Summer Enrichment II

USP Seminar 11/5/13 – Undergrad Enrichment Seminar

During this seminar Arun Karottu (Trinity ’15), Yavuz Açikalin (Trinity ’14), and Linda Cao (Trinity ’14) reported on how they used their Uni undergrad enrichment funding this past summer

Arun – Computer Science Major

Arun worked on 3 different start-up ideas this summer, his goal was to have one generate revenue.

1) KlickOp

• Description: “Use your computer handsfree in the OR!”
• Goal: to solve a big problem in healthcacre
• Ideas/Challenges:
  • Idea A – Use the infrared (IR) system of “Leap Motion: to control a mouse, type only using hand movements
    • Challenge A – Leap Motion is not very accurate, and since it is IR it has trouble working under all of the lights needed in the OR
  • Idea B – Use a smart surface table (like a giant tablet) with replaceable glass
    • Challenges – Anything would need outside investment and FDA approval, decided to move on from this idea.

Result: http://www.klickop.com/ – didn’t work out but found some interesting things along the way

2) Pitturo

• Description: easy creation of personal websites for artists, like wordpress for art
• Key features:
  • scalable platform
  • Pitturo would host the sites for the artists
  • artists could choose a template, build the site
  • the same backend exists for each template
  • easy and customizable
  • Pitturo would free artists from the gallery model

Outcome: http://www.pitturo.com/

This idea took most of the summer, Arun believes it is viable and may return to it.

3) Smart Metals Recycling (start up of fellow Uni Shelly Li, Trinity ’15)

• Goal: Create a wesbsite for Smart Metals Recycling
• Key features:
  • website must include an ordering form for material pickup where an image can be uploaded and specifics entered.
  • the administrators of the website must be able to organize the order forms easily
  • a tracking system must be implemented

Outcome: http://www.smartmetalsrecycling.com/

Arun is currently still working on this, he and Shelly are talking to Lenovo, Duke, SBX…

 

Yavuz – Double major in Neuroscience and Economics

Yavuz spent his Uni funding to support himself as he did research with Baba Shiv at the Stanford University School of Business (http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/users/bshiv)

Working with Professor Shiv, Yavuz was studying “neural correlates of generalized conflict and decision deferral”. Basically, the group wants to understand how quickly we make decisions and how that speed is impacted by conflict. To date, research has been confined to studying the impact of conflicts that are relevant to the decision at hand, where it is seen that in the presence of conflict, decision is deferred, i.e. people take longer to decide. Yavuz was working with Professor Shiv to understand how incidental conflicts, those that not relevant to the decision, would impact decision making. Their hypothesis consisted of three parts: 1) incidental conflict should cause decision deferral, 2) this deferral should be statistically indistinguishable from that caused by relevant conflict, and 3) decisions made under incidental and relevant conflicts should be mediated by the same part of the brain. To complete the study, the group did both non-fMRI, and fMRI studies on 200 subjects. Yavuz was involved with the non-fMRI studies in which subjects were asked to make a decision after being exposed to a type of conflict. The irrelevant conflict was implemented with a Stroop test (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroop_effect) while the relevant conflict was implemented using racial stereotypes before asking subjects to decide something such as whether or not a particular person was likely to play the piano. The group found that parts 1 and 2 of their hypothesis was well supported. They have yet to implement the fMRI tests to explore part 3 of the hypothesis.

Yavuz advises Unis to:

• Use your connections at Duke and elsewhere to find an interesting position.
• Meet new people so you can broaden your network and learn something.
• Take responsibility in your position, ask for responsility and work if it’s not given to you.
• Stay in contact with the people you meet – you never know when it might turn into an interesting opportunity
• Try something new – you might surprise yourself!

Linda – Double major in Biology and Asian/Middle Easter Studies concentrating in Chinese

Linda used her summer funding to support herself while volunteering in China.

Linda’s Goals for the summer:

1) Career goal – further puruse her interest in medicine and pediatrics
2) Personal goal – strengthen her Chinese language skills and explore her birth heritage

Development of her plan:

Linda wanted a “good fit”, a plan that would complement her goals, use her connections, deepen her previous experiences, and allow her to go abroad.

 Plan: 7 weeks in China

• 2 weeks in Beijing – working with the China care home volunteer program
• 1.5 weeks in Shanghai – shadowing doctors in a hospital
• 1.5 weeks in Shanghai – working at the CereCare Wellness Center
• 1.5 weeks in Beijing – working at a summer science camp at her Duke engage site

 China Care Home

• Linda works with Duke China Care, which brings those local children adopted from China together for activities each week. This allowed the children to explore their birth heritage. Duke China Care also raises money for orphans in China who need surgeries. After surgery, these children are much more likely to be adopted.
• -The China Care Home in Beijing is a pre- and post-op facility for orphans where Linda volunteered caring for the children.
•  This experience allowed Linda to put her previous work at Duke into context.

Shadowing Doctors in Shanghai

• Linda shadowed at the hospital where her grandmother was a nurse for 55 years, that was her connection to get in.
• She shadowed doctors in orthopedics, radiology, surgery, traditional chinese medicine/acupuncture, and gynecology.
• The doctors she was with saw 150+ patients/day.
• She gained insight into the different models of medicing in the US and China, which helped further her career goal for the summer.
• Linda realized that she would prefer to work in the US system where personal interaction and follow up with patients is more possible

CereCare Wellness Center

• This center works with children with cerebral palsy, it specializes in rehabilitation as well as care.
• Since Linda only had 1.5 weeks with CereCare, she struggled to figure out how to give something meaningful to the organization. She feels that often in volunteer experiences the volunteer can get more out of the experienece that they leave behind, and she didn’t want that to be the case here.
• Lindaworked to translate CareCare’s website into English and is still working on that here at Duke.
• Linda was inpired by the children she saw at Cere Care, which validated her career choice of pediatrics.

Science Camp at Dandelion Middle School

• Dandelion is a residential school for children of migrant workers
• Linda worked there for 11 weeks in the summer of 2012 teaching English with Duke Engage (http://dukeengage.duke.edu/immersion-programs/international-programs/china-beijing)
• Linda found returning to the same site and reuniting with her students very meaningful.
• She worked on building a curriculum for the summer science camp that would combine science and art through hands on projects.

Linda’s Take Aways/Advice:

• Tying together meaningful experiences from your undergraduate experience can be very rewarding!
• Learning about your career goals in a different context is very helpful.
• Building your language/communication skills is never a bad thing.
• Meeting new people is wonderful and allows you to build connections.
• Don’t be afraid to use your connections!
• Don’t be afraid to design your own program.
• Don’t be afraid to double major is two very different subjects!