A team of eight undergraduate students at The University of Texas at San Antonio (USTA) won the $100,000 Student Technology Venture Competition, presented by the UTSA Center for Innovation and Technology Entrepreneurship (CITE) for a prototype thermoelectric cooling system they developed and a business plan they wrote to market the technology. The cooling system adds comfort and improves hygiene for prosthetic users.
Individuals with amputations who wear prosthetic limbs frequently experience discomfort. Heat builds up in the space where their residual limbs meet the prostheses, leading to the accumulation of sweat. In addition to the discomfort this causes, medical problems can result, such as infection, skin breakdown, ulcers, and painful friction blisters.
The team, Leto Solutions, produced the Aquilonix Prosthetic Cooling System that uses thermoelectric technology integrated into a prosthetic socket worn by the patient to regulate the temperature and reduce sweating. Leto Solutions includes undergraduate engineering majors Austin Darius, Jake Montez, David Schultz, and Gary Walters, and undergraduate business majors Nam Do, Eric Michael Garza, Enrique Medrano, and Justin Stultz.
“It’s been six years since my leg was amputated, and for six years I’ve been searching for a solution to the discomfort that I feel from heat every day wearing a prosthetic,” said Walters, senior mechanical engineering major. “This competition allowed for the perfect time and opportunity to create a solution.”
During the competition, local academic, business, and entrepreneurial experts judge the teams on their technology, business plan, and presentation. The competition offers UTSA undergraduate senior business and engineering students the opportunity to build a technology, patent it, create a business, and launch it in an incubator program. Ten student teams competed for $100,000 in cash and business-related services including consulting, marketing, legal services, office space, and other benefits.
