The 2024 MAIC Qld Student Bionics Innovation Challenge has been a unique opportunity for Queensland university students to showcase their early-stage innovations for game-changing bionic devices, implants or treatments.Â
A highly competitive field of individuals and teams submitted their new-to-the-world idea, or an innovation that delivers a marked improvements in the design and end-user benefits of a medical bionic device, implant or treatment.
Eligible bionic innovations were to sit within one or more of our focus innovation domains:
- Bionic mobility
- Bionic senses
- Brain-computer interfaces and neurobionic treatments
- Bionic implants and organs
With the core theme of Innovating with Medical Bionics to Respond to Trauma, Related Disability and Disease, all projects were also to demonstrate direct benefit the recovery, rehabilitation and quality of life of motor accident survivors.
2024 MAIC Qld Student Bionics Innovation Challenge prize winners, Alastair Quinn and Vaheh Nazari in conversation with ABC Radio.
Be Inspired: Announcing our 2024 Winners
Our winners have been announced! Thanks to our partner, MAIC Queensland, we are thrilled to have awarded $15,000 in cash prizes to two outstanding student-led team projects, helping to change the lives of those impacted by road trauma, related disabilities and chronic disease through medical bionics.
A futuristic superhero suit to help children with lower limb paralysis become mobile has taken out the $10,000 first prize in this year’s 2024 MAIC Qld Student Bionics Innovation Challenge. A $5,000 second prize has been awarded to student innovators developing a real-time spinal cord electrical stimulation rehabilitation device for clinical and home use. Read more about these outstanding innovations below.
Prize winners also receive bespoke mentoring from Bionics Gamechangers Australia to help progress their life-changing ideas to market.
2024 MAIC Qld Student Bionics Innovation Challenge Winners
First Prize Winner: $10,000 plus Commercialisation MentoringÂ
Team Leader: Vaheh Nazari (Pictured)
Team: Monzurul Alam, Alistair McEwan, Jordan Davis, and Melissa Winnel
Project: A novel superhero suit combining mechanical support and electrical stimulation to improve ambulatory function in children with movement difficulties.
Children with ambulatory dysfunction because of their deprivation of an independent life and daily activities such as mobility, [can] experience a low quality of life. Recent research showed the potential of exoskeletons in improving paralysis and restoring functional mobility in these patients. Unfortunately, current lower-limb exoskeletons are made of solid materials to bear the weight of the user, which makes them heavy, uncomfortable, and cumbersome to use. Utilising soft materials and soft robotic technology this team has designed a lighter and comfortable lower-limb exosuit. In addition, functional electrical stimulation will be combined with exosuits to increase the muscle activities and functionality of the exosuit.
Second Prize Winner: $5,000 plus Commercialisation Mentoring
Team: Matthew Hambly (team leader) and Alastair Quinn.
Project: Next-generation spinal cord injury rehabilitation: controlling electrical stimulation with motor unit level precision.
While functional electrical stimulation shows great potential for restoring lost motor function following spinal cord injury, existing systems lack the ability to provide real-time, precise control of motor unit-level stimulation due to limitations in high-density electromyography decomposition techniques and their high computational demands. This team’s proposed solution develops a neural network-based system capable of real-time motor unit decomposition from high-density electromyography (HD-EMG) signals, allowing precise control of functional electrical stimulation during therapy. The proposed innovation will transform neuromuscular rehabilitation by enabling highly targeted muscle activation, improving patient outcomes. It also sets the foundation for future wearable devices that support at-home therapy.
2024 MAIC Qld Student Bionics Innovation Challenge prize winners
(L-R): Aniket Kumar (Special Mention); Matthew Hambly and Alastair Quinn ($5,000 Second Prize); Vaheh Nazari and two of his team, Melissa Winnel and Monzurul Alam ($10,000 First Prize).
