REU Site: Hybrid Design and Fabrication

在三年内，这个以创客为中心的本科生研究体验网站将招募30名来自不同和跨学科背景的学生，参与开发智能材料工具包，人工智能辅助和传感器驱动的工具以及智能创意环境。该项目将创造一个真实的本科生研究体验，结合制造商文化的元素，以开发克服开放式研究问题的模糊性所需的积极应对机制，促进研究社区内的个人身份形成，并增强科学和创造性的好奇心。它的研究建立在基于工艺的方法来设计数字制造实践，允许用户在制造过程中保持代理，这已被证明可以民主化获得先进的材料和制造技术，使业余爱好者和专业社区的基层创新，并扩大STEM领域的参与。每个研究活动都位于一个实践社区内，旨在让REU学生与利益相关者和同行研究人员接触，包括来自国际公认的人机交互程序的外部导师。学生将受益于设计思维，加法和减法制造，以及人体研究的专业发展。跨学科的研究经验和培训将有助于为REU参与者提供高要求的研究技能，以便他们能够适应各种科学和技术学科。项目将专注于数字制造中各种各样的欠发达材料，包括粘土，硅树脂，玻璃，生物材料和纺织品，这将提供一个体验式和协作式的学习基底，并吸引科学和工程教育周边社区中代表性不足和服务不足的学生。虽然数字制造的核心优势是自动化和抽象化，但它也有助于消除用户与材料的直接交互。这些基于物质的互动是经验知识发展的核心，也是创造性认知的核心贡献者。总的来说，本科研究人员将帮助开发和传播数字制造工具包和用户界面系统，以进一步促进学术和独立的“自己动手”社区的材料和技术素养。在专业艺术和设计学院的指导下开发的示例文物将通过社交和流行媒体传播，并围绕艺术与技术之间的跨学科合作产生灵感，兴奋和批判性反思。使用Maker Competition框架对网站进行评估将为REU社区提供关于以创客为中心的培训对本科生研究经验的影响的宝贵知识。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

Over three years, this maker-centered Research Experiences for Undergraduates site will recruit 30 students from diverse and interdisciplinary backgrounds to participate in developing smart material toolkits, AI-assisted and sensor-driven tools, and smart creative environments. This project will create an authentic undergraduate research experience that incorporates elements of maker culture to develop positive coping mechanisms needed to overcome the ambiguity of open-ended research questions, foster personal identity formation within the research community, and bolster scientific and creative curiosity. Its research builds on craft-based methods to design digital fabrication practices that allow users to maintain agency in the making process which has been shown to democratize access to advanced materials and fabrication techniques, enable grassroots innovation from hobbyist and professional communities, and broaden participation in STEM fields. Each research activity is situated within a community of practice and designed to engage REU students with stakeholders and peer researchers, including external mentors from internationally recognized human-computer interaction programs. Students will benefit from professional development in design thinking, additive and subtractive fabrication, and human subjects research. The interdisciplinary research experience and training will contribute to a high-demand research skill set for REU participants portable to a variety of science and technology disciplines. Projects will focus on a diverse range of underdeveloped materials within digital fabrication including clay, silicone, glass, biomaterials, and textiles which will provide both an experiential and collaborative learning substrate and attract underrepresented and underserved students in communities peripheral to science and engineering education. While a core advantage of digital fabrication is automation and abstraction, it has also contributed to removing users from directly interacting with a material. These material-based interactions are central to how experiential knowledge develops and are core contributors of creative cognition. Collectively, undergraduate researchers will help develop and disseminate digital fabrication toolkits and user interface systems to further promote material and technological literacy in both academic and independent "do it yourself" communities. Exemplar artifacts developed under the mentorship of professional art and design faculty will be disseminated through social and popular media and generate inspiration, excitement, and critical reflection around interdisciplinary collaborations between art and technology. Evaluation of the site using a Maker Competencies framework will provide valuable knowledge to the REU community on the effects of maker-centered training on the undergraduate research experience.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.