The team is expected to carry the project from requirements through a demonstrated, documented prototype. The work includes, at minimum:
1. Work with ONTO Innovation engineers to understand the measurement objective, review the sponsor requirements, and flow them down into a complete set of system requirements.
2. Evaluate off-the-shelf scanning Fabry-Perot solutions and components against a custom design built from individual components, trading performance against the $2,500 material-cost target.
3. Design the optical cavity — including mirror selection, cavity length, finesse and free spectral range — and perform the supporting tolerance and alignment analysis.
4. Design the mechanical sensor housing and mounting, including any fiber or free-space interfaces, mechanical tolerance analysis, and an enclosed, compact package suitable for integration into a commercial interferometer.
5. Design the electrical subsystem: piezoelectric transducer drive electronics, photodiode sensing, digitization, and the processing solution.
6. Develop software to acquire, process, display, and record the transmission signal, and to determine longitudinal mode spacing.
7. Build the prototype and integrate the optical, mechanical, electrical, and software subsystems.
8. Test the assembled system against the sponsor requirements using the provided laser and iterate the design until performance targets are met.
9. Deliver documentation for alignment, operation, and calibration, along with design reports and test results, and present the completed system at Craig M. Berge Design Day.

The basic goal of this project is to complete the previous Capstone project, codenamed ATLAS.
Atlas is intended to be a semi-autonomous robot that can travel around AMARG and perform logistics assistance by delivering tools and equipment to technicians in the field, and transporting aircraft components that they have removed back to a central location. This would reduce the amount of time AMARG technicians spend performing these logistics tasks and maximize their time working on the aircraft.
The previous students produced a non-functional prototype. The body is a modified electrical go kart, and is mostly functional but needs reinforcing. The steering linkage in particular is unreliable, overly fragile, and suffered some breakages during last year’s final testing. The cargo bay is a lockable steel box that is in good condition, but is not attached to the kart. The motor and battery are in good condition and believed to be suitable. The LIDAR, cameras, and overall brains of the ATLAS are not functional, and need to be replaced. This project, therefore will focus on electrical engineering, optical engineering, software engineering, and system integration with minor mechanical engineering requirements.

The project will redesign and improve an existing aquaponic growing-media cleaning system originally developed by a previous senior engineering design team. The current system can clean only approximately three gallons of lightweight expanded clay aggregate (LECA) per cycle, while the required capacity is approximately 15–20 gallons per cycle. The system also experiences significant water leakage, periodic clogging, inadequate internal filtration, and inconsistent rotation of the stainless-steel cleaning drum.

The student team will evaluate the existing design, identify the primary causes of its performance and reliability problems, and develop an improved system capable of safely and consistently cleaning larger volumes of aquaponic media. Major design areas should include:

Increasing the cleaning capacity to 15–20 gallons of LECA per cycle.
Redesigning the drum or cleaning chamber so that it maintains its shape, rotates smoothly, and can withstand repeated use.
Improving seals, plumbing connections, and containment to minimize water leakage.
Improving internal filtration and solids removal to reduce clogging and prevent roots, sediment, and organic debris from recirculating through the system.
Developing a more effective agitation or mechanical masticating mechanism to break apart compacted root balls without excessively damaging the LECA.
Evaluating and selecting an appropriately sized water pump based on required flow, pressure, solids-handling capability, reliability, and energy use.
Improving accessibility for loading, unloading, cleaning, inspection, and routine maintenance.
Incorporating appropriate operator safety features, including guarding of rotating or moving components and protection of electrical equipment from water exposure.

The final design should be durable, reliable, easy to operate, and suitable for repeated use in a greenhouse or aquaponics research environment. The project should include design calculations, component selection, fabrication or modification of a functional prototype, performance testing using root-bound LECA, and documentation of operating procedures, maintenance requirements, system capacity, water use, and cleaning effectiveness.

The objective of this project is to design, prototype, and evaluate a portable power architecture capable of delivering the same therapeutic output as Regenesis Biomedical's existing diathermy platform- the Reprieve. The student team will focus on the electrical, firmware, and systems engineering necessary to demonstrate technical feasibility.
The project scope includes:
• Evaluating battery technologies, including rechargeable and replaceable battery options
• Developing a battery management and power conversion architecture capable of supporting the required therapy output
• Designing electrical hardware, including schematics and printed circuit boards (PCBs), as needed
• Developing embedded firmware to control battery management, safety functions, and therapy operation
• Performing systems engineering activities such as requirements definition, architecture development, interface design and system integration
• Building and testing a functional engineering prototype that demonstrates equivalent therapy performance using portable power
• Characterizing system performance, including power consumption, runtime estimates, thermal performance, and output verification
The project is intended to demonstrate technical feasibility rather than create a production-ready medical device.
The following activities are outside the scope of this project:
• Final industrial or cosmetic product design
• Mechanical enclosure optimization or manufacturing-ready packaging
• Human factors or usability studies
• Clinical testing or regulatory submission
• Manufacturing process development
• Product commercialization
The preferred outcome is a working engineering prototype that validates the feasibility of a portable diathermy platform and provides a foundation for future product development.

Business Impact: Successful completion of this project will enable Regenesis Biomedical to assess the technical viability of a portable diathermy platform, supporting future development of home-use, travel-friendly, and wearable therapy devices that expand patient access while leveraging the company's existing therapeutic technology.

The engineering team will collaborate with the sponsor to establish the robot's capabilities and corresponding requirements. Additionally, a set of stretch goals for extended capabilities will be defined. The team will proceed to design the hardware, systems, software, and other key components of the robot. Once the design phase is complete, parts will be procured, assembled, tested, and refined to ensure the robot meets the outlined requirements and demonstrates its capabilities effectively.

Northrop Grumman Space Systems develops technologies on the bleeding edge of the aerospace industry, from commercial and scientific space launch to hypersonic missiles. Launching rockets is one of the most complex engineering tasks ever devised by mankind. The intricate systems which are needed to ensure a successful launch can never be fully tested on the ground in such a way to undoubtedly prove their capabilities for flight. As a result, it is common to install instrumentation throughout a vehicle for launch, often including strain gauges and accelerometers for structural/dynamic response, pressure transducers for motor performance, or thermocouples for thermal protection performance. However, these sensors provide limited insight compared to something as simple as a video, especially for more dynamic events such as stage separations and payload deployments.

Scope: Students will (1) work with Northrop Grumman engineers to understand the needs and desires of the delivered project; (2) design a camera system that interfaces with Northrop Grumman launch vehicles and provides high-quality footage of in-flight events to the ground; (3) develop design concepts that trade factors such as resolution, instrumentation, reliability, cost, manufacturability, and ease of integration/testing; (4) construct a working prototype of the designed system ahead of an in-depth test campaign; (5) as part of the design effort, conduct a Preliminary Design Review (PDR) and Critical Design Review (CDR) which are required to provide periodic updates and reviews by Northrop Grumman subject matter experts (SMEs) and leadership; (6) demonstrate and verify via a variety of tests to that all design requirements specified are met by the proposed design; (7) deliver a final product to Northrop Grumman in the form of a working prototype and final report chronicling design, analysis, and testing. The final product will be presented at the Northrop Grumman Design Day fair with additional Northrop Grumman sponsored Arizona capstone teams such as those from ASU, ASU Polytechnic, and NAU.

Develop a functional prototype of SolPet Vision, a modular AI-powered pet monitoring system that integrates computer vision, embedded hardware, and software to detect, analyze, and communicate potential pet health, safety, and behavioral events while providing a scalable foundation for future capabilities.

Cancer and many other diseases rely on histopathology for diagnosis. This process typically involves taking a tissue biopsy, processing it, staining it, and viewing the cells under a microscope. The staining step is critical because most cells are transparent at visible wavelengths. Applying stains that bind to different cellular components makes these cells visible under a microscope, thus allowing pathologists to differentiate between normal and diseased cells.
Roche Diagnostic Solutions (RDS), develops and manufactures various automated instruments to aid in the diagnostic process ranging from advanced staining systems to high quality antibodies to digital imaging and AI assisted diagnosis. Roche’s automated staining instruments help standardize and optimize the staining process, ensuring accurate and reproducible results. Meanwhile Roche’s immunohistochemistry (IHC) reagents offer disease- and/or therapeutic drug-specific staining.
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The BenchMark Ultra Plus system collects both aqueous and oil liquid waste during the staining process. The current design includes two waste carts each with a 20L aqueous container and a 5L oil container. Users must be able to empty the liquid waste without disrupting the continuous slide staining operation.


The waste system is based on design elements developed long ago. Several areas exist where a new design could help improve the customer experience and take advantage of advancements made since the initial development.


Example of areas for potential improvement (not comprehensive list)
1) Human Factors Design - 20L containers are very heavy and difficult for users to handle during waste removal.
2) Design Integration - Waste carts are separate from the system which leads to variability
3) Design for Reliability - Waste sensing variation caused by bubbles, foam, or surface imperfections
4) Design for Safety - Spigots on 20L waste containers create slip and fall risks.

The goal for this project would be to design a new waste collection subsystem to improve the usability while maintaining continuous fluid waste collection and providing removal of full waste bottles. The exact scope of this is flexible and should be defined by the UofA design team based on Roche feedback regarding potential areas of improvement. This should operate in a standalone fashion collecting up to 40L of aqueous waste and 10L of oil, but it must also interface into the Ultra Plus control system to enable it to replace the existing Ultra Plus waste collection system. The new system should provide separate interfaces for displaying and logging of waste levels and controls.

Cancer and many other diseases rely on histopathology for diagnosis. This process typically involves taking a tissue biopsy, processing it, staining it, and viewing the cells under a microscope. The staining step is critical because most cells are transparent at visible wavelengths. Applying stains that bind to different cellular components makes these cells visible under a microscope, thus allowing pathologists to differentiate between normal and diseased cells.
Roche Diagnostic Solutions (RDS), develops and manufactures various automated instruments to aid in the diagnostic process ranging from advanced staining systems to high quality antibodies to digital imaging and AI assisted diagnosis. Roche’s automated staining instruments help standardize and optimize the staining process, ensuring accurate and reproducible results. Meanwhile Roche’s immunohistochemistry (IHC) reagents offer disease- and/or therapeutic drug-specific staining.

Roche manufactures hundreds of different reagents used in various combinations specific to each individual staining protocol. Labs may use multiple staining protocols at the same time. One of the first steps in the automated staining process is for the instrument to read the slide barcodes, determine which staining protocols have been ordered, and then determine if the correct reagents are in place on the instrument to begin the staining procedures.
The goal for this project is to create a standalone prototype subsystem that is able to read up to 20 barcodes in a rack of densely packed microscope slides. This prototype should be designed such that it can eventually be incorporated into a larger staining instrument. The barcodes contain information about which staining protocol will be used on the slide. These protocols determine which reagents are needed before staining can begin. The prototype must read the barcodes fast enough for the instrument to determine if all necessary reagents are on-board before the user walks away. Since the standalone prototype will not be integrated into the instrument at this stage, it will need a user interface and the ability to store all the barcode information.
The final deliverable is a working prototype which must meet predetermined customer requirements and a report to document how the design meets (or does not meet) the specified requirements below.

Optical manufacturing test systems require repeated mating and demating of optical connectors while maintaining stable optical performance. Connector repeatability directly impacts insertion loss variation, measurement accuracy, and overall test capability in high-volume manufacturing environments.
This project will develop and demonstrate a dynamic MT-24 connector mating system capable of achieving high optical repeatability under controlled positional variations.
The test platform will consist of:
Fixed Connector Assembly
• Female MT-24 optical connector with integrated loopback fibers.
• Mounted on a precision x, y motion stage.
• Capable of manual movement in:
o X-direction (left-right)
o Y-direction (up-down)
• Position offsets of ±150 µm will be introduced to simulate connector placement variation and manufacturing tolerances.
Active Connector Assembly
• Male MT-24 optical connector.
• Student team will design and build a fixture and actuation mechanism to:
o Securely hold the male connector.
o Automatically connect and disconnect from the female connector.
o Maintain consistent mating conditions over repeated connection cycles without damaging female connector alignment hole.
o Accommodate positional offsets introduced by the moving female connector.
System Characterization
The completed system will be used to evaluate:
• Optical insertion loss (IL)
• Channel-to-channel variation across 24 fibers
• Repeatability over multiple mating cycles
• Sensitivity to X/Y positional offsets
• Mechanical repeatability of the mating mechanism