CWRU medical students win bronze at 2018 Collegiate Inventors Competition

A group of medical students from Case Western Reserve University recently won bronze at the 2018 Collegiate Inventors Competition, an annual competition for college and university students and their faculty advisors. The team was composed of:

• Sanjit Datta;
• David Pfau;
• Eric Salomon; and
• Charit Tippareddy.

Daniel Lacks, the C. Benson Branch Professor and chair of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the Case School of Engineering, is the advisor for the group. Their winning invention, Optimized Solar Purification with a Reusable Indicator (OSPRI), is a reusable UV-radiation-measuring sensor that changes color to notify a user that the treated water is safe to drink. They intend to increase access to clean drinking worldwide, reducing waterborne illness with a low-cost device. Read more about the group and their nonprofit, the Billion Bottle Project. Established in 1990, the Collegiate Inventors Competition is a program of the National Inventors Hall of Fame. The competition was held in partnership with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.