Selected research projects
• Funding Program: MISTI Seed Fund
• Amount: 30,000 USD – URL
• PI: Dr. Emir Vela (evela@utec.edu.pe) and Ellen Roche (MIT)
A Lower Limb Soft Robotic Exoskeleton for Motor Development of Infants Affected by Spina Bifida
The goal of this proposal is to develop a low-cost robotic exoskeleton made of soft and flexible materials to perform lower-limb rehabilitation of 0-6-month-old infants affected by SB through passive repetitive flexion/extension movements of joints and muscles to significantly reduce their walking disorders.
• Funding Program: MISTI Seed Fund
• Amount: 30,000 USD – URL
• PI: Dr. Ursula Rodriguez-Zuñiga (urodriguez@utec.edu.pe), Daniel Frey and Elizabeth McDonald (MIT)
Community-Led Social and Environmental Problem-Solving with Women Miners in Peru
The project will enable students to better understand the connection between technological, environmental, social, and economic issues in extractive economies in general and particularly in the mining industry in Secocha, Peru. It will also provide them with hands-on experience in community-led social and environmental problem-solving by directly engaging with artisanal and small-scale women miners, known as pallaqueras.
• Funding Program: MISTI Seed Fund
• Amount: 30,000 USD – URL
• PI: Dr. Jose Antonio Larco (jlarco@utec.edu.pe), Dr. Claudia Antonini (UTEC) and Christopher Mejia (MIT)
Unraveling smallholder agricultural supply networks in Peru
This project aims to understand and characterize the complexities that lie underneath the accessibility to the market in the Peruvian context and relate them to observed supply-chain and firm outcomes. Using social network analysis, this project will identify and learn from success stories through a strong commitment to collaboration among supply-chain actors, to create a methodology that might be scaled-up to integrate current data sources with field observations and reveal meaningful metrics that describe supply-chain network structures.
• Funding Program: MISTI Seed Fund
• Amount: 30,000 USD – URL
• PI: Dr. Wangdo Kim (mwdkim@utec.edu.pe) and Sang-Gook Kim (MIT)
Development of proper tunnel syndrome placement device to avoid impingement
This study shows that whereas the current rationale for tibial tunnel placement identifies a range in which the roof impingement is not allowed to avoid the negative affordance, in reality, all this can be done to constrain the target bounds with respect to the positive affordance that is desired. The affordance-based design has been best illustrated for artifacts that having biomechanical offerings, how to avoid the ligament impingement during ACL reconstruction, focused on the search for placing optimal tibial tunnel.
• Funding Institution: Newton-Paulet Fund and Fondecyt
• Amount: 1’500,000 PEN – URL
• PI: Dr. Daniel Horna (dhorna@utec.edu.pe)
Producing EnerGy and preventing hAzardS from sUrface water StorageS in Peru (PEGASUS)
The main objective is to provide the basic science necessary to maximize opportunities and minimize the risks presented by the future storage of surface water in the glacial basins of the Peruvian Andes: Urubamba, Vilcabamba, and Vilcanota, in order to provide information on the sustainability of current and future hydroelectric schemes, how to manage water use in the coming decades, formulate policies that reflect the needs of all stakeholders, and the potential dangers that unstable mountain environments can represent for the livelihood in future years.
• Funding Institution: Newton-Paulet Fund and Fondecyt
• Amount: 1’500,000 PEN – URL
• PI: Dr. Pedro Rau (prau@utec.edu.pe)
WateR security And climate cHange adaptation in PerUvian glacier-fed river basins (RAHU)
This project is focused on participatory monitoring of water resources as an innovative approach to increase and transform knowledge of physical processes and the application of modeling in water resources, in order to support the design and implementation of adequate adaptation strategies to changes in water resources in Peru.