A good two years - LOL team forever

LOL team stands for design team 10. It is the first, and most awesome thing I have done in Hopkins. We started in September 2007. Despite the debate of what we have accomplished and where the project will go to, I am very proud and honored to work closely with a group of great teammates, who have become my closest friends in Bmore.

Two days ago we had our last animal experiment. Quote Harry's famous words, "another day, another deliverable", the team stayed up in the instrumentation lab the night before the experiment. The prototype was "packaged" for the first time, thanks to the design team field trip to Bensville - the 24 hr electronic shop :p. We were so closed to screw up our circuit during packaging by mis-connecting 5V to 48V power supply. Somehow, we were blessed by the god of electronics, and the circuit was still functional after replacing one component.

10AM the morning, Dawn and Diana came and helped us, who are definitely the best veterinarians we have ever worked with. Without asking for any return, and helping us probably would not do them any good, they came and helped us constantly. They located the phrenic in two hours, and after switching off the ventilator, our device caused the pig to breathe by her own diaphragmic contraction, boom! :-) The pig had lived only on our device (no mechanical ventilation) for at least two hours, and might had continued to live if we continued. The pig also survived with physiological CO2 concentration and patterns of diaphragm contraction. We even recorded this cool video: the pig could not breathe and the alarm went off, and we brought the pig back to life by turning on our device.

Also, the concept of localization was the first time confirmed in this experiment. The program found the right pair of electrode (as only one pair of the electrode was inserted) at both sides (we did bilateral stimulation). Everything went so well and smoothly, circuit for the first time worked perfectly, and the program was as usual impeccable. I think the prototype is almost at the stage of refinement and testing in human. Only by that can we understand the anatomy and conditions of phrenic stimulation in human, as we aim at resuscitation in emergency setting.

Each of our design team mate has a unique, but adorable personality - they are all really great people! My life in Hopkins BME could not have been as happy without them. We went to a dinner at Thai Restaurant with our best friend design team 9 representatives, which reminded me the good time we had in the thai restaurant during our trip to Illinois. I don't know when is the next time we all gather, but I will pass in continuing this sentiment and stop here. :)