Quinn Mitchell,
Junior, Mechanical Engineering
Athens, OH 17 October 2017 –
Last Thursday, I woke up early and tossed my suitcase in my car and drove to Columbus. I was on my way to the airport to fly to Phoenix, Arizona to attend the 2017 Biomedical Engineering Society Conference. I was going to the conference to present the research I had been performing in Dr. Monica Burdick’s lab.
When I got to Phoenix, I immediately headed to the hotel to quickly unpack, change, and head to the conference. After signing in, I skimmed the program and decided to join some other members of my lab in lecture session focusing on prosthetics. This was an extremely interesting session and a great example of how biomedical research can improve people’s life.
After this session, my labmates and I visited a few more presentations before eventually heading to dinner. We spent most of that night networking with other biomedical engineering students and professors.
Much like Thursday, I spent Friday listening to experts in the biomedical engineering field discuss their cutting-edge work. The best thing about the conference was that I was not just listening to these speakers, but I also had the opportunity to have conversations with them. It was a great experience to meet researchers whose work I had read about in journal articles.
Around 8:00 am on Saturday morning, it was my turn to present on my work with plasma-based cervical cancer therapies. This would be the first time that I had ever given a talk to a room full of engineering professors and students from universities around the country. The presenters that went before me had done a fantastic job, so I felt that I had a high standard to meet.
I gave my presentation, fielded a few questions, and sat back down. I was relieved that I had managed to talk at a reasonable speed throughout the whole ordeal, something that I struggle with in normal conversation.
I flew home Saturday afternoon, and except for a few flight delays, it was a great trip!
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