ABOUT
I am a second year Bachelor of Science student at the University of Calgary, majoring in Electrical Engineering and specializing in Biomedical Engineering. I found my passion for developing new medical technology and innovations through my past involvements in hackathons: The 2019 Health Hack: Child Health and Wellness organized by Innovation4Health and the 2020 NeuroNexus competitions. Our 2019 project was awarded 'Best in Category: Clinical Research' and in 2020, my team and I partnered up with two Canadian neurology residents to develop a portable encephalogram for use in acute care settings. Having learned more about neurological disorders, I decided to become involved as an executive for Run for Little Ones, a non-profit student-run club dedicated to raising money for the Neuro-Critical Program at the Alberta Children's Hospital. My other interests include raising awareness to the variety of research conducted at the University of Calgary through scientific journalism - which also led me to becoming a content creator and co-host for The Uddering Engineers Podcast, a podcast created by engineering students for engineering students. This past year, I also have been a weekly virtual tutor through the SW community Resource Center in Calgary, teaching subjects like math, physics and biology at the high school and introductory college levels.
Research
Microwave Imaging (May 2020-Present)
Supervisor: Dr.Elise Fear
This research focuses on the application of microwave imaging in monitoring breast health in patients with breast cancer. This is done by evaluating changes in scattering signals measurements as a response to changes in tumour size and breast tissue composition before and after radiation treatment of patients in the ACCEL clinical trial.This research was conducted under Alberta Innovates Summer Research Studentship grant.
Submitted an abstract and presented at the 14th Annual Biomedical Engineering Undergraduate Summer Research Symposium and 21st Alberta Biomedical Engineering Conference titled "Monitoring Breast Treatment with Microwaves: Consistency of Scans of the Healthy Breast"
Biomechanics Lab (May 2021-September 2021)
Supervisor: Dr.Walter Herzog
Research will focus on determining the effects of titin loss in spastic Cerebral Palsy. When spastic muscle tissue samples from patients with Cerebral Palsy (CP) are tested, it has been found that they are stiffer and produce more passive force (Barber et al, 2011). Increased passive stiffness has been assumed to occur on all structural levels of the muscle. However, in a recent study, we showed that passive force and stiffness was reduced to half in myofibrils and single sarcomeres of spastic muscles from patients with CP compared to control (Leonard et al. 2019, because of a 50% reduction in the structural sarcomeric protein titin. However, titin has also been associated with active force transmission in muscles, and artificial reduction of titin has led to a corresponding decrease in active (actin-myosin based) cross-bridge forces (Joumaa et al. 2018 ). However, how the natural decline of titin in spastic muscles of children with CP affects active force is not known.
Contact me
patricia.sharleen@ucalgary.ca
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