Fort Hays State University is about people, passion, and dreams. I love discovering the unique stories of students, faculty and staff. Like me, each has a unique reason why our university fuels their energy to make a difference in the lives of others. Eric Deneault is one of those stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eric is a\ntypical, extraordinary Fort Hays State University professor. He not only knows\nhis students by name, he knows their personal stories. And, like most of us at\nFHSU, Eric also has his own story, and part of that story is driving a current\nresearch project he and his students are building together \u2013 designing a\nspeech-activated mechanical glove to help people with hand mobility challenges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His story: In 2015 his wife, Amanda, at the age of 31, had a\nmassive stroke induced by a vertebral artery injury. The brain damage caused by\nthe stroke inhibits the communication of signals to her extremities on the\nright side of her body, affecting all her fine motor movement. This has been\nthe main contributor to his motivation in developing an assistive mechanical glove that will help increase her\nhand strength and mobility, specifically targeting her opening, closing, and\ngripping functions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Simply\nput, necessity and inspiration led Eric to combine his passion for teaching with\nhis vision of creating a solution for his wife and many other victims of\nstrokes and cerebrovascular accidents, who have minimal to no movement in their\nextremities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
From an\nacademic standpoint, this project required collaboration, bringing students and\nfaculty together to form a research team with backgrounds in engineering design,\nrobotics, programming and art. Departments represented include Applied\nTechnology, Art and Design, and Informatics. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOur students and the faculty are working\ntogether utilizing both traditional technology like foundry work and\nblacksmithing and the newest of 3D printing and CNC operated equipment,\u201d said\nToby Flores, associate professor of sculpture. CNC is \u201cComputer Numerical\nControl,\u201d a kind of software that makes it possible to automate machine tools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFor my sculpture students, this expands what it\nmeans to get a sculpture degree at FHSU,\u201d Toby said. \u201cI am very thankful for\nthe opportunity to work with students and my new friends in Applied Technology.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Deep learning comes from a position of overcoming\nchallenges. The students and faculty involved in this research project have had\nto confront the design obstacles that come when researchers who have working\nhands try to understand the mechanics of having a hand that does not work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
FHSU student Liberty Tegethoff, a Newton freshman, said, \u201cMy\nfavorite part of the class is that there were a lot of hardships and issues to\novercome, but everyone\u2019s different ideas came together to create something that\ncould potentially change someone\u2019s life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Comfort and functionality are essential to the project\u2019s\nsuccess \u2013 the research team has to ensure that each and every small piece of\nthe device is placed deliberately to maximize these features. In addition, the\ndevice must be easy to put on, like a glove, because Amanda has to be able to\nput it on with only her non-dominant hand. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Amanda, the inspiration for the project, said, \u201cWhen my\nhusband stated that his research class was going to be making a robotic glove\nfor my hand that was affected by the stroke, I was kind of skeptical. However,\nI have been involved in some of the process, and I have to say that I am\nimpressed with the enthusiasm the students have shown. This project is\nfascinating, and I am so excited to see it come to fruition.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is precisely why Fort Hays State is such a special place. Thank you, Eric and team, for your passion and purpose. You are why I start each day with enthusiasm and hope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tisa Mason is president of Fort Hays State University.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fort Hays State University is about people, passion, and dreams. I love discovering the unique stories of students, faculty and staff. Like me, each has… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12323,55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-life","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tigermedianet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Mason-Tisa-040A6662.jpg?fit=750%2C1050","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=53636"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53636\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53637,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53636\/revisions\/53637"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=53636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=53636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=53636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}