This internship offers a dynamic opportunity for students interested in the intersection of technology and medical education. The intern will contribute to the development of an Augmented Reality (AR) application designed to enhance lab courses related to physiological measurements and anatomy at a medical school. The AR application will serve as an interactive tool to aid students in understanding complex anatomical structures and physiological processes, offering an immersive learning experience during practical courses.
Work Placement:
The intern will be integrated into a university research lab focused on innovative educational technologies, collaborating closely with faculty members, AR developers, and medical education experts. The work will involve both individual and team-based projects, giving the intern hands-on experience in software development, user interface design, and AR implementation. The intern will primarily focus on extending and improving an existing framework that has already produced a pilot AR application for auscultation (listening to heart and lung sounds) in laboratory courses.
The intern will be expected to:
- Participate in regular meetings with the research team to discuss progress and receive feedback.
- Coordinate with medical faculty to ensure the AR application meets educational needs and is aligned with course objectives.
- Test the application in both controlled lab settings and real-world course environments.
Experimental Techniques:
The research assistant will gain experience in a variety of experimental and development techniques, including but not limited to:
- Augmented Reality Development: Building interactive and visually rich AR experiences, including integrating 3D models, animations, and real-time data overlays into an AR platform.
- Software Development: Extending the existing application framework by writing and optimizing code in programming languages such as C#, Python, or JavaScript, depending on the AR platform in use (e.g., Unity, Vuforia, ARKit).
- User Experience Design: Collaborating with instructional designers to create intuitive and engaging user interfaces tailored to medical education, ensuring that the AR application is easy to use for both students and instructors.
- Data Integration: Implementing real-time physiological measurement data (e.g., heart rate, blood pressure) into the AR environment, allowing students to visualize these parameters in an interactive way.
- Testing and Validation: Running usability tests with medical students and faculty to gather feedback, refine the application’s design, and ensure accuracy in representing anatomical and physiological concepts.
Possible Tasks:
Throughout the internship, the research assistant will engage in a variety of tasks that contribute directly to the development of the AR application, such as:
- Extending AR functionality: Building upon the existing auscultation application to include additional physiological measurements (e.g., muscle activity, nerve responses) and anatomical systems.
- Interfacing hardware and AR software: Linking medical sensors (e.g., for ECG, blood pressure) to the AR app so that live data from physiological measurements can be visualized.
- Documentation and reporting: Documenting the development process, creating user manuals or tutorials for instructors, and presenting progress during lab meetings.
- Pilot testing and troubleshooting: Assisting in running pilot tests with students in laboratory settings, identifying and solving issues related to the AR experience, and ensuring the application is robust and reliable.
This internship will provide the student with not only technical skills in AR development but also a strong understanding of how technology can be applied in medical education, enhancing learning experiences through interactive and immersive tools.