The Virtual Access to STEM Careers (VASC) project is an intertwined classroom and virtual reality (VR) curricular program for third through fourth graders. Elementary school students learn about and take on the roles and responsibilities of STEM occupations through authentic, problem-based tasks with physical kits and immersive VR environments. This article reports on a round of curriculum and virtual environment development and in-classroom experimentation that was guided by preliminary results gathered from our initial VASC prototyping and testing.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTraumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a significant public health and financial concern that is affecting tens of thousands of people in the United States annually. There were over a million hospital visits related to TBI in 2017. Along with immediate and short-term morbidity from TBI, chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) can have life-altering, chronic morbidity, yet the direct linkage of how head impacts lead to this pathology remains unknown.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Mech Behav Biomed Mater
January 2021
A variety of biochemical and physical processes participate in the creation and maintenance of collagen in biological tissue. Under mechanical stimuli these collagen fibers undergo continuous processes of morphoelastic change. The model presented here is motivated by experimental reports of stretch-stabilization of the collagen fibers to enzymatic degradation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: The purpose of this paper is to describe the rapid deployment of telehealth, particularly real time video conference, for chiropractic services as a response to COVID-19.
Methods: Two health centers at 2 campuses of a large California corporation have chiropractic care integrated into physical medicine services. Care was suspended beginning on March 17, 2020 to prevent spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) among patients and staff.
During pregnancy, the cervix experiences significant mechanical property change due to tissue swelling, and to ongoing changes in the collagen content. In this paper, we model how these two effects contribute to cervical deformation as the pressure load on top of the cervix increases. The cervix and its surrounding supporting ligaments are taken into consideration in the resulting mechanical analysis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF