To gain a better understanding of the roles and functions of components of the human respiratory system and our need for clean air, students construct model lungs that include a diaphragm and chest cavity. They see how air moving in and out of the lungs coincides with diaphragm movement. Then student teams design and build a prototype face mask pollution filter. They use their model lungs to evaluate their prototypes to design requirements.

This seminar engages in the notion of space from various points of departure. The goal is first of all to engage in the term and secondly to examine possibilities of art, architecture within urban settings in order to produce what is your interpretation of space.

Student teams investigate biomedical engineering and the technology of prosthetics. Students create a model prosthetic lower leg using various materials. Each team demonstrate its prosthesis' strength and consider its pros and cons, giving insight into the characteristics and materials biomedical engineers consider in designing artificial limbs.

Students reinforce their knowledge of the different parts of the digestive system and explore the concept of simulation by developing a pill coating that can withstand the churning actions and acidic environment found in the stomach. Teams test the coating durability by using a clear soda to simulate stomach acid.

Students design and build prototypes for protective eyewear. They choose different activities or sports that require protective eyewear and design a device for that particular use. Students learn about the many ways in which the eyes can be damaged and how engineers incorporate different features and materials into eyewear designs to best protect the eyes.

Students observe and test their reflexes, including the (involuntary) pupillary response and (voluntary) reaction times using their dominant and non-dominant hands, as a way to further explore how reflexes occur in humans. They gain insights into how our bodies react to stimuli, and how some reactions and body movements are controlled automatically, without conscious thought. Using information from the associated lesson about how robots react to situations, including the stimulus-to-response framework, students see how engineers use human reflexes as examples for controls for robots.

Students learn about human reflexes, how our bodies react to stimuli and how some body reactions and movements are controlled automatically, without thinking consciously about the movement or responses. In the associated activity, students explore how reflexes work in the human body by observing an involuntary human reflex and testing their own reaction times using dominant and non-dominant hands. Once students understand the stimulus-to-response framework components as a way to describe human reflexes and reactions in certain situations, they connect this knowledge to how robots can be programmed to conduct similar reactions.

Students learn about how biomedical engineers aid doctors in repairing severely broken bones. They learn about using pins, plates, rods and screws to repair fractures. They do this by designing, creating and testing their own prototype devices to repair broken turkey bones.

Students continue to build a rigorous background in human sensors and their engineering equivalents by learning about electronic touch, light, sound and ultrasonic sensors that measure physical quantities somewhat like eyes, ears and skin. Specifically, they learn about microphones as one example of sound sensors, how sounds differ (intensity, pitch) and the components of sound waves (wavelength, period, frequency, amplitude). Using microphones connected to computers running (free) Audacity® software, student teams experiment with machine-generated sounds and their own voices and observe the resulting sound waves on the screen, helping them to understand that sounds are waves. Students take pre/post quizzes, complete a worksheet and watch two short online videos about "seeing" sound.

This is a description of many different activities that have been used with Pre kinder gardeners to further their understanding of their bodies and their senses.

Students use their knowledge about how healthy heart valves function to design, construct and implant prototype replacement mitral valves for hypothetical patients' hearts. Building on what they learned in the associated lesson about artificial heart valves, combined with the testing and scoring of their prototype heart valve designs in this activity, students discover the pros and cons of different types of artificial heart valves based on materials, surgery requirements, and lifespan.

Using film and related popular media as our texts, this course will examine how screen “embodiments” of the woman visualize ideologies of discipline and desire in a culture in which her body has become a representation of the ability to control appetites, size and shape while investing personal and social capital in its rehabilitation as a project of endless reconstruction, redesign and maintenance. Throughout the course we will draw from feminist film theory, clinical psychology, as well as women’s, gender, and cultural studies, to better understand how filmic representations of the woman’s body first emerge from contemporary psychosocial contexts and then in turn shape the body ideals and internalizations, as well as the behavioral practices of the film spectator.
The Graduate Consortium in Women’s Studies (GCWS)
This course is part of the Graduate Consortium in Women’s Studies. The GCWS at MIT brings together scholars and teachers at nine degree-granting institutions in the Boston area who are devoted to graduate teaching and research in Women’s Studies and to advancing interdisciplinary Women’s Studies scholarship. Learn more about the GCWS.

Towards finding a solution to the unit's Grand Challenge Question about using nanoparticles to detect, treat and protect against skin cancer, students continue the research phase in order to answer the next research questions: What is the structure and function of skin? How does UV radiation affect the chemical reactions that go on within the skin? After seeing an ultraviolet-sensitive bead change color and learning how they work, students learn about skin anatomy and the effects of ultraviolet radiation on human skin, pollution's damaging effect on the ozone layer that can lead to increases in skin cancer, the UV index, types of skin cancer, ABCDEs of mole and lesion evaluation, and the sun protection factor (SPF) rating system for sunscreens. This prepares students to conduct the associated activity, in which they design quality-control experiments to test SPF substances.

Why do humans have two ears? How do the properties of sound help with directional hearing? Students learn about directional hearing and how our brains determine the direction of sounds by the difference in time between arrival of sound waves at our right and left ears. Student pairs use experimental set-ups that include the headset portions of stethoscopes to investigate directional hearing by testing each other's ability to identify the direction from which sounds originate.

Students follow the steps of the engineering design process to create their own ear trumpet devices (used before modern-day hearing aids), including testing them with a set of reproducible sounds. They learn to recognize different pitches, and see how engineers must test designs and materials to achieve the best amplifying properties.

This lesson introduces students to the space environment. It covers the major differences between the environment on Earth and that of outer space and the engineering challenges that arise because of these discrepancies. In order to prepare students for the upcoming lessons on the human body, this lesson challenges them to think about how their bodies would change and adapt in the unique environment of space.

In this activity, students will review and practice naming their body parts in Spanish. They will also use the vocabulary they already know to give clues to their classmates to describe a body part.

In this activity, students will review and practice naming their body parts in Spanish. They will also use the vocabulary they already know to give clues to their classmates to describe a body part. Students will practice asking and answering questions relating to the body and come up with solutions for illnesses.

Students will be able to recount events that have happened to them using vocabulary about health and body parts. Students will learn to discuss injuries, illness, and medical related events. Students will also learn more about insurance and medical costs.

Students will be able to recount events that have happened to them using vocabulary about health and body parts.