29/08/2026
It was fantastic to tour the Medical Engineering Research Facility (MERF) this past week, hosted in collaboration with the QUT Fellowship of Medical Engineers (FoME).
Throughout the visit, the MERF team walked us through the full breadth of research underway at the facility, from early-stage device development through to the final in-vivo studies that de-risk a design before it’s ever cleared for the human market. Seeing that translational pipeline up close, the exact path our Total Artificial Heart project will need to follow, gave our team a much clearer picture of what “market-ready” actually demands beyond the bench.
As we head towards the Heart Hackathon Grand Final, opportunities like this are exactly what keep pushing QUT Heartbeats to think bigger about what our project needs to become a real, deployable medical device. We’re incredibly grateful to be part of a QUT engineering community that gives students this kind of access to world-class research infrastructure.
Thank you to FoME for organising the tour, and to the entire MERF team for their generosity with their time and expertise.
