Engineering Student Builds Device to Help Stroke Patients

02 Oct 2012 - 16:19:40 in Achievement
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Abigail Arulandu didn't plan to study engineering at Victoria University but the opportunities it has brought her confirm she made an excellent choice.

After being roped into a speech competition for young engineers at Victoria, Abigail went on to win the Asia-Pacific final of the prestigious Institution of Engineering Technology event and is gearing up for the world finals in London.

The Engineering Masters student will also soon be representing Victoria at the Australasian final of the Three Minute Thesis speech competition.

In addition, Abigail has accepted a job as a product development graduate for medical device company Fisher & Paykel Healthcare and will start work for them next year after completing her Masters degree.

At secondary school, Abigail was interested in Criminology and planned to study it - until she attended an open day at Victoria and saw student-designed search and rescue robots in action.

"Seeing some of the amazing things being designed by engineering students inspired me to change my mind," says Abby.

When she started at Victoria, Abby had limited experience of computers and no knowledge of programming or electronics. It made her first year of study quite challenging but also exciting, and by her second year she knew she had found her niche.

Abby's research has been in the area of stroke rehabilitation technology. She designed and built a tool for rehabilitating the hands of people who have had a stroke. The device repetitively exercises a person's hand in order to help them re-learn muscle sensation and regain control of their hand movements and then creates resistance against the user's movements, allowing them to build up muscle strength.

Abby says working in the medical field is important to her because she wants to make a difference and help improve people's quality of life.

Success for Abby has come through determination, hard work and motivation.

"If I can do it, anyone can. If you put in the hard yards you start reaping the benefits-nothing comes easy in life."

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