“We were attracted by the unique nature of the project and by the opportunity to work with professor Lyes Kadem,” he adds.
“Some of us remembered professor Kadem talking to us about his research and Capstone projects in his Thermodynamics I class. We even talked about it then: ‘Wouldn’t it be cool to work on a heart simulator?’ Even as first-year students, we were intrigued by his research.”
Kadem and the team recognized a gap in how Class III medical devices are tested. Currently, devices go through lab testing, as well as animal and human testing, posing a certain level of risk for the animals and patients involved.
“The high‑fidelity heart simulator aims to address that ‘missing block’ by adding a phase of simulation that could minimize the use of animals and the risk imposed to humans during clinical testing,” says Singh.
The development of the technology has come about through Kadem’s efforts. “From the start of the project, professor Kadem was confident that the end-product was going to be something unique,” says Singh. “He guided us through the whole patent process.”
For their Capstone project, the student team came up with a proof of concept. They are now working with Lyes Kadem and Giuseppe Di Labbio at Concordia’s Laboratory of Cardiovascular Fluid Dynamics to create a marketable version of the simulator that is ultrasound and MRI compatible.
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