Undergraduate Achievements and Internships

Daria Zelasko, senior in Bioengineering, has received the ExCEL Scholarship, an award granted by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs to six students from across campus units who have shown academic distinction and will assume a leadership position in the coming year. Daria was recognized for her work with the Society of Women Engineers and Colleges Against Cancer. She was also awarded the Ruth and Harold Hayward Scholarship from Tau Beta Pi and the College of Engineering. Over the summer, Daria was a researcher in the group of Dr. Gerald Wong of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering where she analyzed synchrotron small angle x-ray scattering data from phospholipid bilayers. This was done to assess how synthetic antimicrobial peptides, to which bacteria may not develop resistance, affect membrane curvature and topography.

Samantha Blum, junior in Bioengineering, worked as a research intern at Illinois Bone and Joint Institute in Morton Grove, Illinois. She assisted an orthopedic surgeon in his study of both successful and failed total knee replacements, reading x-rays and making measurements of patients' patellas.

Jeffrey Pearl, senior in Bioengineering, spent the summer as a researcher in the lab of Dr. Christopher Rao in the CHBE department at the University of Illinois. His research focused on the genetic pathways involved in salmonella fimbriation. He also worked as an MCAT preparations teacher for Kaplan.

Wiktor Stopka, senior in Bioengineering, worked as an undergraduate researcher in the Lauffenburger Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He worked on two projects investigating inflammation induced by autocrine loops and the Ras protein and its implications in cancer.

Sarah Ashton-Szabo, senior in Bioengineering, worked in a Hip Development Co-op for Zimmer, Inc. in Warsaw, Indiana. She performed a variety of projects that supported both new product development and post-market surveillance.

Michelle Hattan, junior in Bioengineering, interned in Quality Assurance Program Management at Abbott Diabetes Care in Alameda, CA. She managed a large cross-functional group to improve the process and output for reporting site-wide metrics.

Devin Patel, senior in Bioengineering, spent his summer as a Quality Intern in Global Pharmaceutical Research and Development at Abbott Laboratories in Waukegan, IL. During his internship, he worked in the Quality Systems group to maximize efficiency of the department's projects to ensure products met the FDA's and the company's quality standards.

Ellora Sen-Gupta, senior in bioengineering, worked as a researcher for McGill University in Montreal, Canada. She was in charge of a project working to improve osseointegration of titanium headpost implants in rhesus macaques for the physiology department. During her time there she acquired many machining skills, learned to sandblast and acid-etch metal, and performed some surgical procedures on monkeys.

Margie Mathewson, senior in Bioengineering, studied abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina at the Universidad del Salvador. She spent four weeks taking intensive language courses and two weeks touring engineering facilities in the Buenos Aires area.

Heather August, junior in Bioengineering, was awarded a Howard E. Charles, Jr. Scholarship from the Community Foundation. The scholarship is a merit-based award for students pursuing studies in the health care field.

Ashley Pastore, junior in Bioengineering, was a Research Assistant at The University of Chicago, Department of Medicine Chicago, Illinois. She continued work on a project from the previous summer searching for new genetic causes of neonatal diabetes using linkage studies of large families affected with the disease. She also screened patients for known causes of NDM, such as ABCC8 and KCNJ11. Her first co-authored paper, "Diagnosis and Treatment of Neonatal Diabetes: A United States Experience," was e-published this summer and will be out in Pediatric Diabetes soon.

Vanessa Weisman, junior in Bioengineering, was an Engineering Intern, at Cook Medical, Bloomington, IN. She worked in their testing laboratory and on validating their test methods.

Megan O'Connor, senior in Bioengineering, was an Intern at Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Cincinnati, Ohio. She worked as a design engineer, and investigated possible device design changes that would eliminate device failure modes. Megan recently accepted a full time position at Ethicon Endo-Surgery to begin after graduation in May 2009.

Brett Harton, senior in Bioengineering, was a Neural Engineering Student Intern at Edward J. Hines VA Hospital, in Hines, IL. She worked in a Neurorehabilitation lab focusing on Traumatic Brain Injury. She was responsible for setting up the lab and new equipment and getting an EEG machine up and running.

Kim Vlcek, senior in Bioengineering, was an Intern Program Manager at Microsoft in Redmond, WA. She worked in the Natural Language Group creating ideas and prototypes to improve the Office grammar and spellcheckers.

Pratik Randeria, junior in Bioengineering, was an Engineering Intern at Baxter Healthcare, Global Infusion Systems Division. He worked with Engineers and Project Managers in the Research and Development sector to help develop new features that would make the V-link needleless device system further reduce the number of catheter related bloodstream infections.