotics and Autonomous Systems Lab! He is pictured below with Dr. Nilanjan Sarkar.

‼️ There are still open spots in Applied Robotics! 🤖 📅 Open registration began today and will close on September 4th. Course Numbers: ME 4272/5272 and BME 4272/5272 Prerequisite: ME 4271/5271 (Robotics)

✈️ Some of our students recently had the incredible opportunity to visit world-renowned automotive manufacturers across the US and Europe. Huge thanks to Jason E. Mitchell and Ranjana Sahai for making this possible!

Congratulations to VISE faculty member Xiaoguang Dong, PhD, for being awarded a The National Institutes of Health (NIH) R21 grant from the National Institute on Aging (NIA)! 🎉👏 Dr. Dong will use this award to develop a next-generation smart esophageal stent with integrated magnetic soft robotic structures for actively transporting solids and viscous fluids to assist swallowing in patients with esophageal diseases. Current esophageal stents primarily serve as passive conduits and often fail to restore natural swallowing function. The goal is to create an active, wirelessly actuated stent capable of facilitating bolus transport and improving quality of life for patients suffering from dysphagia and other esophageal disorders. To learn more: https://lnkd.in/eBEiNXmB #VISE #VISEVanderbilt #Vanderbilt #NIH #R21 #NIA #Award #Esophageal #Stent #Magnetic #Robotics #Transport #Quality #Clinical #Technology #Research #Science #Healthcare #Medicine #Innovation #Intervention #Engineering #Surgery Vanderbilt University School of Engineering

Excited to share that our lab has been recently awarded an NIH R21 grant from National Institute of Aging to develop a next-generation smart esophageal stent with integrated magnetic soft robotic structures for actively transporting solids and viscous fluids to assist swallowing in patients with esophageal diseases. 📣 📣 Impact: Current esophageal stents primarily serve as passive conduits and often fail to restore natural swallowing function. Our goal is to create an active, wirelessly actuated stent capable of facilitating bolus transport and improving quality of life for patients suffering from dysphagia and other esophageal disorders. We are grateful for the support from #NIH and excited to advance this implantable device technology toward personalized, minimally invasive therapies for gastrointestinal diseases. We also thank Vanderbilt Center for Technology Transfer and Commercialization (CTTC) and the Vanderbilt provost office for supporting our research through the Innovation Catalyst Funds. Vanderbilt News: https://lnkd.in/gxMmcuYJ Vanderbilt University School of Engineering, VISEVanderbilt, Vanderbilt Institute of Nanoscale Science and Engineering (VINSE), Vanderbilt University Mechanical Engineering #magnetic #implantable_device #soft_robotics #dysphagia #aging

Proud to share that our lab presented at the LSU Symposium on Control, Learning & Intelligent Systems! Abigale Plunk presented our work, “When Humans Break the Loop: Evaluating Autonomous Driving Control in Mixed Traffic,” exploring how small variations in human driving behavior can lead to major differences in autonomous vehicle outcomes, including collision, deadlock, and unsafe passing. We are excited to continue advancing behavior-aware approaches for safer mixed-traffic autonomy. Read our extended abstract here: https://lnkd.in/eBrCZf9m Special thanks to Adrian Stein and his team for organizing and hosting a great symposium!