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LAUNCHPAD

CONFERENCE

PROBE

PROJECT

CONNECT

DIGITAL HEALTH

Catalyst

Learn, Think, Do

SSB's long-running Launchpad team is at the forefront of Biodesign education. Its goal is to educate the Stanford community about medical device design, and in the process, help to incubate and 'launch' new potential biotech startups out of Stanford. In collaboration with Stanford Medical School and the Byers Center for Biodesign, Launchpad organizes (and then co-teaches!) Stanford's annual Biodesign Fundamentals class, MED 175B/275B for undergrad and grad students. This year, it also aims to expand its work into connecting new projects from the class with funding and support from venture capital.

Students in MED175B/275B are given a project-based interdisciplinary dive into medical device design and prototyping. Student teams develop novel medical devices and healthcare technologies from ideation to physical realization and take part in a weekly seminar series with high-profile speakers in the industry from groups such as IDEO Health and Google X. The course ends with final presentations to local medical device professionals and venture capitalists, and teams can carry forward projects into startups after the conclusion of the quarter. Previous years' projects have included noninvasive monitoring of patient blood count, 3D-printed custom-fit neck braces from patient CT scans, low-cost prosthetics, and more! 

Applications for the course will go out winter quarter

Check out MED 275B: Biodesign Fundamentals!

Discover, Collaborate, Share

The SSB Conference committee brings cutting-edge research, and thought-leaders in healthcare innovation to students through speaker series, student panels, and an annual spring Biodesign conference to showcase leaders in biomedicine and healthcare innovation. Past conference topics have included regenerative medicine, pediatric medical devices, medical robotics, and engineering for the developing world. We have hosted hundreds of attendees and faculty from Stanford and around the country in the past, including students, faculty, and industry professionals.

Take a peek at past conferences:

Biodesigning Solutions for Health Inequities

The 2021 SSB Conference focused on how the biodesign innovation process of needs finding and product realization could be applied to address health inequities and promote global access to healthcare. The virtual conference featured a variety of topics, from racial and socioeconomic disparities in healthcare access to reducing pathogen transmission in under-resourced settings to building low-cost biomedical devices.

Medical DEVICE INNOVATION: From NEED-Finding to Product Realization

The 2019 SSB Conference focused on the medical device development pathway, from identifying unmet clinical needs to FDA clearance and patient translation. With representatives from Stanford Byers Center for Biodesign, UCSF, Medtronic, and more, Stanford students and members of the Bay Area community learned about the medtech industry from the perspective of venture capital, intellectual property, insurance reimbursement, engineering, and clinical testing.

predictive, preventative, and personalized medicine

The 2018 SSB Conference focused on personalized medicine from the perspective of research, industry, and public policy. Speakers from Stanford School of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, UCSF, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, NIH All of Us, and more presented future directions on the field of predictive and precision medicine.

Discuss, Spread, Learn

SSB’s Probe team leads the production and publication of Probe Magazine, which discusses topics and issues in medicine and technology and highlights interesting and impactful individuals in the healthcare space. The committee is in charge of writing and editing articles that examine popular or prominent issues in biomedical engineering and healthcare and showcase pathways to biodesign through interviews with physicians, researchers, engineers, venture capitalists, and more. 

Visit Probe Magazine's website to learn more and view articles here!

Network, Explore, Initiate

SSB's Connect team builds and fosters relationships between leaders in the biotech industry and the Stanford community. In addition to creating and organizing Stanford's only funded Biotech [industry] internship program for undergraduate students, Connect organizes many events during the year, from alumni-student mixers with Stanford alumni currently in the biotech industry, to career panels and recruitment fairs. Additionally, Connect arranges tours with academic labs, large R&D companies, and up-and-coming start-ups alike. Recent events include trips to IDEO, 23&Me, and more!

Imagine, Experiment, Test

Project is SSB's flagship in medical device innovation. With dedicated lab space, multiple research teams, faculty mentorship and institutional support, Project is making headway in areas like Computational Biology through DNA Devices and more. In addition to providing students with research mentorship and contact with important faculty throughout the School of Medicine, Stanford's Byers Center for Biodesign, and Stanford's Biology/Chemistry/Engineering departments, students gain critical exposure to wet lab procedures, and/or to advanced computational techniques for digital health projects. Previous projects have included the "Second Skull", to develop a novel helmet to minimize traumatic brain injuries in contact sports, but for the project teams for 2022-23 are still being initiated! This year, we want to work on projects both in medical devices and digital health, so expect cool things :)

imagine, ideate, inspire

Now under the SSB family, SHIFT [Stanford Health Innovations in Future Technologies] is Stanford's internationally-renowned group focusing on the intersection of CS and Healthcare, and this year is rebranding as SSB Digital Health. It aims to promote and cultivate health innovation on campus by creating a forum for developers, entrepreneurs, and pre-health students to collaborate. Digital Health's initiatives include organizing Stanford's annual seminar class on Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare (CS 522), running development workshops for health-related tools/APIs, developing an internship pipeline dedicated to Digital Health, and [potentially] working with the Project teams on actual digital health projects to address clinical needs!

Since the Digital Health Team is transitioning from its former status as SHIFT, you can find further information about its work at its previous domain: https://shift.stanford.edu!

practice, collaborate, master

SSB Catalyst is a newly pioneered program designed to cultivate a strong, cohesive community of Stanford students passionate about biotechnology and bioentrepreneurship. Members in Catalyst remain engaged with another SSB committee of their choice but will also have access to speaker events with faculty and leading members of the biotech and Biodesign communities, socials and retreats throughout the school year, and unique engagement with the larger Biodesign space.

Catalyst will start in the second half of the Fall quarter and continue into the Winter quarter. Every week contains a unique event, ranging from high-priority speakers in the biotech industry to workshops with Stanford Biodesign and Bioengineering faculty, lab and company tours, and networking mixers with venture capitalists and bioentrepreneurs.

Members also participate in another SSB team, because Catalyst is not meant to be time-intensive, and to allow members to continue participating in SSB after its conclusion.