Soft Robots Girls Summer Camp club

The lab organized a 2-day summer camp for middle-schoolers focused on soft robotics, in collaboration with the fantastic CEAT STEM team. In total, 33 girls participate in this free camp where all expenses were taken care of by the NSF CAREER award. We started with the basics of smart materials, muscles, artificial muscles, concepts of energy and movement. On the first day, they each synthesized their own pneumatic actuator. It cured overnight, and on the second day they were assembled into soft robots for locomotion. They experimented with the pneumatics on their individual actuator or as part of an assembly to understand motion. It was amazing!

Girls who Code club

Dr. Azoug is now leading a Girls Who Code club in Stillwater Middle School for 6th and 7th graders. The participants are joining every Wednesday for 45 minutes, currently having lots of fun coding a video game on Scratch!

Women in Science Conference – October 2019 + 2022 + 2023

The lab participated to the Women in Science conference, organized by Oklahoma NSF EPSCOR, with the Biomechanics and Musculoskeletal Modeling (BAMM) lab of Dr. Hausselle. We demonstrated our portable 3D scanner and the fun of biomechanics and artificial muscles made out of liquid crystal elastomers. The Women in Science Conference is held annually at the Science Museum Oklahoma in Oklahoma City. The free, one-day conference immersed more than 1,600 students (grades 6-12) in numerous fun and exciting hands-on science activities designed just for this event. Representatives from universities and businesses across Oklahoma hosted more than 70 interactive hands-on science and recruitment booths. Learn more about the conference at www.okepscor.org/calendar/2019-women-science-conference-s…, https://www.sciencemuseumok.org/WIS. Thanks to Leila Rezaei, Kara Marchetta, Abby Haddox, Jaden Kasitz, Luella Hollis, Cassandra Hardin, Sakib Nazmus!

National Lab Day – June, 4 2019

We received two teams of students for National Lab Day to show the magic behind smart elastomers! Color changing rings and artificial muscles have no secrets for us.

Introducing a Girl to Engineering and Research – April, 15 2019

We opened the lab and demonstrated for senior high school girls as part of the “Introduce a Girl to Engineering and Research” day at OSU, co-organized by SWE and CEAT. 

Upward bound Workshop – December, 10 2016

The lab organized an Upward Bound Workshop on Dec. 10, 2016. About 20 high school students came to the lab to see first-hand what liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) can do! They got to perform a DMA test of their hair and build robots with artificial muscles made of LCEs.