Showcase

The Pietà  iconography was seen almost over a hundred years before Michelangelo's sculpture and is derived from themes that were introduced in Christian art and practice centuries prior. Starting in 14th century Germany and spreading towards the Ital ... Italian peninsula, the Pietà  changed in style and meaning based on the various schools of sculpture. Along with an extensive visual language rooted in the history of Christian art, the Pietà  iconography combined the two themes of the relationship between mother and son and the interest in suffering. It also developed with influences from mystic literature and belief with a shift in emphasis on emotional connection. From this, in the artworks of Michelangelo, the Pietà  evolved from illustrating the Compassion of Mary to reflecting the pity of the artist changing its focus to Christ, the suffering man. Through the analysis of Michelangelo's three sculptures, this paper seeks to explain the history and development of the Pietà  and how it altered its appearance from grotesque to beautiful and later to a reflection of the artist's personal suffering. Read more

The artistic discipline of art conservation and restoration did not begin with its origins in the art museums. It was once only the responsibility of an artist to restore and conserve their own artworks. Before the beginning of the nineteenth century ... , the technical process of how a painting aged was not considered by artists or contemporary art historians. But, as the discipline of art conservation has matured, the way conservators and restorers preserve oil paintings now includes elements of science and technology. This paper analyses and describes the methods and practices of current art conservation and restoration in fine art museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, its history and current practices in the professional field. The most relevant discourse in the museum world is the intent of the artist, what works are being altered, how exactly the paintings are altered, and the techniques used to ensure that any conservation or restoration work done to the paintings is reversible in order not to jeopardize the paintings integrity as an original work. Read more

This paper discusses how The Herron School of Art created an exhibition titled, “Past is Present: Black Artists Respond to the Complicated Histories of Slavery”, curated by Jonathan Square. This is an exhibition that brings attention to slavery and i ... ts effects into modern society. The installations focus on ideas pertaining to hegemony, white supremacy, social inequalities, politics, in conjunction with showing viewers that art galleries have historically been “white spaces”. This paper examines this exhibition to help understand its social effects, as well as what social ideas affected the exhibition itself. The paper further analyzes the pieces sharing cultural experiences with an audience and looks at how different perceptions and life experiences affect what the art means and how this affects viewers. This exhibition encourages viewers to question themselves to understand how much slavery has affected African Americans' experiences in life and society. This moves viewers to understand how slavery has affected everyone's lives and shaped the ideals and standards of this society. I show in my paper how whether one wants to admit that or not is up to the viewer, however this exhibition makes these issues relevant, showing how dangerous slavery and its implications are and why a show like this was created. Read more

In partnership with our sponsor Nian Wang, our team worked to improve the device used to hold ex vivo murine tissue during High Resolution Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). MRI images of murine tissues are used to collect qualitative and quantitativ ... e data for research studies on neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's Disease (AD). These images can become obstructed by artifacts either from movement or magnetic resonance susceptibility. Our device and the filling procedure designed for it work to eliminate these artifacts by holding the tissue in place and extracting the bubbles that are created when filling the container with a Perfluoropolyether solution. Read more

Our goal was to create a fetoscope that can manipulate existing equipment to effectively access vasculature and increase the rate of success for the procedure.

In partnership with our sponsor Dr. Angela Yepes D.D.S, IU School of Dentistry, our team worked to create a device that would allow dental students to practice administering pediatric local anesthetic without a participating patient. Currently, there ... are no physical training models for practicing such procedures before performing them on live patients. Because of variable landmark locations in pediatrics, it can be difficult for students to know where to administer the local anesthetic, which increases the risk of a dental emergency. Thus, our team created a 3D model of a pediatric jaw that will allow dental students to practice local anesthesia procedures in order to improve their skills and confidence. Read more

Our objective is to develop a form factor that provides continuous and accurate fetal heart rate during all processes and procedures involved in the surgical delivery of the fetus. Funding support for this multidisciplinary educational project was pr ... ovided, in part, by the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine, to Dr. Sherri Bucher. Read more

Kidney Disease refers to the improper filtering of waste and excess fluid from the body. Acute Kidney Injury, a form of kidney disease, affects 30-50% of hospitalized infants [1]. For the infant population, peritoneal dialysis (PD) via a catheter is ... the preferred treatment modality over hemodialysis [2]. Currently, there are not any official and practical solutions to treat infants suffering from kidney disease. With the help of our sponsors, our team sought to address this issue. As part of the project, our team focused on developing a catheter and finding a minimally-invasive procedure by which the catheters can be placed. Two existing techniques that are used to place catheters in the peritoneal cavity of infants include: laparoscopic surgery and the seldinger technique [2]. Read more

Overall, it is expected that 268,490 men in the United States will be diagnosed with prostate cancer this year and estimated that 1,414,259 people worldwide were diagnosed in 2020, making it the fourth most diagnosed cancer in the world. Removal of t ... he prostate is one of the most common treatments to prevent the spread of cancer to different organs. The removed prostate is sent to the lab to diagnose the severity of cancer (tumor size and location) and is sliced into sections. The tissue slices must be of uniform thickness to allow for proper area calculations of the tumor. If the slices are not of uniform thickness it can lead to improper diagnoses of cancer. The goal is to create a device to assist medical professionals in creating uniformly thick slices of prostates post-prostatectomy. Read more

Currently, infants born with heart conditions in need of pacing are treated using the smallest traditional pacemaker on the market, which is still considerably large for patients who are less than one year old. This is done by placing the pacemaker i ... n infants' abdomen then running the leads up to the heart, a procedure which has been in practice for the past 30 years. In 2016, the FDA approved the use of the MicraTM Pacemaker by Medtronic, known for its significantly smaller dimensions and leadless adaptation. This pacemaker would be an ideal alternative for current pediatric pacemaker implantation surgeries allowing a more fitting size in infant patients. However, there lies a crucial problem with the MicraTM: it is a pacemaker designed to be implanted directly into the heart of an adult patient. Direct implantation is an impossible task for infant populations considering their heart is about the size of a walnut (25-35 cubic centimeters). The goal of this project is to design an adapter prototype that would allow for the MicraTM to be used in the same fashion as the current pacemaker that uses leads. This would allow cardiac electrophysiologists to utilize the smaller MicraTM pacemaker, while also allowing the device to remain outside of the heart. Succeeding in this task will result in an adapted pacemaker that is proportional to the size of infants, use of the most advanced technology on the market, and the ability to produce products with reduced costs within a limited customer population. Read more