5 Student Teams' Innovations Win 2026 Collegiate Inventors Competition

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 16, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- A glimpse into the future of American innovation and emerging technological trends from the nation's brightest young innovators — from a wearable knee rehab system to emergency resuscitation — were recognized and honored this week at the 2026 Collegiate Inventors Competition®, an annual competition for college and university students and their advisers.

Finalist teams (five Undergraduate and five Graduate), consisting of 25 students from nine colleges and universities across the United States, presented their inventions to an esteemed panel of final-round judges composed of the most influential inventors and innovation experts in the nation — National Inventors Hall of Fame® Inductees and United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) officials.

"Innovation is a journey that requires creativity, courage and persistence," said National Inventors Hall of Fame Chief Executive Officer Monica Jones. "We are proud to support, recognize and reward these young inventors who embody all these traits, and to provide opportunities to meet and learn from the greatest role models in American innovation — Inductees of the National Inventors Hall of Fame."

Established in 1990, the Collegiate Inventors Competition is a program of the National Inventors Hall of Fame and is sponsored by the USPTO. In addition to cash awards, the winning teams also receive a USPTO Patent Acceleration Certificate.

FIRST-PLACE WINNERS ($10,000 PRIZE)

UNDERGRADUATE:
CPRight, University of Washington
Team Members: Shubham Bansal, Prisha Hemani, Deeya Sharma, Nikhita Vaddineni; Adviser: Tristan Jafari
Real-time guidance for emergency resuscitation: Each year, more than 350,000 Americans experience a heart attack outside a hospital, and about 90% of them die. Bystanders are often willing to help but are unable to deliver high-quality CPR. CPRight is a single-use, wallet-sized patch a rescuer places on a patient's sternum. Displaying simple LED cues, it shows the rescuer, in real time, whether compression depths and rates are effective. CPRight does not require any additional technology or equipment, making it accessible and easy to use when seconds count to save lives.

GRADUATE:
ClearView-Jaw, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
Team Members: William McKay, Zachary Spears, Amogh Vellore; Advisers: Anish Ghodadra, Matthew Spector
Improving outcomes for head and neck cancer patients: Head and neck cancer patients often need mandibular reconstruction after jaw tumor removal, followed by high-dose radiation. The titanium plates used to secure the reconstructed jaw can distort radiation, shielding tumor cells and scattering the radiation into healing tissue, with about 60% of patients developing a complication within five years. The ClearView-Jaw device reduces harmful backscatter and shadowing while helping clinicians target tumors more precisely, lowering complications and improving patient outcomes.

RUNNER-UP WINNERS ($5,000 PRIZE)

UNDERGRADUATE:
KAIRS (Knee Artificial Intelligence Rehabilitation Sleeve), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Team Members: Samanyu Dixit, Hieu Minh Doan, Sahaj Sapovadia, Chinmay Singh; Adviser: Devin Hubbard
A smart solution for knee recovery: After knee injuries and surgeries, patients follow months-long rehabilitation routines. The Knee Artificial Intelligence Rehabilitation Sleeve (KAIRS), a wearable rehab system, continuously monitors the range of knee motion and quality of movement during at-home exercises and everyday activities on the move. With a flexible, sensor-embedded sleeve, mobile app and cloud-based machine learning model, KAIRS delivers individualized progress tracking for patients and remote monitoring for clinicians. This invention could improve rehab adherence, support clinical decisions, enable personalized care plans and expand recovery guidance to patients with limited access to physical therapy.

GRADUATE:
BioAxis, New York University
Team Members: Rayan Bargouth, Asser El Ashwah; Adviser: Richard Stein
Supporting rotator cuff healing: Partial-thickness rotator cuff tears affect about 3 million Americans annually. Standard care includes rest, rehabilitation and pain management but does not repair structural damage. Many untreated tears progress to full-thickness rupture. Developed by Vitalis Regenerative Materials Inc., BioAxis is a single-use, point-of-care medical device that combines a patient's platelet-rich plasma with a prefilled bioresorbable polymer to form a tissue-adherent hydrogel. This closed sterile system combines scaffold reconstitution, controlled platelet activation, and injectable hydrogel delivery to support tendon preservation and repair for patients who don't meet the threshold for full surgical repair.

PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARD WINNER ($2,000 PRIZE)
NeuTrode, University of South Florida
Team Members: Bridget Clift, Cristina Ramirez-Vargas, Addison Whitehead; Adviser: Nathan Schilaty
Reliable technology for neurological care: Electroencephalography (EEG) helps diagnose and monitor neurological conditions such as epilepsy, sleep disorders and brain injuries. Current EEG technologies consist of wet, semi-dry and dry electrodes, but each presents significant limitations. Providing an innovative alternative, NeuTrode is a flexible EEG electrode designed to maintain consistent scalp contact without the use of gels or liquids. Its soft, comfortable design adapts to different hair densities, skin conditions and head shapes, and it enables faster setup, improved patient comfort and steady, reliable signal acquisition.

About the Collegiate Inventors Competition
The Collegiate Inventors Competition encourages and drives innovation and entrepreneurship at the collegiate level. A program of the National Inventors Hall of Fame, this competition recognizes and rewards the research, innovations and discoveries by college students and their advisers for projects leading to inventions that have the potential of receiving patent protection. Introduced in 1990, the competition has featured more than 500 innovators who have created cutting-edge, world-changing inventions, and awarded cash prizes to winning student teams for their innovative work and scientific achievement through the help of its sponsors. For more information,, visit invent.org/collegiate-inventors.

CONTACT:
Ken Torisky
National Inventors Hall of Fame
[email protected]
234-901-6085

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SOURCE Collegiate Inventors Competition