Haena-Young Lee, a Ph.D. student in mechanical engineering at UMD and researcher in the BAM Lab, received the “Microsystems & Nanoengineering Springer Nature Outstanding Paper Award” at the 22nd Solid-State Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems Workshop.
Mechanical engineering Ph.D. student Haena-Young Lee won the Microsystems & Nanoengineering Springer Nature Outstanding Paper Award at the 22nd Solid-State Sensors, Actuators, and Microsystems Workshop, held in Hilton Head, South Carolina.
The paper, “Application of 3D Nanoprinting Toward a Retinal Vascular Phantom Library,” demonstrated a new strategy for additively manufacturing small blood vessels found in the eye with a level of 3D accuracy not possible previously. For her award, Lee received a certificate and a cash prize of $500 in front of an audience at the biannual Hilton Head Workshop, which is one of the premiere venues for the microsystems community.
The work represents a multi-disciplinary effort led by UMD Associate Professor Ryan Sochol’s Bioinspired Advanced Manufacturing (BAM) Laboratory. Study co-authors include recent mechanical engineering Ph.D. graduates Xin Xu and Adira Colton, Assistant Research Professors Molly Carton and Francis VanGessel, and Osamah Saeedi, Associate Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
The research leverages the team’s recently acquired state-of-the-art 3D nanoprinter while building on their previous advancements in the areas of organ-on-a-chip systems and non-animal models, including work presented by Xu at the 37th Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Conference on Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (IEEE MEMS 2024).
In the future, the team’s goal is to apply their strategy to create model systems, called “phantoms,” that mimic the structure of the human eye—enabling new applications in ophthalmic imaging, including the early diagnosis and monitoring of diseases such as glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy, and Alzheimer’s disease.
