Research

I am a PhD candidate in SHAPE Lab at Stanford University, where my advisor is Professor Sean Follmer. My research focuses on shape changing robotics and flexible mechanisms, which we are currently using to create dynamic, smooth tangible user interfaces. I am funded by the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program and the Stanford Graduate Fellowship.

Timelapse of discrete elastic rods simulation of gridshell display generating a curved surface.
Reconfigureable Gridshell Display

Sofia Wyetzner and Wing-Sum Law, and Sean Follmer

This project is a work in progress. It extends the curved line display into a surface display by combining curved line segments in a grid. As with the curved line display, we use the discrete elastic rods formulation to model the system. To extend discrete elastic rods, my collaborator, Sofia Wyetzner, also added aspects to the model to capture the intersections of the rods. At each intersection there is a passive coupler that allows sliding and rotating. We actuate three degrees at each end of a rod – bias, extrude, and translate.

Video of the curved line display generating a shape that has a peak and a valley.
A Multi-Stable Curved Line Shape Display

Wing-Sum Law, Sofia Wyetzner, Raymond Zhen, and Sean Follmer

In this work, we present a multi-stable curved line shape display, with which we are able to display high curvature, smooth shapes by bending the ends of a flexible rod. We used a discrete elastic rods simulation to inform our actuation strategy, and demonstrated the display's ability to display a variety of shapes consistent with simulation results.

  Paper  | ICRA 2024

Figure showing order of information depicted with 1-DOF haptic device. Left side of figure shows first order information, height, and right side shows second order information, slope.
Conveying Shape Characteristics

Danyang Fan, Alexa Fay Siu, Wing-Sum Law, Raymond Zhen, Sile O'Modhrain, and Sean Follmer

More and more, we all interact with data-driven graphs to understand our environments and current events. However, information that is conveyed only visually is inaccessible to blind and visually impaired users. Some alternatives exist, but they are often non-refreshable or prohibitively expensive. We attempt to address this through a 1-DOF haptic device.

  Paper  | CHI 2022