Mechanical and Materials Engineering (MME) Undergraduate Research Projects Showcase (URPS)
Planning Form For 2026 URPS (Deadline: April 2, 2026)
One Submission Per Team: Online Form
Details
April 24th 2026 is set aside for students in the MME Department to communicate outcomes of this year’s MQPs, both internally and externally, to provide the opportunity for students to fulfill the oral presentation requirement for the MQP, and to select teams/students to receive the various MQP awards in MME – these include certificates and cash prizes.
Faculty, Corporate Sponsors and Engineers from industry will attend and judge the presentations (Ph.D. students are also involved in judging). Students are encouraged to invite their families as well. All ME students must present their MQP work to an audience. Most students will do so at the MME URPS. However, presentations can occur at a sponsor’s location or another department for projects that span multiple departments.
Schedule of Events
Poster presentations will take place in Harrington Auditorium (location to be confirmed) between 8.30am-12pm for all areas in Mechanical Engineering. The presentations are in the same format as a science fair.
The judging of projects will take place between 8:30am-11:30am in three sessions: 8.30-9.15; 9.30-10.15; 10.30-11.15. During each session, up to three judges will be listening to your team’s presentation and asking questions. We expect students to prepare a presentation ranging from eight to ten minutes during each session so that the judges have at least 25 minutes to ask clarifying questions.
Teams are also encouraged to prepare a 30-to-60 second elevator pitch (Link 1 | Link 2) of the project for visitors (guests, parents, students) that are not official judges.
In the morning, 8-8.30am, breakfast pastries and coffee will be available and for lunch between 11.30am-1pm, brown bag lunches will be served.
At 1.15pm, we will be announcing the top ten teams of URPS 2026 in Harrington Auditorium (location to be confirmed). The first five will receive departmental honors, and the remaining five will receive honorable mention certificates.
The winning teams and their advisors will be invited to the MME Faculty meeting on April 28th between 11.30am-12.30pm for a celebration lunch and award distribution.
Note: Each MQP group can only compete for awards in one academic program. You can still be judged and receive comments but will not be considered for awards if you are competing in another department.
Planning Form Details
All MQP teams must submit the following form by April 2nd, 5pm (irrespective of whether you are participating in the MME URPS or other department URPS).
This form will be requesting the following information:
- Information about Project Team and Advisor
- Group Email Address (if you do not have a group email alias, please create one since all emails will be sent to the email alias only)
- Title of the Project
- Please note that this title needs to be finalized and cannot be changed.
- Abstract (150 words maximum): Will be shared with Judges. Make sure to get approval from the advisor(s) before submitting the abstract.
- Photograph of your project (optional, will be used in an Abstract Booklet – 2025 URPS Booklet)
- Note that the abstract can be modified when you submit the final report
- Select the top two areas applicable for your project:
- Biomechanical (example topics: soft tissue mechanics, flow in constricted blood vessels, joint kinematics, prosthetic devices, sports biomechanics, biomaterials, tissue engineering and rehabilitation)
- Design (example topics: optimum design of mechanical elements, stress analysis of machine components, evaluation and design of industrial machine components and systems, robotics, and computer-aided design and synthesis, factory automation, prototype manufacturing)
- Materials and Manufacturing (example topics: materials processing, materials characterization, computer modeling of properties and processing, mechanical testing and fatigue, biomaterials, recourse recovery and recycling, photovoltaics, surface engineering and surface metrology)
- Robotics (example topics: designing of robots and robotic components, including mobile ground robots, aerial robots and underwater robots, automatic assembly and industrial robotics applications, and development of software and control algorithms for individual robots and robotic swarms)
- Thermo-Fluids (example topics: biological fluid mechanics, laminar/turbulent separation, lifting bodies, heat pipes, electronic component cooling, power cycles, thermal-fluid component analysis and design, and energy storage)
- Provide your team’s choices for lunch:
- Vegetarian – carrot, zucchini, yellow squash, red onion, bell pepper and tomatoes with hummus on Bulkie Roll
- Ham and Cheese on Bulkie roll
- Roast beef with lettuce and tomato on Bulkie roll
- You will be able to request a closed presentation location if you have sponsored/IP protected projects.
- All MQP teams consisting of even one ME student should submit this form irrespective of their participation in the MME URPS.
- Due to a record number of projects, safety and space are major concerns. While limited hardware is welcome, significant demonstrations with moving parts (that cause any potential safety hazard) will not be allowed. To reduce floor hazards, there will NOT be power to demonstrate devices. If you want to demonstrate your project, please create a video of your project in a safe environment, choose the lighting carefully, and get the best video to capture all the features of your MQP. Please make sure your computer devices are fully charged for the morning. If your laptop battery is insufficient for MQP day, have a backup laptop available.
- Here is an example of a typical space allotment for each team (9ft x 10ft): Picture
- Any Artifact you bring should fit within this space.
- Any Artifact you bring should fit within this space.
- Every team will be given an Easel and a form board for poster display.