The Laboratory for Living Systems Engineering is dedicated to outreach activities that stimulate K-12 student interest in biomedical engineering.
Fall 2019
We are repeating our personalized medicine field trip and hands-on activity established in Spring 2019, in partnership with Ortho and ASBME.
Summer 2019
We are hosting two SHINE students this summer, Jennifer Gipson from Hamilton High School and Jaylene Lopez from Ortho. Welcome to LLSE!
Spring 2019
Through generous funding from a USC Good Neighbors grant, Megan M hosted a field trip for students at Orthopaedic Medical Magnet High School themed around personalized medicine and partnered with ASBME students to develop and execute a module for fabricating PDMS fluidic devices in their classroom. Read more here. Thanks to the many people who made this possible!
We also hosted our annual centrifuge field trip for Ortho students.
We also hosted our annual centrifuge field trip for Ortho students.
Summer 2017
This summer, we are hosting two high school students, Sabina and Jacqueline, through the USC Viterbi SHINE program. Welcome!
Megan also visited Ortho this summer to evaluate projects for the Summer Bridge Presentation Showcase. This year, incoming 9th graders prepared presentations on how stress affects the brain. Great job!
Megan also visited Ortho this summer to evaluate projects for the Summer Bridge Presentation Showcase. This year, incoming 9th graders prepared presentations on how stress affects the brain. Great job!
Spring 2017
We welcomed the physics class from Orthopaedic Medical Magnet High School again for their annual field trip on centrifuges. Thanks for visiting us!
Fall 2016
We contributed to the USC Viterbi STEM Spotlight on the Department of Biomedical Engineering by hosting lab tours for 50 middle school students from Compton. Read more about the event here and here!
Summer 2016
Jezell, a high school student from Diamond Bar High School, joined our lab for the summer as part of the USC Viterbi SHINE program. She did a great job presenting her final poster, "Miniaturizing Heart on a Chip Constructs for Metabolic Measurements in a Standard Cell Culture Plate."
Spring 2016
We visited two local elementary schools as guest speakers for the USC Wonderkids Program. We taught 6-8 year old students about the structure and function of the heart, and helped them engineer their own "organs" by mixing together beads (representing cells) and clay (representing matrix).
We welcomed 11th grade physics students from Orthopaedic Medical Magnet High School for a field trip. Students were learning about centrifuges in class, so we showed them how we use centrifuges in our research. We also gave students a lab tour and an overall introduction to our research in Organs on Chips. Read more here!
Fall 2015
Our collaboration with Orthopaedic Hospital Medical Magnet High School was recently highlighted by USC Viterbi. Read more here!
Summer 2015
We have initiated a collaboration with the OrthopaedicHospital Medical Magnet High School (known as Ortho) in downtown Los Angeles. Ortho is dedicated to preparing students for careers in the health care industry. Megan recently met with several teachers and administrators from Ortho and visisted Ortho as a volunteer judge for their science fair. We are excited about developing future visits to Grade 9-12 science classes to introduce students to biomedical engineering through interactive, hands-on activities. Thanks to Katie Mills, administrator of the USC Viterbi Adopt-a-School Adopt-a-Teacher (VAST) program, for making the connection!
Spring 2015
Megan spoke to students in Grades 9-12 at the Haverford School in Haverford, PA as part of the Will Gwinn Lecture Series. In addition to her seminar entitled "Engineering Your Heart on a Chip," Megan met with students in engineering and biology classes, including lunch. Thanks to Holly Golecki for the invitation!
Summer 2014
Andre Lai and Nicolaus Jakowec, both local high school students, spent 8 weeks in the lab as part of the Summer High School Advanced Research Program (SHSARP) at USC. Andre and Nicolaus did a great job on their project and presentation: "Fixing Broken Hearts: Optimizing the Cross-Linking of Gelatin Hydrogel Scaffolds for Cardiac Tissue Engineering."