Fractyl Health

Manufacturing Engineering Co-op ~ January - June 2024

I worked as a Manufacturing Engineering Co-op at Fractyl Health for my first co-op from January - June 2024. Fractyl Health is a biomedical start-up in Burlington, MA, working towards creating medical procedures to cure digestive diseases. While working at Fractyl, I gained a wide variety of engineering skills, including 3D printing, technical documentation work, bench testing, and more!

What is Revita?

Revita is the medical procedure that I worked on during my internship.

The revita procedure involved a catheter going into your duodenum and ablating the outside of it slightly. This procedure allows your cells to regrow, which gets rid of diabetes.

Process Instructions

I created and revised 15+ manufacturing process instructions to aid process development, implementation, and improvement. Among these instructions, I broke down an 80+ page document containing the entire procedure for the catheter. I broke this document into 12 easily digestible instructions to aid assemblers.

ECOs/DCOs

Revita Catheter

I split up the parent document for the assembly process of Revita into 12 separate documents to implement easier training for assemblers. I also created training plans to ensure all assemblers had access to all required documents.

Bench Testing

Needle Retraction Force Testing

I conducted bench testing on 10+ Catheter’s to support the development of new iterations of the Catheter's injection needle design. I used different tools and equipment to place the needle in a clamp, pull with a specified force, and then record the force to see if the needle was functional. This allowed me to gain hands on experience with small parts and mechanical tools.

Potential New Balloon Supplier Testing

I performed two different balloon studies during my time at Fractyl. First, I tested different weights from the company, Mitutoyo, on their digital drop gauge to ensure all equipment was functional and calibrated for balloon testing. From the data, I performed calculations on the weights for the succeeding balloon study. The second balloon study I did involved testing the double-wall thickness of new MIS balloons for the catheter. This allowed me to determine if these new MIS balloons were a suitable replacement for Nordson Medical balloons.

SolidWorks Drawings of the parts

Tubing Assembly Fixtures

I reverse-engineered 3 manufacturing assembly fixtures in SolidWorks for single-use disposable products to improve tubing ergonomics. This project allowed me to work with vendors and various teams within the company, allowing me to gain professional experience with other teams. I was able to improve my SolidWorks skills throughout this project.

These fixtures were used for quick-connection for different tubing and improving ergonomics for assemblers.

I reverse-engineered these fixtures using the physical components and a pair of calipers.

From those measurements I built the parts in SolidWorks for Fractyl to have as spare fixtures.

This project gave me lots of experience with SolidWorks, mechanical tools, and iterations. From the parts we received, I had full control over reverse-engineering and rebuilding the parts in SolidWorks. This allowed me to learn about the Engineering Design Process and understand why ergonomics is essential in manufacturing. I am very grateful to have gotten such an incredible experience with this project and it has aided me in all my design processes since.

Gantry Programming

I programmed a robotic gantry for Plasma manufacturing process development and 2 notebook studies. I ran trials on different speeds, revolutions, and timings to see how these factors would impact plasma treatment on balloons. For the gantry itself, I created 18 different programs at different speeds, positions, and rotary speeds to evaluate the optimal settings for plasma-treated balloons.

Igus Robot Control software is used to simulate motion for the gantry.

Igus programming software is used to simulate motion for the gantry.

The Innovation Behind Fractyl

Here is a video from CEO, Harith Rajagopalan, M.D., explaining Revita (the medical device I worked on) and the innovation that Fractyl is creating! It was truly inspiring to see the work being done here, and I can't wait to see what the future holds for Fractyl!

Phone

(203)-819-9670

rescsanski.s@northeastern.edu

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