Micromedic contest - 25K prizes

[Brian Wagner]

Parallax Partners with the U.S. Army and Carnegie Mellon University to host the 2013 National microMedic Contest to Encourage Medical Innovation

http://learn.parallax.com/contest/home

[Joe Ibershoff]

Just wanted to give this a bump and a more thorough description.  This is a great opportunity for folks looking for a project, or folks who coincidentally have a project that already fits their criteria (like me).  I kinda feel like this is "announce once or twice during some Tuesday meetings to get the word out" worthy, but I'm not sure if it really fits given that it has no specific connection to LVL1 or Louisville.

From their site (http://learn.parallax.com/micromedic):

Now YOU have the opportunity to help others through your medical application invention! Using microcontrollers and sensors inventors and students will create medical applications and products for possible use in the healthcare industry, medical simulation training, and the battlefield.

There are 2 entry categories, "public" and "education", and entries to either can be team or individual.  Separately for each category, the award for first place is $5k, second place $3k, multiple 3rd-, 4th-, and 5th-tier awards, and honorable mentions will be given for various other criteria outside the award structure.  Entrants have until July 1 to submit an initial contest application, and until July 31 to submit a final project.  Full rules are here: http://learn.parallax.com/contest/2013-national-micromedic-rules

The contest is free to enter, and they're giving away 100 free electronics kits on a first-come-first-serve basis to folks who submit worthy project applications -- that's the application, not the completed project!  They've given away about 30 of them so far, so there's still time to enter and get a free kit.  There are 2 versions of the kit -- one includes a Propellor microcontroller board, the other includes an Arduino-compatible shield instead, and both include a bunch of sensors and miscellaneous useful bits.  Full info about the kits is available here: http://learn.parallax.com/contest/micromedic-contest-inspiration-kits, and a video about the contest and the kits is here: http://youtu.be/KBDkNHRaEpY

 -- Yeti