I/UCRC: UTSA Planning Grant: I/UCRC for Site Addition to the iPerform Center for Assistive Technologies to Enhance Human Performance

University Of Texas At San Antonio, San Antonio TX

Investigators

Abstract

Today there exists a mass consumer demand and a strong industrial need for Assistive Technology (AT) that is portable and mobile and that will enhance human performance for healthy people as well as those with chronic health and mobility difficulties. The current I/UCRC iPerform Center for Assistive Technologies to Enhance Human Performance has minimally targeted this much needed focus area in AT. The proposed University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) site with its long established collaboration with UT Health Science Center SA (UTHSCSA), the support of the Military Health Institute and San Antonio's burgeoning entrepreneurial base aims to add significant value to the existing center. The new center based at UTSA and partnered with UTHSCSA will bring together unique expertise from computer science, engineering and health fields that better inform the development and testing of a new generation of mobile assistive technologies driven by a comprehensive understanding of human health and user needs and informed by technological constraints as well as possibilities. The UTSA center site will promote the development of AT research infrastructure in industry, health facilities, research centers and academia. It will address real-world problems, generate new types of jobs, products and services. It will impact all areas where a human has the potential to improve. The center site will also play an important role in training of scientists and engineers, and health professionals facilitating transfer of technology to the private and government sectors and address compelling real world problems that increase industry and individual productivity, improve human health, lower costs and span both the research and outreach needs of its members. Efforts will be made to increase diversity in the center. UTSA is a minority-serving institution with a large population of minority (57% Hispanic) students. UTSA has a strong history of involving the participation of underrepresented groups in research efforts. The PIs are devoted to attracting and mentoring female and underrepresented minority students in interdisciplinary projects, honors thesis research, and internships at the interface of health sciences and technology. PI Simmonds is female faculty. Moreover, both PI Quarles and PI Simmonds have significant disabilities that give them unique perspectives on this research area and the needs of the end users. The project increases the diversity of learning perspectives by bringing together faculty, researchers, clinicians, and students from different institutions and disciplines. It offers new opportunities to engage scientists with cultural diversity in joint efforts that infuse teaching and learning in a compelling application. The primary objective of this planning grant is to attract and bring together potential industrial partners, research centers and service organizations that could benefit from mobile AT to join the proposed UTSA site of the existing I/UCRC iPerform center with a special emphasis on the military health sector, which has a large presence in San Antonio. At the meeting, the team will discuss the integration with current center policies, roles of all participants, and plans to attract new members. During the planning phase, UTSA (lead institution) and UTHSCSA (subcontracted institution) will collectively organize a meeting that includes all entities that expressed interest in joining as members, as well as additional companies that the team did not have time to contact about the center but deal with ATs. Specifically, the UTSA site of the iPerform center aims to (a) attract support towards the commercialization of mobile AT products and (b) promote innovation in academia that is driven by human health needs and has industrial scalability. In work environments, the site's proposed technology aims to improve work efficiency, identify safety risks, reduce the learning curve and improve the outcomes of worker training, especially health professional training, through simulations and improve resource allocation, creativity and communication. In healthcare environments, the site will develop mobile tools that can enhance sensory, motor and cognitive capabilities, improve training, enable remote monitoring, and management, predict risk for those with chronic health problems (e.g., the elderly who live alone), monitor sleep and activity disorders, create novel robotic assistants, enable real-time analysis of patient data, and develop and test novel augmented and virtual reality therapies.