Senior Design
[Game Development] | [Project Management] | [Team Building]
Course Description
The Senior Design Center (SDC) was created in 1994 to provide Computer Science seniors a value-added capstone learning experience. By 2016, more than 2000 students and over 175 companies have benefited from collaborating on senior design projects.
The added value for students comes through the supportive environment provided by the center's faculty and staff. They provide the direction and teaching that enables students to develop the writing, speaking, interpersonal and project management skills needed to make a difference in today's technology industry.
The added value for companies who sponsor senior design projects comes from the opportunity to meet and work with graduating seniors who will be entering the work force — a great recruitment opportunity — as well as project results that student teams provide.
Sponsorship involves presenting a problem, mentoring a team during the semester, and providing financial support.
Final Poster
Project Overview
Sponsor: Dr. Srougi - Associate Teaching Professor at NC State’s Department of Molecular Biomedical Sciences
Problem Statement: Students have limited access to labs and often lack opportunities to practice critical equipment handling and proper lab etiquette. Lab training is also associated with high costs, time-intensive maintenance, and safety concerns.
Solution: Create an immersive lab experience using Virtual Reality. Build a series of mini-games, each focusing on a separate piece of lab equipment, using the Unity Engine and the Meta Quest 3. In these games, students will learn proper lab procedures, handle simulated lab equipment, and become familiar with the lab layout/environment.
Mini-game 2 Beta
My Contributions
During the first phase of the project, the teams focus was primarily on aesthetics including the lighting of the room, outside visibility, and ambient sound. I contributed to this by creating the outside environment, modeling it off of my main street that runs through NC State. This shaped how the room was lit and gave the entire room a more welcoming atmosphere, which our sponsor was very happy with this change.
My biggest contribution was creating the entirety of the mini-game 2 beta. This involved modeling, animating, and programming the functionality of the micro pipette. I also had to brainstorm and develop the control scheme, figuring out how to adapt the Meta Quest controller to real lab equipment. I believe my control scheme fulfills the learning and immersion objectives for our project, since it provides tactile feedback and simulates ideal finger placement on the device.
Most importantly, I created a solid foundation for future teams to continue working on the project. This will make it easier for them to fine-tune values and add instructions/alerts, delivering a final product quickly.
Micro Pipette Control Scheme
Micro Pipette 3D Model
Environment Modeling
