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Be well at home while celebrating Wellness Day on September 19th. Drop by the Center for Well-Being or the lobby of Gateway 1 (60 Prescott) starting on Wednesday, September 17th to pick up your Wellness @ Home Kit to help de-stress and relax. Kits will be available September 17-19 or until we run out. Get one before they are gone! Sponsored by the CWB.

Abstract: In recent years, there has been growing recognition that the physical bodies of animals play just as crucial a role in performing complex tasks as the control signals that drive them. In the field of robotics, this has given rise to the concept of “mechanical intelligence,” whereby desired behavior is embedded directly into robotic hardware rather than relying purely on active control. Though much work remains to match the level of performance found in nature, great progress has been made by both soft and rigid roboticists, alike. In this talk, Prof. Connor McCann will present his research at the intersection of these two fields, using a combination of experimental, theoretical, and numerical techniques to embed intelligent behavior into rigid robotic hands, soft wearable rehabilitative robots, and biomimetic soft-rigid structures inspired by stingray skeletons. As the director of the Principled Rigid-Soft Mechanisms (PRiSM) Lab at WPI, Prof. McCann’s ongoing research directions focus on the development of new paradigms to achieve mechanical intelligence through “hybrid-stiffness” mechanisms. By leveraging the benefits of both softness and rigidity, he aims to push the bounds of robotic hardware to enable complex and intelligent robotic behavior beyond what is currently possible.Bio: Connor McCann is an Assistant Professor in the Robotics Engineering department at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. His research focuses on hybrid-stiffness mechanisms at the intersection of rigid and soft robotics. He is interested in the underlying mechanics that govern the non-trivial interactions between rigid and soft materials, and how these interactions can enable advanced, highly functional behavior in robots. His work combines first-principles physical modeling with application-driven design and prototyping, spanning multiple application areas including robotic grasping and manipulation, wearable robotics, and bioinspired robotics. Prior to joining WPI, he received his Ph.D. and M.S. from Harvard University and his B.S. from Yale University, all in mechanical engineering.

TITLE: Investigations of current-use flame retardants and plasticizers in atmospheric particulate matterAbstract: The World Health Organization (WHO) considers air pollution “one of the biggest environmental threats to human health". Since organic chemicals can efficiently sorb to particulate matter (PM), the health effects associated with these chemicals must also be considered a hazard. Organophosphate esters (OPEs), which are a “reemerging” pollutant with a wide-range of uses in consumer products, including as a flame retardant (FR) and plasticizer, are one such ���high production volume” chemical. Despite known and suspected health effects of OPEs, there is no international regulation in place for OPEs and studies of these chemicals in PM in the US are limited. Providence, RI is the third most populated city in New England while also being home to New England’s second largest deep-water port. It has been documented that urban centers are a significant source of OPEs and have been shown to be transported to coastal regions from other nearby cities. Filter-based samples of total suspended particulate (TSP) and PM2.5 have been collected in Providence, RI. Samples were extracted to determine the concentration of 33 OPEs (including 14 novel-OPEs) in an urban area as a function of size fraction, season, precipitation, and solar radiation. Comparison of partitioning between size fractions will allow for a better understanding of health-related exposures, since PM2.5 is the respirable fraction of PM. Preliminary data on OPEs in Pacific Northwest wildfires will also be presented.Biography: Adelaide E. Clark received a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry with a concentration in education from Emory & Henry College before pursuing her PhD in analytical chemistry from Baylor University. Prior to coming to Providence College, she spent 6 years teaching at the Oregon Institute of Technology, the last year as a tenured faculty member. While at Oregon Tech, she worked with undergraduate researchers looking at the effects of wildfire smoke on hospitalization rates and the effects of wood stoves on air quality in the Klamath Basin. Since coming to PC, she's been conducting research looking at flame retardants and plasticizers at three sites in Rhode Island through FriAir Net, the Friar Air Monitoring Network at Providence College (established by her group in 2023), and in wildfire samples from the Pacific Northwest.

Looking for a way to make your day less stressful and more mindful...take some much-needed time for yourself and join us for Mindful Wednesdays! Drop-in meditation sessions are open to the entire WPI community, and no experience is necessary. A certified meditation teacher will offer guided meditations appropriate for both beginners as well as experienced meditators. People can join in person or via zoom.

Title:Fusion of Imaging and Robotics for Healthcare and Human-Machine Interface Abstract:Medical robotics has been widely applied in areas such as surgical assistance, enabling higher precision, reduced fatigue, and enhanced performance and tele-operation, allowing surgeons to perform procedures remotely without being physically present with the patient. A key enabler of medical robotics is imaging, which has rapidly evolved over the past two decades to support more minimally invasive, personalized, and low-risk diagnostic and therapeutic approaches. My research group focuses on the intersection of medical robotics, sensing, and imaging, with the aim of developing robotic-assisted imaging systems and image-guided robotic interventional platforms leveraging AI. In this talk, I will highlight two projects in our lab. First, I will discuss autonomous robotic imaging, which aims to reduce user dependency during image acquisition, resulting in higher-quality images and more comprehensive scanning. This includes our development of an autonomous ultrasound robot for diagnosing lung diseases. Second, I will introduce AI-powered biosignal-based human-machine interaction that harnesses signals from the human body to estimate hand movements and forces. This research is crucial for designing effective human-machine interaction systems, which can control robots, augmented/virtual/mixed reality interfaces, and digital media. Ultrasound data from the forearm provides valuable insights by visualizing a cross-section of the forearm, revealing the underlying causes of hand movements and interaction. These advancements in robotic imaging and human-machine interaction have the potential to significantly enhance both healthcare and our daily quality of life. Speaker:Haichong (Kai) Zhang, Ph.D.Associate Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering and Robotics Engineering Program, WPIBio:Dr. Haichong (Kai) Zhang is an Associate Professor in Biomedical Engineering and Robotics Engineering with an appointment in Computer Science at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). He is the founding director of the Medical Frontier Ultrasound Imaging and Robotic Instrumentation (Medical FUSION) Laboratory. His research interests include advanced medical imaging and robotic instrumentation with an emphasis on ultrasound and photoacoustics. Dr. Zhang received his B.S. and M.S. in Human Health Sciences from the Kyoto University, Japan, and subsequently earned his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science from the Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Zhang is the recipient of the NIH Director’s Early Independence Award (DP5) in 2019 and the Early Investigator Research Award from the Department of Defense Prostate Cancer Research Program in 2018. He has served as a Program Committee Member for two tracks at the Image-Guided Procedures, Robotic Interventions, and Modeling and Ultrasonic Imaging and Tomography at the SPIE Medical Imaging Conference. He has been a member of the Young Professionals Committee of the IEEE Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control Society (UFFC-S) since 2021.Host: Professor Ulkuhan Guler