Women Engineers: Many Paths to a Rewarding Life

Dominika Kulinski ’06
Troubleshooter

“I’m a very stubborn, determined person, and I stuck with it. I think that’s one of the things you have to be with engineering: stubborn.’”

B.S. in Biomedical Engineering '06.

Currently a doctoral candidate in Manufacturing Engineering.

Ever since I can remember, I wanted to know how things were put together. I loved taking things apart and trying to put them back together, and then asking my parents why it didn’t work. I took apart our label maker and I was able to put that back together –and it worked. When our microwave broke, I was very tempted to take that apart too, but my dad beat me to it.

I realized I wanted to troubleshoot, I wanted to make things better, I wanted to design.

As an undergrad at BU, I studied biomedical engineering. I chose BU because it was top 10 in the nation for biomedical engineering and the program was just getting better. I wanted to do something where I would have the opportunity to help people, to make a change in people’s lives. And biomedical engineering gave me the background with physiology and medicine and also gave me the engineering aspect that I’d be able to understand biomedical issues and develop systems to solve those problems, which is exactly what I’m doing now as a graduate student.

I’m working in Professor Catherine Klapperich’s laboratory, the Biomedical Microdevices and Microenvironments Laboratory, helping to develop new low-cost diagnostic devices. We do preliminary research – the proof of concept – that we hope will allow these devices to be mass produced -- they must be easy to produce, low cost and robust.  Our eventual goal is for our devices to be used not only at the point-of-care, such as doctors’ offices, but also eventually in situations such as mobile clinics in developing countries.

Between undergraduate and graduate school, I had an internship at a medical device manufacturing company.  They would throw a problem at me and say, “you need to fix this.” I loved it.  I got to troubleshoot and use my engineering background. I knew some of the design elements I needed to be aware of in developing systems, but not manufacturing them.  Now I’m learning how to design for manufacture in my classes as a graduate student in manufacturing engineering. It’s a rewarding experience.

When I first got to BU, I thought engineering would be easier. There were times when I was overwhelmed with everything or where I just didn’t feel like I had what it took. But, I’m a very stubborn, determined person, and I stuck with it. I think that’s one of the things you have to be with engineering: determined. Tell yourself, “I will do this. I will figure it out.”

And now, having finished my Bachelor’s in engineering, I am more confident with myself. I’m more confident in what I can accomplish.