Singapore, France, Boston, and Tulsa -- all in 2023!
"Have you ever seen Baymax – Big Hero 6? A big, white Michelin-man looking character?" Garrett Williamson (ME, ‘19) is studying soft robotics at the University of Tulsa. Soft Robotics is defined as “the design and construction of robots with physically flexible bodies and electronics. .” 
Soft robots move with inflated chambers – more like an octopus than a human does. This flexibility enables the robots to squeeze "under obstacles and around them and deform better. It's a very new research field!"
Last April Singapore hosted RoboSoft and Garrett presented on
embedding stretchable optical fibers that we make into the skin of the robot. They act like nerves allowing a robot to do proprioceptive shape reconstruction. Our robots perceive where their limbs are in the same way we know where our limbs are. His paper is titled “Stretchable Optical Waveguide Sensor Suitability for Wrinkle Degree Detection in Soft Robots.” Emily and Garrett are pictured here in Singapore.
After graduating, Emily "McCloy" Williamson (BSME '19) completed her MSE in Mechanical Engineering from the The University of Tulsa and is currently working as a Design Engineering for NORDAM in Tulsa, Oklahoma. NORDAM is an independently-owned aerospace company and an integrated supplier of cast and stretched acrylics, including windshields, cabin windows and wingtip lenses. Their two-ply design offers both optical performance and erosion resistance. Last September Emily traveled to France (pictured above with her mom Adina) to ensure a cabin window test plan -- including tensile tests of non-flat parts at extreme temperatures-- was followed exactly. She was present to help troubleshoot when issues arose.
Last November Garrett presented in Boston at the Materials Research Society (MRS) Meeting & Exhibit. He made a modification to the fibers which had only one stiffness option by identifying a material and characterizing it so that it allows one to choose the stiffness. His abstract titled “Characterization of Clear Urethane Plasticizer for Use in Optical Waveguide Strain Sensors in Soft Robotics” explains the details!
Don't miss Garrett's interview with Director of Alumni Engagement Lara Rose!
J. G. Williamson and J. Schultz, "Stretchable Optical Waveguide Sensor Suitability for Wrinkle Degree Detection in Soft Robots," 2023 IEEE International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft), Singapore, Singapore, 2023, pp. 1-6, doi: 10.1109/RoboSoft55895.2023.10122087. keywords: {Optical fibers;Mechanical sensors;Optical fiber sensors;Soft robotics;Robot sensing systems;Skin;Sensors},
