Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

For his senior capstone project, electrical engineering concentrator Jerry Li developed a flexible cuff that uses ultrasound, rather than electrical currents, to precisely stimulate the vagus nerve. This approach has the potential to be less invasive and more targeted, which could one day help treat conditions such as depression, epilepsy, or support neuroprosthetic control.

"To my knowledge, no one has used microfabricated ultrasound transducers for peripheral nerve stimulation before," he said.

He began the microfabrication process in May 2025 and continued over the summer; during the academic year he focused on the electronics design. He described the most challenging part of the project as the microfabrication itself – a long, detailed process, even with expert guidance. Jerry especially enjoyed the interdisciplinary nature of the work, which spans neuroscience, phased array theory, wireless charging, and mechanical prototyping, and helped him build confidence as an engineer. https://bit.ly/4aabhrC

From the Democratic Republic of the Congo to Dallas-Fort Worth, Harvard, and now Arizona State University, Grace Kossia has always seen technology as a tool for human connection and opportunity.

A mechanical engineering concentrator at SEAS and a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, Grace spent years in the classroom as a physics teacher before moving into roles at the intersection of education and technology, including serving as Chief Academic Officer at Almost Fun.

Now an AI Strategist Specialist on ASU’s AI Practice Team, she focuses on responsible, value-driven AI adoption across teaching, research, and operations—always centering students and educators.

“If I have a vision or idea that I'm wanting to bring to life that would normally require a lot of financial or manpower resources that I might not have access to, I can use AI as a tool to bring those ideas to life,” she said. “It's not so much the AI itself, but more so what it's allowing me to build and create as a thinking partner. I think where the division happens is when the solution ends at the AI.”

Read how her systems thinking, refugee experience, and love of tinkering shape her work today: https://bit.ly/3QMgJKF

For their senior capstone project, Ayande Joseph and Kulani Temesgen tackled a critical challenge in global food systems: post-harvest maize processing in Kenya.

Their project, “An Affordable Maize Shelling Device for Enhanced Post-Processing in Kenya,” focuses on a portable, locally manufacturable maize sheller designed for smallholder farmers in places like Migori County. The device uses a funnel for continuous loading of dehusked cobs and can be powered first by a hand crank and later by an external power source to reduce labor and increase efficiency.

Building on prior capstone projects and a longstanding partnership through Harvard’s chapter of Engineers Without Borders, they traveled to Migori County during J-term to interview farmers, gather feedback, and refine their design around local material constraints and real stakeholder needs. https://bit.ly/3SKF83H

Harvard researchers have set a new benchmark for enzymatic DNA synthesis by writing 64 distinct sequences in parallel on a semiconductor chip. https://bit.ly/3StZwpI

Harvard researchers have made a pico-calorimeter that directly measures heat signals from small groups of living cells. The device could lead to advances in bacterial growth monitoring or antibiotic resistance testing. https://bit.ly/4fHRyD3

For his senior thesis, applied mathematics concentrator Saad Atif examined how a country’s legal track record shapes its access to private capital when global financial conditions tighten.

His senior thesis, “Legal Credibility as a State Variable: Dispute Exposure and the Transmission of Monetary Shocks into Private Capital Markets,” used panel econometrics and data from 76 countries over 22 years. The research finds that countries with a history of investor‑state disputes see substantially larger slowdowns in venture capital and private equity investment when U.S. interest rates rise—roughly 24% less capital deployed during tightening cycles compared with countries with cleaner legal records.

The project highlights that legal credibility, not just macro fundamentals, can play a decisive role in whether global private capital shows up.

"I came into the project with a strong intuition, shaped in part by my experience in Pakistan, about how sovereign legal credibility affects investor behavior," he said. "What the process taught me was how to turn that intuition into a careful empirical question without overstating what the data could prove. Learning to be precise, transparent, and restrained in my claims was probably the most valuable skill I gained." https://bit.ly/4v2Ihdv

How can we help the heart heal itself after a heart attack?

For her senior capstone, bioengineering concentrator Kiyana Gallagher designed an injectable hydrogel that delivers circular RNA encoding regenerative transcription factors directly to damaged heart tissue.

This hydrogel-based, non-viral system is engineered to keep therapy localized at the site of injury and to release it gradually over several days, supporting sustained activation of regenerative pathways in surviving heart cells. By integrating bioengineering, materials science, and gene therapy, Kiyana’s project tackles a critical challenge in translating cardiac regeneration biology into a practical, clinically relevant treatment for patients after myocardial infarction.

"Beyond technical skills, this project helped me become more comfortable working in an open-ended design space where there is no single 'right' answer," she said. "It required iterative thinking, balancing trade-offs, and clearly communicating both the rationale and limitations of my approach, skills that are essential for tackling real-world problems in biomedical engineering."

https://bit.ly/4vYlIHh

Over 90,000 people in the U.S. are waiting for a kidney transplant, yet only about 2% of willing donors actually make it through the approval process. High blood pressure, diabetes, a history of cancer, obesity, or mental health challenges can all be enough to disqualify someone.

Computer Science alum Daniela Shuman, A.B./S.M. ’24, is working to change that. As co-director of Project Donor at the University of Chicago’s Center for Radical Innovation for Social Change, she builds tools that connect potential donors with health programs that help them overcome the barriers to donation.

Since she joined, Project Donor has grown from saving 30 lives to 185, driven in part by the software infrastructure she created to support hospitals, case managers, and donors.

“Most kidney disease interventions are geared toward care navigation or dialysis management,” she said. “We felt that a critically important and neglected area was increasing the supply of kidneys in the first place. If we can get someone a kidney, that’s far better than any improvement we can make to their dialysis experience.” https://bit.ly/4fzAC1G