NeuroRehack

International Summer/Winter School and Hackathon on Neurorehabilitation Engineering

“I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.” – Confucius

What is NeuroRehack?

NeuroRehack is a Summer/Winter School (depends on which side of the world you are) and a hands-on Hackathon. The event will be held from June 28, until July 16 2021, and is aimed at introducing the exciting, multi-disciplinary field of NeuroRehabilitation Engineering to late undergraduate and early graduate students interested in designing and using technology for applications in movement neurorehabilitation.

What is NeuroRehabilitation Engineering?

NeuroRehabilitation Engineering is a trans-disciplinary field in which engineering, neuroscience, and clinical knowledge are used to understand and aid the recovery of functions lost because of neurological disease or injury. A major aspect of this field relates to the design and development of technology that is meant to help improve the quality of life of people with disabilities.

Engineering

Neuroscience & Movement sciences

Rehabilitation Sciences

The design of appropriate technological devices for neurorehabilitation requires strong skills in engineering, along with a good understanding of human physiology, neuroscience, and rehabilitation science.

NeuroRehack intends to provide:

a first introduction to the field to students with no prior experience in this area, or
a single stop, big picture view of the field for students with some prior experience through interaction with experts working on different aspects of neurorehabilitation.

How is the event organized?

This event will be carried out in different countries simultaneously (see Participating Institutions), and will consist of ~30 hours of lectures/seminars and >80 hours of project-related activities, spanned over a period of three weeks.

Summer/Winter School

The Summer/Winter School component of this event will be offered online through real-time and pre-recorded talks that are common to all Participating Institutions. These will cover the fundamental of robotics, sensors and instrumentation, biomedical signal processing, neuromechanics, and neurorehabilitation to help introduce the basic concepts required for the second part of the event - the Hackathon.

Hackathon

The Hackathon is a hands-on team project carried out at one of the Participating Institutions. This will be an opportunity for students to interact directly with researchers in the field and spend time in their lab. Suitable arrangements to adhere to the relevant COVID-related restrictions will be made.

The projects offered by each institute can be viewed in the Projects page. The following are the broad areas in which projects are offered in this edition of NeuroRehack:

Robotics in upper-limb neurorehabilitation.
Sensor-based systems for measuring movements and physical interaction.
Neurophysiological interfaces for neurorehabilitation.
Movement analysis

The Hackathon will culminate with a series of presentations where students demonstrate their results (live or with a video) to the international audience and jury.

Best project will receive a prize from our Sponsors.

Who CAN Participate?

Anyone who has an interest in developing technology for neurorehabilitation applications. Such technology can include robotics, XR (cross or extended reality), wearable sensors, human-machine interfaces, and similar technologies.

Our goal is to foster trans-disciplinary collaboration in the co-creation of new technologies by people with different relevant backgrounds.

We encourage undergraduate and early graduate students from engineering and computer science, rehabilitation and human movement sciences, and neurosciences to join this event. Professionals (engineers or physiotherapists) interested in gaining experience in developing technology for neurorehabilitation are also welcome to join.

Do I need to have a technical background?

The event is highly focused on developing technologies, so affinity and basic understanding of technology is desirable.

The Hackathon component of this event will require technical background (e.g. instrumentation, maths, programming, data analysis). However, we expect that teams will have at least 2 students with technical background, so the fact that you may not have engineering technical skills should not discourage you from joining this event. In fact, your inputs will be valuable in the co-development process! You may learn new things from your technical peers, and they will too from you about your field.

INTERESTED?

Go to the Registration page to submit your applications for application to NeuroRehack event. More details about the registration process is provided in the Registration page.

Is there a limit TO the number of participants?

Each Participating Institute has limited space to accommodate students for on-campus activities and carrying out their projects as part of the Hackathon. Each Participating Institute will accommodate a maximum of 15 students (per lab) to carry out the projects. The selection of students to NeuroRehack projects will be based on the details furnished in the registration form; students that register earlier will be given preference. All registrations received until May 30 (India, UK, Germany and Italy) & June 6 (Australia) will be considered for participation on on-campus activities.

If you are not selected to participate on a project, or attend on-campus activities you will still be able to attend to the Summer/Winter School part of the event (lectures/seminars) online. Registrations for attending just the Summer/Winter School part will open after June 1.