Design Engineer

NeuraLyfe

A disease you can only diagnose after death — I designed the system that sees it in the living.

role
Design engineer
team
4 designers
timeline
72 hours, 2026
build
Designed in Figma, built in Claude Code and Figma Make
NeuraLyfe team roster — the demo's opening frame.

No test can find CTE in a player who is alive

A player can pass the sideline concussion check while CTE, a brain disease linked to repeated hits to the head, keeps building. More than nine in ten former NFL players whose brains were studied after death had it.

Everyone around the player cared, and none of them had a way to act on CTE

  • The player

    Would lose their spot

  • The family

    Can’t take them off the field

  • The coach

    Needs them playing to win

  • The doctor

    Has no test to prove they have it

I talked my team out of warning the player, and pushed for the doctor

For FigBuild, my team imagined a helmet sensor that could one day catch CTE building during play.

My team · Problem statement

How might we warn the player, their family, and the coach, so they can act?

Me

A warning won’t get a player off the field. The doctor can, and only needs the evidence.

Suggested instead

How might we give the doctor evidence to pull a player before more hits add up?

I told them about a player's wife who watched him decline for years. He wouldn't stop playing, his family couldn't make him, and they only got an answer at his autopsy. That story changed the room. I ruled out the coach too. Once the team agreed, I pointed our work at what a doctor would need.

The monitor had to show who to pull, why, and where the hits came from

A doctor watching play can't hold a tablet, so I pushed for a sideline monitor that can answer all three at a glance.

Medical staff at a sideline desk, backs to us, reaching toward three large screens: the roster, the brain, the impact replay.
  1. LeftThe rosterWho to pull
  2. MiddleThe brainWhy
  3. RightThe impact replayWhere the hits came from

All three would read one score from the Halo, a helmet sensor I sketched and another designer rendered. I combined its biomarkers into that score and built the roster and the brain view. Another designer made the impact replay.

Blue marker sketch on a whiteboard: a band over the head with round sensor pads.

Sketch

The rendered Halo: a dark carbon band with small sensor nodes and a camera at its front end, holding white pads that arc over the head.
  1. Impact cameraVerifies hits and reconstructs plays
  2. EEG sensorsMap brain activity and connectivity
  3. Biomarker sensorsDetect p-Tau 217, NfL, GFAP
BIOMARKERS
p-Tau 2174.2 pg/mL
NfL Level38.1 pg/mL
GFAP186 pg/mL
  • p-Tau 217Disease progression
  • NfLActive neural damage
  • GFAPInflammation and structural breakdown

Combined into one score

CTE Progression Index0–100

I picked these three because each one tracks a different kind of brain damage. Combined, they give the doctor one number to read instead of three.

A doctor has a split second, so my roster shows only who to pull from the game

My last roster gives a doctor the call in one glance: critical, mandatory removal.

Another designer's second pass on my first roster still showed biomarker percentages, injury history, a clearance status and a filter tab. Each was nearly as prominent as the warning, so I cut all four and kept the score.

I made four cuts, and the warning became the loudest thing on the roster

Another designer's second passMy cuts to that passMy last pass
  • I cut
  • 1Biomarker percentages
  • 2Injury history
  • 3Clearance status
  • 4Filter tab

CTE is linked to repeated small hits, so the brain view shows them adding up

A doctor who pulls a player has to explain why, so I built the brain view as a season-long record of the damage. Its timeline shows where the damage started and how far it has spread. I built it in Claude Code, then Figma Make.

Region analysis

  • Frontal87
  • Temporal62
  • Parietal41
  • Occipital23
  • Cerebellum15

Biomarkerspg/mL

  • p-Tau 2174.2
  • NfL38.1
  • GFAP186

The replay I almost cut showed the coach which drills to change

Another designer built the impact replay for players after I thought the team had agreed on the doctor. Players hide their symptoms, so I almost cut it, until I saw it could work for the coach. I moved its footage from a game broadcast to a practice field.

Most hits happen at practice, not in games

  • MonTueWedThuFri

    2 of every 3 hits at practice

  • Sat

    1 of 3 in games

College football, six Division I programs, 2015–2019. McCrea et al., JAMA Neurology, 2021.

Each hit on the video traces back to the play behind it. A coach can change how that play is practiced instead of losing the player. I'd ruled the coach out of pulling a player, not out of preventing the hits.

The replay moved from the player to the coach, who can change the drills

BeforeAnother designer’s version, for the player: their hits over a game broadcast

Stadium broadcast footage of a tackle during a game.
  1. Hit 1: moderate, 52g, first quarter 14:22
  2. Hit 2: severe, 87g, first quarter 8:33
  3. Hit 3: light, 28g, second quarter 13:58
  4. Hit 4: severe, 92g, second quarter 6:30
  5. Hit 5: moderate, 61g, third quarter 9:18
  6. Hit 6: moderate, 48g, fourth quarter 11:27

AfterMy version, for the coach: the hits over practice footage, to change the drills behind them

The doctor can act on the damage, and the coach can change what caused it

Now everyone around the player is better off than before

  • The player

    Before: Would lose their spot

    Now: Takes fewer hits, and comes off before they add up

  • The family

    Before: Can’t take them off the field

    Now: Can rest easy knowing the doctor has the player’s back

  • The coach

    Before: Needs them playing to win

    Now: Sees where the hits come from, and changes practice

  • The doctor

    Before: Has no test to prove they have it

    Now: Has the proof, and pulls them early so they can recover

My team took first place out of 689 submissions at FigBuild 2026, Figma's annual student design-a-thon.

  • The four teammates standing together on a rooftop, a lake and city skyline behind them.

    First place FigBuild 2026

  • The four teammates on the same rooftop, making a heart together with their arms.
  • The four teammates at dinner, leaning into one photo over bowls of food.
  • An instant photo of the four teammates at the event, wearing lanyards, in a yellow Figma for Edu frame.
  • The four teammates around a table of laptops and snacks, mid-conversation while they build.

4:20

Two reflections

  • A warning belongs to whoever will act on what it asks.

    The player it described was the one hiding the symptoms.

    The doctor needed to know when to pull a player, and the coach which drill the hits came from.

  • You can design the screen before the sensor that feeds it exists.

    The brain biomarkers behind it are real research, and no sensor reads them during play yet.

    I designed the screen a doctor would need the day a sensor can read them.