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Living Matter Lab/Unstable Design Lab

Exploring biofoam as a Material for Tangible Interaction, authored by Eldy S. Lazaro Vasquez, Netta Ofer, Shanel Wu,Mary Etta West, Mirela Alistar and Laura Devendorf  introduced the DIS audience to biofoam, a water soluble and biodegradable material that can be made conductive.

During the DIS‘22 Multisensory Design session, lead author, Lazaro, an ATLAS PhD student, presented the team's biofoam research and demonstrated the unique opportunities the material brings to HCI communities.  Vasquez described the material in detail, including the process of making biofoam from scratch and fabricating the material into forms with handcraft techniques. She also presented two HCI-specific applications of biofoam and demonstrated the different life cycles of the material, all of which can be considered in the design process; biofoam can be cooked, molded, layered, extruded, dissolved and recooked.

Publication

Eldy S. Lazaro Vasquez, Netta Ofer,Shanel Wu, Mary Etta West, Mirela Alistar and Laura Devendorf. 2022. Exploring Biofoam as a Material for Tangible Interaction. In Designing Interactive Systems Conference (DIS ’22), Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 1525-1529. https://doi.org/10.1145/3532106.3533494 (June 13-17, 2022—Virtual Event, Australia). 

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ATLAS researchers will present six published works and two workshops at the 2022 ACM Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction (SIGCHI), the world’s preeminent forum for the field of human-computer interaction. The conference, commonly referred to as “CHI,” will be held hybrid-onsite April 30-May 6, 2022 in New Orleans.

Researchers affiliated with Laura Devendorf’s Unstable Design Lab will be presenting two workshops, one full paper and one journal article; Mirela Alistar’s Living Matter Lab authored two papers, one of which received a Best Paper Honorable Mention award. The ACME Lab collaborated with the VisuaLab (formerly with the ATLAS Institute) for one paper and ATLAS associated PhD students also will present one paper.

​​CHI Papers are publications of original research in the field of Human Computer Interaction that are read and cited worldwide, and have a broad impact on the development of HCI theory, method, and practice. It's a prestigious honor for papers to be accepted to CHI; within the last decade, the overall acceptance rate for CHI has only been 20-27 percent.

CHI 2022 papers, journal articles and workshops by ATLAS faculty and students

Living Matter Lab

. [Best Paper Honorable Mention Award].
Fiona Bell, (PhD student, ATLAS); Netta Ofer, (research master’s student, ATLAS);  Mirela Alistar, (faculty, ATLAS/Computer Science).
This paper presents ReClaym: a clay-like material made from the makers’ own compost, reflecting the makers' relationship with food, applied manual fabrication techniques and design explorations. Through a process of Intimate Making with an intimate material, researchers used ReClaym to create a collection of applications, including garden paraphernalia, games and personal household items. 

 (interactivity paper)
Fiona Bell, (ATLAS PhD student);  Netta Ofer, (research master’s student, ATLAS); Hyelin Choi (undergraduate student, Molecular Cellular and Developmental Biology);  Ella S McQuaid (undergraduate student, Mechanical Engineering); Ethan Frier (MS, CTD—Creative Industries '21); Mirela Alistar, (faculty, ATLAS/Computer Science).
In this work, researchers introduce a range of sustainable biomaterials including ReClaym, a clay-like material made from compost; Alganyl, an algae-based bioplastic; Dinoflagellates, bioluminescent algae; SCOBY, symbiotic cultures of bacteria and yeast; and Spirulina, nutrient-dense blue-green algae to create unique interactive interfaces. The researchers will present the biomaterials at CHI, where conference participants can engage with the biomaterials.

ACME Lab—Workshop Papers

Augmented Personification of Intelligent Music Tools for Creativity and Collaboration
ACM CHI 2022 Workshop 47: : When Interactive Assistance and Augmentation Meet Musical Instruments .
Torin Hopkins (ATLAS PhD student), Rishi Vanukuru (ATLAS PhD student), Suibi Che-Chuan Weng (Creative Industries master's student), Amy Banic, (Visiting Associate Professor, Computer Science), Ellen Yi-Luen Do (Professor, ATLAS Institute & Computer Science).

Designing and Studying Social Interactions in Shared Virtual Spaces using Mobile Augmented Reality
ACM CHI 2022 Workshop 46:
Rishi Vanukuru, (ATLAS PhD student), Amarnath Murugan, Jayesh Pillai, and Ellen Yi-Luen Do (Professor, ATLAS Institute & Computer Science). 

What to Design Next: Actuated Materials and Soft Robots for Children
ACM CHI 2022 Workshop 39: Actuated Materials and Strategies for Human Computer Interaction Design.
Chris Hill (ATLAS PhD student), Ruojia Sun, (ATLAS PhD student), Ellen Yi-Luen Do (Professor, ATLAS Institute & Computer Science).

ACME Lab and VisuaLab* collaboration

S. Sandra Bae, (ATLAS PhD student), Clement Zheng, (ATLAS post-doctoral research associate, PhD; Technology, Media & Society ‘20); Mary Etta West, (PhD student, Computer Science); Ellen Yi-Luen Do, (faculty, ATLAS/Computer Science); Samuel Huron, (faculty, Telecom - Institut Polytechnique de Paris); Danielle Albers Szafir (UNC Chapel Hill, former ATLAS faculty).
Physicalizations are more than just physical representations of data. Each physicalization is also (un)consciously a product of different research communities physicalization is part of, specifically of their research perspective and values. But research currently lacks a synthesis across the different communities data physicalization sits upon, including their approaches, theories, and even terminologies. To bridge these communities synergistically, ATLAS researchers present a design space that describes and analyzes physicalizations according to three facets: context (end-user considerations), structure (the physical structure of the artifact), and interactions (interactions with both the artifact and data). 

*Following Danielle Szafir's departure last summer, the ATLAS VisuaLab was closed

Unstable Design Lab 

Maya Livio (PhD student, Intermedia Art, Writing and Performance); Laura Devendorf (faculty, ATLAS/Information Science).
This paper introduces the concept of the eco-technical interface— which represents the sites at which human, non-human and technological interfaces overlap—as a critical zone at which designers can surface and subvert issues of multispecies relations, such as nonhuman instrumentalization. 

  (journal article)
Jordan Wirfs-Brock (PhD candidate, Information Science); Alli Fam (reporter, New Hampshire Public Radio); Laura Devendorf (faculty, ATLAS/Information Science); Brian C Keegan (faculty, Information Science).
This first-person, retrospective exploration of two radio sonification pieces illuminates the role of narrative in designing to support listeners as they learn to listen to data.

(workshop)
Jordan Wirfs-Brock , (PhD candidate, Information Science); Maxene Graze (Data Visualization Engineer, MURAL), Laura Devendorf (faculty, ATLAS/Information Science); Audrey Desjardins, (faculty, University of Washington); Visda Goudarzi (faculty, Columbia College Chicago); Mikhaila Friske, (PhD student, Information Science); Brian C Keegan  (faculty, Information Science).
This workshop engages synesthesia to explore how translating between sensory modalities might uncover new ways to experience and represent data. 

(workshop)
Verena Fuchsberger (Post Doc, Center for Human-Computer Interaction, University of Salzburg), Dorothé Smit (Research Fellow, Center for Human-Computer Interaction, University of Salzburg), Nathalia Campreguer França (Research Fellow, Center for Human-Computer Interaction,University of Salzburg); Georg Regal (Scientist, AIT Austrian Institute of Technology); Stefanie Wuschitz (Mz. Baltazar’s Lab);  Barbara Huber (Mz. Baltazar’s Lab); Joanna Kowolik (project manager, Happylab); Laura Devendorf (faculty, ATLAS/Information Science); Elisa Giaccardi (faculty, Delft University of Technology); Ambra Trotto (Research Institute of Sweden).
In this one-day workshop, organizers aim to counteract the phenomenon that access to making (e.g., in makerspaces, fablabs, etc.) is not equally distributed, with certain groups of people being underrepresented (e.g., women*).

Associated PhD Students

 
Ryo Suzuki (ATLAS/PhD Computer Science '20; assistant professor, University of Calgary); Adnan Karim, (MS student, University of Calgary); Tian Xia, (BS, Computer Science, University of Calgary); Hooman Hedayati, (ATLAS/PhD Computer Science ‘21), Nicolai Marquardt (faculty, University College London). 
Researchers surveyed 460 research papers, formulating key challenges and opportunities that guide and inform future research in AR and robotics.

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A group of ŷ���ڱ���Ƶ Boulder artists and technologists, many of whom share connections with the ATLAS Institute, contributed to the Museum of Boulder’s newest exhibit, “Convivial Machines,” which opened Saturday, Oct. 30.

The gallery showcase is the first museum installation for Boulder Experiments in Art and Technology (B.E.A.T), says the exhibit's curator, Jiffer Harriman (ATLS PhD '16), who started B.E.A.T. in 2019 to “foster creativity and collaboration at the intersection of art and technology.”  Museum visitors can expect to see a variety of interactive systems, including musical installations and video art, as well kinetic sculptures, digital games, bioluminescent algae and more, Harriman says.

“The exhibit highlights a local community of artists and creative technologists looking for new ways to see the world,” says Harriman. “It explores the differences and balance between what people do well—expressiveness and creativity—and what machines are good at–repetition and connection.”

One of the emerging themes of the show is the tension between the benefits that technology offers and the negative impacts, Harriman says. Some installations imagine new possibilities, while others point toward technology’s negative effects, including an installation of "useless boxes" that contain a single switch, which when turned on, is immediately switched off by a robotic finger, he adds.

The ATLAS Connection
Inspired by bioluminescent algae and the idea of engaging with something “live,” Harriman has blended research led by Mirela Alistar, assistant professor of computer science with the ATLAS Institute, into the installation. Alistar, also the director of the Living Matter Lab, and Netta Ofer, an ATLAS master’s student, have created an exhibit, “Bioluminescent Touch,” where visitors can interact in the darkness with dinoflagellates, algae that produce light when exposed to oxygen through physical stimulation.

“The bioluminescent response to human touch creates unexpected connection and empathy with the microorganism, drawing us into the wonder of communicating and interacting with nonhuman beings,” Ofer says.

Slaton Spangler, now a software engineer with LASP who, as an undergraduate majoring in computer science was a very active member of the BTU Lab, made the interactive installation, “Amorphous Breeze.” The piece displays a network of undulating “blobs” that fade in and out following a set of underlying rules. When a viewer presses a glowing green button, a fan in the real world appears to blow away the blobs, replacing them with new blobs that follow new rules. The patterns that emerge from the waves of blobs tend to be mesmerizing in the same fashion as a lava lamp, Spangler says.

Spangler also constructed the installation, “Clear the Void,” which uses an XBox Kinect to create an interactive space of digital images provided by Matt Corones, an ATLAS master's student (Creative Industries) in the ACME Lab, Dajira Medić, Jeanne Kipke, Andy DiLallo and Shannon Derthick. 

In a third installation, Spangler created a hardware platform to loop an installation of video art from the B.E.A.T. community that includes a range of experimental techniques and themes.

Priyanka Makin, an ATLAS master's student, fabricated the “Nature Mobile,” a kinetic sculpture of nature shapes that explores the future relationship between technology, engineering, art and nature. Makin used a laser cutter to cut the pieces and built and programmed the motor. With the help of natural sunlight in the lobby, the sculpture scatters colors throughout the entry to the museum.

Perry Owens, an undergraduate CTD student and member of the ACME Lab, created the sculpture, "The Future of Problem Solving," which expresses the duality between man and machine as they are tasked with solving a puzzle. To succeed, man and machine must achieve harmony through trust and coordination. Owens made the "human" from resin casts of his own hands. Using a 3D modeling software, he designed the mechanical arms and 3D printed them with fingers that can be posed. He also 3D printed the Rubik's cube, which can be rotated, and added a wooden exterior, while the LED-lined portals and mirrors were laser-cut.

"I imagine the future of our world is one in which there is collaboration between technology and humanity, instead of competition and war," Owens says. "This piece was fabricated using human skills combined with technology, akin to its message of unity between man and machine."

A collaborative effort of seven created the musical arcade, “Galaga's Ghost,” a multi-channel musical instrument that up to six people can play with buttons, joysticks and air guitar moves. The interactive musical composition was created by Sean Winters, a CMCI lecturer in the Department of Critical Media Practices who performs regularly in the ATLAS Black Box. Winters is also on the B2 advisory committee. Torin Hopkins, a PhD student in the ACME Lab and the instructor for the SOUND class, helped design the interface layout and assisted with the final fabrication of the piece. 

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