Crummer Students Win Grand Prize at 2025 NASA Patent Remix Challenge

The SubQ Six team consists of Crummer Graduate School of Business students Ava Ager ’26MBA, Matheus Westphalen ’24 ’26MBA, McKenzie Steuerer ’26MBA, Oliver Alcorn ’26MBA, Xandria Bramble ’25 ’26MBA, and Ryan Procopio ’26MBA.

The project builds on NASA’s Subcutaneous Structure Imager, a near-infrared imaging system originally developed for use in extreme and resource-limited environments. The team members reimagined the technology as a portable, handheld device designed to help clinicians and first responders visualize veins beneath the skin in real time without contrast dyes, ultrasound equipment, or complex setup.

Vein access is a common but failure-prone procedure, with first-attempt IV insertion failing in roughly one out of three adult patients and more than half of pediatric cases. These failures increase patient discomfort, delay care, and raise costs. SubQ Six approached this challenge as a tooling problem rather than a skills issue, focusing on making vein access more reliable across different skin tones and clinical conditions.

Judges recognized the team for its strong value proposition, storytelling, customer discovery, and clear path to real-world deployment. The project stood out for its emphasis on clinical impact, thoughtful commercialization strategy, and alignment with NASA’s mission to translate research into public benefit.

Winning the NASA Patent Remix Challenge marks a major milestone for the SubQ Six team as they continue to pursue prototyping, clinical validation, and pathways toward regulatory approval and deployment.