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1. Design Educators’ Conceptions of Prototyping in Engineering Design Courses

   Ali, Hadi; Lande, Micah (June 2019, ASEE Annual Conference proceedings)

   This is a research study that investigates the range of conceptions of prototyping in engineering design courses through exploring the conceptions and implementations from the instructors’ perspective. Prototyping is certainly an activity central to engineering design. The context of prototyping to support engineering education and practice has a range of implementations in an undergraduate engineering curriculum, from first-year engineering to capstone engineering design experiences. Understanding faculty conceptions’ of the reason, purpose, and place of prototyping can help illustrate how teaching and learning of the engineering design process is realistically implemented across a curriculum and how students are prepared for work practice. We seek to understand, and consequently improve, engineering design teaching and learning, through transformations of practice that are based on engineering education research. In this exploratory study, we interviewed three faculty members who teach engineering design in project-based learning courses across the curriculum of an undergraduate engineering program. This builds on related work done by the authors that previously investigated undergraduate engineering students’ conceptions of prototyping activities and process. With our instructor participants, a similar interview protocol was followed through semi-structured qualitative interviews. Data analysis has been undertaken through an emerging thematic analysis of these interview transcripts. Early findings characterize the focus on teaching the design process; the kind of feedback that the educators provide on students’ prototypes; students’ behavior while working on design projects; and educators’ perspectives on the design course. Understanding faculty conceptions with students’ conceptions of prototyping can shed light on the efficacy of using prototyping as an authentic experience in design teaching and learning. In project-based learning courses, particular issues of authenticity and assessment are under consideration, especially across the curriculum. More specifically, “proportions of problems” inform “problem solving” as one of the key characteristics in design thinking, teaching and learning. More attention to prototyping as part of the study of problem-solving processes can be useful to enhance understanding of the impact of instructional design. Challenges for teaching engineering design exist, and may be due to difficulties in framing design problems, recognizing what expertise students possess, and assessing their expertise to help them reach their goals, all at an appropriate place and ambiguity with student learning goals. Initial findings show that prototyping activities can help students become more reflective on their design. Scaffolded activities in prototyping can support self-regulated learning by students. The range of support and facilities, such as campus makerspaces, may also help students and instructors alike develop industry-ready engineering students. 

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2. WireFab: Mix-Dimensional Modeling and Fabrication for 3D Mesh Models

   Min Liu, Yunbo Zhang (May 2017, Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems)

   Many rapid fabrication technologies are directed towards layer wise printing or laser based prototyping. We propose WireFab, a rapid modeling and prototyping system that uses bent metal wires as the structure framework. WireFab approximates both the skeletal articulation and the skin appearance of the corresponding virtual skin meshes, and it allows users to personalize the designs by (1) specifying joint positions and part segmentations, (2) defining joint types and motion ranges to build a wire-based skeletal model, and (3) abstracting the segmented meshes into mixed-dimensional appearance patterns or attachments. The WireFab is designed to allow the user to choose how to best preserve the fidelity of the topological structure and articulation motion while selectively maintaining the fidelity of the geometric appearance. Compared to 3D-printing based high-fidelity fabrication systems, WireFab increases prototyping speed by ignoring unnecessary geometric details while preserving structural integrity and articulation motion. In addition, other rapid or low-fidelity fabrication systems produce only static models, while WireFab produces posable articulated models and has the potential to enable personalized functional products larger than the machines that produce them. 

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3. Compact Tensegrity Robots Capable of Locomotion through Mass-shifting

   Rhodes, T.; Vikas, V. (August 2019, Proceedings of the ASME 2019 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference)

   Robustness, compactness, and portability of tensegrity robots make them suitable candidates for locomotion on unknown terrains. Despite these advantages, challenges remain relating to simplicity of fabrication and locomotion. The paper introduces a design solution for fabricating tensegrity robots of varying morphologies with modular components created using rapid prototyping techniques, including 3D printing and laser-cutting. % It explores different robot morphologies that attempt to balance structural complexity while facilitating smooth locomotion. The techniques are utilized to fabricate simple tensegrity structures, followed by tensegrity robots in icosahedron and half-circle arc morphologies. Locomotion strategies for such robots involve altering of the position of center-of-mass to induce `tip-over'. Furthermore, the design of curved links of tensegrity mechanisms facilitates continuous change in the point of contact (along the curve) as compared to piece-wise continuous in the traditional straight links (point contact) which induces impulse reaction forces during locomotion. The resulting two tensegrity robots - six-straight strut icosahedron and two half-circle arc morphology - achieve locomotion through internal mass-shifting utilizing the presented modular mass-shifting mechanism. The curve-link tensegrity robot demonstrates smooth locomotion along with folding-unfolding capability. 

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4. Towards Very Low-Cost Iterative Prototyping for Fully Printable Dexterous Soft Robotic Hands

   https://doi.org/10.1109/RoboSoft54090.2022.9762122  

   Bauer, Dominik; Bauer, Cornelia; Lakshmipathy, Arjun; Shu, Roberto; Pollard, Nancy S. (April 2022, International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft))

   The design and fabrication of soft robot hands is still a time-consuming and difficult process. Advances in rapid prototyping have significantly accelerated the fabrication process while introducing new complexities into the design process. In this work, we present an approach that utilizes novel low-cost fabrication techniques in conjunction with design tools to help soft hand designers systematically take advantage of multi-material 3D printing to create dexterous soft robotic hands. While very low-cost and lightweight, we show that generated designs are highly durable, surprisingly strong, and capable of dexterous grasping. 

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5. Why make it? Understanding undergraduate engineering students' conceptions for the purpose of prototyping in engineering design activities

   Ali, Hadi; Liu, Yue (October 2018, Frontiers in education)

   Prototyping in design provides ways to navigate ambiguity in the design problem, gain insight through the refinement of ideas, and aid in communication between team members. However, while designing, students often underutilize prototyping and do not consider it as an integral part of the design process. To facilitate the scaffolding of design activities, it is necessary first to understand students’ conceptions of prototyping. In this study, we use artifact elicitation interviews as a method to elicit students’ conceptions by moving from the specifics of the artifacts they brought with them to the interview, to their general understanding of prototyping. Participants in the study are students in an undergraduate sophomore design oriented, project-based learning course in a large southwestern university. Students were invited to participate in a screening survey. After potential participants suitable for the purpose of this study were identified, some were selected for a follow-up interview. The findings of the study describe students’ conceptions of “what counts” as a prototype; what is valued in a prototype; the benefits of, and challenges associated with prototyping; and differences between in-class and out-of-class prototyping activities. The findings of this study improve our understanding to effectively scaffold prototyping activities in design and experiential learning. 

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