Remotely Designed and Performed Biomaterials Lab

Jennifer Bailey

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Conference: 2021 ASEE St. Lawrence Section Conference
Location: Virtual
Publication Date: April 17, 2021
Start Date: April 17, 2021
End Date: April 17, 2021
Page Count: 3
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--38306
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/38306
Download Count: 185

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Jennifer Bailey Rochester Institute of Technology (COE)

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Dr. Jennifer Bailey is a Senior Lecturer of Biomedical Engineering at Rochester Institute of Technology, where she has taught since January of 2014. She previously taught at the University of Illinois and the University of Southern Indiana after graduating from Purdue University. Bailey's passion is lab course development and improving student learning through enhancing lab and other hands-on experiences.

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Abstract

“Did they design for it?” is the title for the final project of the sophomore Biomechanics and Biomaterials lab. The learning objectives include preparing and executing an appropriate experimental design to address the question while accounting for specific limitations of time and resources.

The course is a two-credit writing intensive lab with one hour of lecture and three hours of lab per week. The course content consists of skeletal biomechanics, mechanical and biological material properties, and a final project focused on experimental design and hydrogels used in consumer products. The final project requires the testing of two consumer products at three levels in triplicate. Commercial products that contain hydrogel materials and supplies for mixing solutions are provided and intentionally limited. Another limitation is time; teams of 2-3 are given one three-hour lab period to draft a procedure and mix solutions and a second three hour lab period for performing the experiment. This ensures that students come prepared and no special accommodations need to be granted such as special access to the lab facility. The instructor provides feedback on the drafted procedure usually during the initial lab period but at least 48 hours prior to performing the experiment in order to anticipate pitfalls and elicit more details as needed. The challenge in the spring of 2020 was to translate this to an off-campus experience.

Being out of the controlled lab environment presented the opportunity for enhanced creativity in the project. Previously the students had to work with resource and time limitations as well as develop an experimental procedure without the ability for a “do over” if mistakes were made. In the remote version of the project, challenges evolved from focusing on perfect planning to identifying available tools to make measurements. Students were encouraged to troubleshoot the procedure to ensure resolution of the measurements would be adequate. As the students were off campus, tools such as very precise volume measurements for solution mixing and scales for sample measurements were not available to everyone. In anticipation of mass not being measureable for everyone, coaching on how to utilize volume to perform an experiment that would be repeatable was done as part of the introduction to the project. Also, materials made of hydrogels such as diapers were not readily available for everyone so the expectations that the material being tested must be a hydrogel were expanded to any absorbent material which allowed many students to study paper towels.

This approach to designing and performing a remote lab allowed for achievement of experimental design and implementation as well as practicing the skill of selecting appropriate measurement tools. This experience also increased the creativity required by the students. It is not common for an underclassman student to be so resourceful and have to find their own measurement tools or collect supplies from their environment for an experiment. Once the final project is back in the lab again, time and resource limitations will be reinstated while measurement tools become readily available again. However, in the future the experimental design discussion will start earlier in the semester to allow the students to discover what measurement tools can be used instead of being handed an outlined protocol. A conclusion from this experience was that if a third of the students can accomplish the objectives without a scale there is no need for it to be the default tool.

Citation
Format

Bailey, J. (2021, April), Remotely Designed and Performed Biomaterials Lab Paper presented at 2021 ASEE St. Lawrence Section Conference, Virtual. 10.18260/1-2--38306

TY - CPAPER
AB - “Did they design for it?” is the title for the final project of the sophomore Biomechanics and Biomaterials lab. The learning objectives include preparing and executing an appropriate experimental design to address the question while accounting for specific limitations of time and resources.

The course is a two-credit writing intensive lab with one hour of lecture and three hours of lab per week. The course content consists of skeletal biomechanics, mechanical and biological material properties, and a final project focused on experimental design and hydrogels used in consumer products. The final project requires the testing of two consumer products at three levels in triplicate. Commercial products that contain hydrogel materials and supplies for mixing solutions are provided and intentionally limited. Another limitation is time; teams of 2-3 are given one three-hour lab period to draft a procedure and mix solutions and a second three hour lab period for performing the experiment. This ensures that students come prepared and no special accommodations need to be granted such as special access to the lab facility. The instructor provides feedback on the drafted procedure usually during the initial lab period but at least 48 hours prior to performing the experiment in order to anticipate pitfalls and elicit more details as needed. The challenge in the spring of 2020 was to translate this to an off-campus experience.

Being out of the controlled lab environment presented the opportunity for enhanced creativity in the project. Previously the students had to work with resource and time limitations as well as develop an experimental procedure without the ability for a “do over” if mistakes were made. In the remote version of the project, challenges evolved from focusing on perfect planning to identifying available tools to make measurements. Students were encouraged to troubleshoot the procedure to ensure resolution of the measurements would be adequate. As the students were off campus, tools such as very precise volume measurements for solution mixing and scales for sample measurements were not available to everyone. In anticipation of mass not being measureable for everyone, coaching on how to utilize volume to perform an experiment that would be repeatable was done as part of the introduction to the project. Also, materials made of hydrogels such as diapers were not readily available for everyone so the expectations that the material being tested must be a hydrogel were expanded to any absorbent material which allowed many students to study paper towels.

This approach to designing and performing a remote lab allowed for achievement of experimental design and implementation as well as practicing the skill of selecting appropriate measurement tools. This experience also increased the creativity required by the students. It is not common for an underclassman student to be so resourceful and have to find their own measurement tools or collect supplies from their environment for an experiment. Once the final project is back in the lab again, time and resource limitations will be reinstated while measurement tools become readily available again. However, in the future the experimental design discussion will start earlier in the semester to allow the students to discover what measurement tools can be used instead of being handed an outlined protocol. A conclusion from this experience was that if a third of the students can accomplish the objectives without a scale there is no need for it to be the default tool.
AU - Jennifer Bailey
CY - Virtual
DA - 2021/04/17
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Remotely Designed and Performed Biomaterials Lab
UR - https://peer.asee.org/38306
DO - 10.18260/1-2--38306
ER -