Hi Dave,
My name is Glib and I am a part of a family-like group of scientists working on cancer therapy using genetically modified viruses at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada. Being experts in virology and immunology allowed us to quickly shift our focus and work on fighting the Covid-19. Ever since pandemic started we tested thousands of chemicals to assess their ability to help us with fighting the coronavirus and results are looking very promising. On top of my love for science, I am very passionate about electronics. I don’t have professional education in this field besides from what I’ve learned online and from textbooks. I am mostly interested in equipment repair since we have ancient custom equipment that’s being used on a daily basis and it needs constant maintenance, but it was built in the 80-90s and the service was discontinued years ago. Constant need to troubleshoot mechanical and electrical components pushed me to learn more and more about electronics. I don’t have much equipment home though. I have a 3d printer that I've been using to print face shields and face mask holders for the hospital workers (
https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=2056519&fbclid=IwAR0ILk4oQ6o0BhEuhnIk9L06XGk4tViCGgxNEfrFkReN6rOh3ZH0-i1HU94). I am constantly designing and printing custom tools/parts/adapters/spacers and etc to fit the needs of the lab and make our life easier. I designed, 3d printed and assembled a power supply, I don’t have a proper signal generator in my workbench so I’m using an arduino instead which has very limited capabilities. Also, my oscilloscope is $20 DSO 138 which I guess is better than nothing but it’s close to being useless compared to an actual oscilloscope. To analyze power supplies I have to use an old broken heating element from my oven as a load and my multimeter that I got on ebay is older than I am. Even though my tools are very limited, it never stopped me from repairing all kinds of equipment and finishing many projects for personal use.
Winning in this competition will be a huge help for me because there’s only so little I can do with my limited tools.
Thank you for the opportunity and for reading my unnecessary long message.
Glib Maznyi