How will NASA handle a medical emergency during a manned mission to Mars? That's the question 1,000 Dallas-area middle school students will work to answer when they visit the SMU campus Feb. 16 to take part in Visioneering 2008. Read more.
The popular event is hosted annually by SMU's School of Engineering to show the next generation of technology innovators - today's 6th, 7th and 8th graders - the fun, excitement and challenge of engineering. A combination design contest and technology expo, Visioneering also has become a cornerstone of the University's National Engineers Week celebration. This year's event takes place 8 a.m.-12:30 p.m. in Moody Coliseum.
The budding engineers will be challenged to come up with a plan for providing medical care to a hypothetical astronaut who sustains a serious knee injury during a mission to Mars. The scenario will require students to factor in the nine-month travel time from Earth to Mars, as well as the lack of real-time communications between the two planets.
This year's challenge was inspired by the ever-increasing importance of biomedical engineering as a field of study and research, says Tammy L. Richards, associate dean of the School of Engineering. "Adding the component of space travel to the challenge should help make the competition even more exciting for young students," she says. "We hope that participating in Visioneering will show these middle schoolers that engineering is a fun, exciting field that is about innovation, creativity and teamwork."
The keynote speaker will be José Lage, director of the Laboratory for Porous Materials Applications in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, who is working on research that models the movement of gas in the lungs - a field of study closely related to the Visioneering theme of biomedical research.
This year's activities will be captured by film crews during the course of the day for national broadcast on Channel One, a news and public affairs content provider to millions of students at more than 11,000 middle and high schools. The broadcasts will take place in May and November 2008.
The event is co-sponsored by SMU School of Engineering, Texas Instruments, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and the LOPEZGARCIA Group; it will be the eighth Visioneering event sponsored by The Caruth Institute for Engineering Education at SMU. For more information, visit the Visioneering website or call 8-1920.
