UMBC CSEE research group wins a shark tank style pitch contest sponsored by the Maryland New Venture Fellowship Program.UMBC CSEE professor Ramana Vinjamuri leads a research group that won a shark tank style pitch contest sponsored by the Maryland New Venture Fellowship Program for their work on developing wearable devices that can detect and help manage stress. Graduate student Pranay Manikanta Narava delivered the 5-minute winning pitch, mentored by Ellington West, CEO and Co-Founder of Sonavi Labs, Inc., and Professor Vinjamuri.
The eight teams who participated squared off on May 8 at UMBC's South Campus to share their ideas for commercially viable, technology solutions to some of the nation's problems to secure information systems, utilities, infrastructure and supply chains. Each team included one technologist, one graduate student/fellow, and one mentor.
Professor Vinjamuri's lab is working on Pneuma, a neurotechnology to help individuals with Substance Use Disorder, in collaboration with Nilanjan Banerjee, Abhijit Dutt, Charissa Cheah, and David Gorelick. They are developing a wearable device that can detect and manage stress, a key trigger to substance abuse. In 2021, this research received a UMBC START Award that helped fund the research.
Additional thanks to Marjorie Cota, Matthew Lowinger, Kavya Ravi, Don Engel, David Fink, Hillel Glazer, and Wendy Martin.