The Universal Socket Prosthetic, a student project developed in a course held at Jacobs Hall, has been named a student finalist in Fast Company‘s 2018 World Changing Ideas Awards. The World Changing Ideas Awards honor businesses, policies, projects, and concepts that offer innovative solutions to the issues facing humanity.
The Universal Socket Prosthetic was created by students Dominic Chiavacci, Hunter Garnier, Akhilesh Mishra, and Stephen Shelnutt in Designing for the Human Body, a mechanical engineering and bioengineering course taught by Grace O’Connell at Jacobs Hall. The open-source design project tackles the challenge of limb differences from a new angle, allowing anyone to create a customized prosthetic system that they can adapt and use over long periods of time. Rather than attempting to design a “jack-of-all-trades” arm, this socket system uses varying custom attachments to accomplish a wide range of tasks. Learn more about the project and explore this year’s World Changing Ideas.