Building soft robots for searching complex terrain

To be successful in the laboratory students will need to be highly motivated and dedicate sufficient time to do their experiments. Once trained, you will be given considerable independence, but we expect you to take ownership of the work, keep detailed records, and to be responsible for getting results. Students will be treated as full members of the lab team and will share maintenance responsibilities and must attend the weekly lab meetings. Most of our work requires fine motor skills but we will train you in the use of the appropriate tools including microscopes and micromanipulators. For the research on Manduca you will need to be comfortable with handling caterpillars and moths and willing to perform experiments on living animals and tissues.

Our work in robotics is suitable for someone with experience building things and who is comfortable with electrical circuits and simple Arduino or Raspberry Pi programming. Although we do not require an engineering background basic skills in CAD software will be an asset.