The Coastal Equity and Resilience (CEAR) Hub recently partnered with the U.S. Forest Service to host a two-week international seminar on community resilience. The seminar provided training to 11 community leaders from Honduras, Bangladesh, Samoa, Mozambique, Solomon Islands, Fiji, Tanzania, Nepal, Belize, and Brazil. The participants spent one week in Atlanta and one week in Savannah, learning strategies for building social, environmental, and economic resilience. Numerous CEAR Hub projects were featured as case studies in the seminar, including the Hub’s smart sea-level sensor network in coastal Georgia; emergency management support in Chatham County, GA; resilience planning work in the Gullah Geechee community of Pin Point (Savannah, GA); community garden development and youth engagement in Hudson Hill (Savannah, GA); K-12 education programs at Savannah State University; and environmental health research in Brunswick, GA. Through these examples, participants gained a deeper understanding of climate adaptation options, nature-based solutions, equitable community engagement, and the importance of collaboration in achieving community resilience.

The CEAR Hub lead principal investigator is Russell Clark, senior research scientist at the Georgia Institute of Technology and faculty member of the Institute for People and Technology (IPaT). Several members of the CEAR Hub team are affiliated with IPaT.

About the CEAR Hub
Coastal flooding, extreme heat, and other climate hazards are growing threats to communities throughout Georgia’s coast. These threats are especially critical for historically marginalized groups, who often face the most severe impacts and have the least ability to cope.

CEAR Hub is a project that joins community organizations, local governments, and educational institutions together to develop the knowledge, tools, and strategies that make our communities more resilient. CEAR Hub partners work alongside members of vulnerable communities to create fair and just solutions to the climate challenges through community-led research, training, and outreach.

Both fadpad and NaloPack won this year’s Georgia Tech Convergence Innovation Competition (CIC) for fall 2023. The CIC judges felt both teams deserved to be named winners based on their innovative ideas. Sponsored twice every year by Georgia Tech’s Institute for People and Technology (IPaT), the Convergence Innovation Competition is dedicated to helping students create and showcase innovative, viable products and experiences with the support of campus and industry resources along with guidance.

Fadpad is a multilayered add-on that goes directly on top of a menstrual pad to collect a blood sample. The blood sample is then shipped to a lab for testing. The fadpad team has shown that their approach can effectively detect biomarkers present in diseases like HPV, HIV, and other sexually transmitted infections. They recently earned one of the top prizes at the 2023 Collegiate Inventors Competition at the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

The fapad team includes Rhea Prem, who graduated with a bachelor of science in computer engineering; Netra Gandhi, who graduated with a bachelor of science in biomedical engineering; Ethan Damiani, who will graduate with a bachelor of science in biochemistry this fall; and Girish Hari, who will be completing a master of science in computer science this fall. Each team member will win a cash prize for winning.

NaloPak is a design-driven carry sling bag allowing a wearer to quickly access two Naloxone nasal sprays to quickly reverse an opioid overdose. The specially designed bag system also advertisers that the wearer is carrying this lifesaving medicine. Instructions to use Naloxone are also highly visible if the medicine needs to be rapidly deployed to save a life.

NaloPak was envisioned by Rae Bloom who is an undergraduate industrial design student graduating next spring 2024. By winning, Bloom will gain entry into the Georgia Tech CREATE-X program along with a cash prize. Fadpad has already participated in the CREATE-X program at Georgia Tech.

This year’s sole finalist was a product application named “becalming.” The future vision of her app is to combat bad mental health practices. It’s a product that is still in the early stages of design and development. Becalming is spearheaded by Sai Sanjana Prakash, who is pursuing a bachelor of science in both biomedical engineering and computer science.
 

This year’s fall 2023 competition judges were:

• Russell Clark, Institute for People and Technology at Georgia Tech
• Rahul Saxena, CREATE-X at Georgia Tech

Mid-November’s autumn transition foreshadows the stress of preparations for the Thanksgiving holiday, the imminent wrap up of final projects, and the near-term arrival of final exams as the end of the semester approaches. To alleviate some of the forthcoming stress, Hannah Hendricks, a master’s student in digital media (DM), and Allie Teixeira Riggs, a doctoral student in DM, hosted a fun community event for DM students using the Institute for People and Technology’s (IPaT) Craft Lab resources.

The purpose of the event was to let students relax, decompress, bond, and gain new insight into the capabilities of the Craft Lab which provides equipment such as industrial sewing machines, knitting and embroidery machines, 3D printers, and a number of other tools. Tim Trent, manager of the Craft Lab, and Arianna Mastali, a graduate research assistant in the lab, hosted 12 DM students at this community event.

Student feedback from the event included:

• “It was a supersensory experience for me. Throughout my life, I feared the sewing machine, but the experience yesterday of understanding the mechanics of it and the wonderful workings of the sewing machine after using it has made me mindful of the possibilities. Also, the aspect of community building through knitting is an exciting concept and takeaway.”
• “The [Craft Lab] experience was transformative, I learned quite a few things, and it was a safe space to be outside my comfort zone in terms of trying out something new. It was a great opportunity to meet new people within different fields of expertise.”
• “It was interesting to learn about and see a nitty gritty industrial sewing machine and the rotational knitting machine. I learned more about the equipment in the Craft Lab.”
• “I liked the bringing people together aspect of the event, sharing what we know, crafts we have done, and the digital media/computational craft we can do [using the lab].
• “I could definitely see this event happening again where we meet and do a particular craft for a day.”

“It is incredibly rewarding to see student-led events like this happen,” said Trent. “When I first envisioned the Craft Lab, I was excited by the potential to take equipment that was already being used for research and open its accessibility and use to create a community space for folks to explore and learn new things. The feedback and energy over the past year, as seen in events like this DM student night, have re-affirmed the importance of the lab spaces IPaT provides, and I'm excited to see where we can progress forward.”
 

About the Craft Lab:
The Craft Lab is a unique makerspace sponsored by IPaT which is designed to promote craft and algorithmic making. The equipment in the lab is particularly well-suited for wearable/flexible electronic systems and is available to anyone interested in making soft objects. The lab includes equipment like sewing machines, CNC knitting and embroidery machines, soldering irons, and 3D printers. Lab users must complete a lab training session before being allowed to access the lab.

Clint Zeagler, principal research scientist in the Institute for People and Technology (IPaT), was selected to join Georgia Tech’s Emerging Leaders Program for 2023-2024. Zeagler is also serving as the interim co-director of strategic partnerships for IPaT.

The Emerging Leaders Program is a collaboration between the Office of the Provost, the Office of the Executive Vice President for Research, the Institute for Leadership and Social Impact, and the Office of the Vice Provost for Faculty. Over the course of six months, participants take part in several activities—workshops, small-group work, and coaching—to contribute to leadership development. Zeagler is joining the eighth cohort of Georgia Tech’s Emerging Leaders Program. This is the first year the program has been open to senior and principal non-tenure track faculty and research faculty.

Zeagler’s research background encompasses industrial design, fashion design, and human centered computing. During his time at Georgia Tech, he has taught and created new and interdisciplinary coursework for the College of Computing, Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts, and the College of Design. Zeagler became part of the IPaT team in 2013 helping create the Wearable Computing Center and acted as its program manager. As IPaT’s co-director of strategic partnerships for IPaT, he is engaging with both external and internal partners to develop rewarding research and scholarly endeavors.

His interest in fashion (Master of Arts in fashion, Domus Academy, Milan), industrial design, textiles (Bachelor of Science, industrial design, Georgia Tech, minor in textile manufacturing) and computing (Ph.D. in human centered computing, Georgia Tech) drives his research on electronic textiles and on-body interfaces at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He is a member of the NASA Wearable Technology Cluster and interacts with the NASA Georgia Space Grant Consortium

Georgia Tech’s eighth cohort of faculty members selected for the Emerging Leaders Program can be found here.

The Foley Scholar Awards recognize the achievements of top graduate students whose vision and research are shaping the future of how people interact with and value technology. Winners and finalists for the 2023 Foley Scholar Award were celebrated at Georgia Tech’s hotel and convention center on October 30, 2023. The event was hosted by the Institute for People and Technology with its executive director, Michael Best, serving as the master of ceremonies as each finalist was recognized for their innovative research. James Foley, professor emeritus and for whom the awards are named for, joined in the evening’s festivities to celebrate the achievements of all finalists.

“Congratulations to the two awardees and all the finalists who represent the best that Georgia Tech has to offer,” said Michael Best. “Departing from previous years, this year we only awarded two prizes making them even more precious. Next year we will return to awarding multiple prizes among the finalist,” said Best.

Congratulations to the newly named Foley Scholars for 2023-2024 who are:

• Karthik Seetharama Bhat, Ph.D. student in Human-Centered Computing, in the
  in the doctoral category who was awarded $5,000.
• Arianna Mastali, master’s student in Human-Computer Interaction, in the
  master’s category who was awarded $1,000.

The finalists in the Ph.D. category were Karthik Seetharama Bhat, Arpit Narechania, Sachin Pendse, and Alexandra Teixeira Riggs.

The finalists in the master’s category were Arianna Mastali and Josey Benandi.

A short description of each finalists’ unique research along with their Georgia Tech faculty advisor is listed below:

Karthik Seetharama Bhat is a Ph.D. student in Human-Centered Computing and is advised by Neha Kumar. Bhat’s research explores the future of carework by studying how emerging technologies can support and augment caregiving interactions and relationships. His research examines telehealth efforts in India to understand technology adoption for formal and informal caregiving across socioeconomic, geographic, and cultural boundaries. He is designing new technologies and technology-aided workflows as probes into the potential futures of telehealth. He is also examining the role that emerging AI and data-driven technologies (like conversational agents) could play in informal care environments. He has partnered with ARMMAN—a Mumbai-based NGO that is employing mHealth technologies towards improving maternal and child health outcomes through information provision and care delivery to pregnant women and new mothers. He is also working on the design and deployment of a chatbot that can perform automated tasks that reduce burdens on community health workers who moderate a chat-based online health community for maternal and child health. This is a collaborative study with researchers at IIIT Delhi, India, and SWACH Foundation—an NGO in Haryana, India, that runs multiple WhatsApp-based online health communities for maternal and child health, serving thousands of pregnant women and new mothers from rural and urban regions of north India.

Arpit Narechania is a Ph.D. student in Computer Science, advised by Alex Endert. Narechania designs mixed-initiative, guidance-enriched interfaces that facilitate visual communication of appropriate and timely guidance between users and systems, and promotes the design of new visualization tools for enhanced human-data experiences from data preparation through analysis. He also develop tools that augment visualization interfaces with the querying power of natural language. A recent team research project of his examined how misrepresentation using fertility maps could change how funds are distributed to different locales and how people perceive the state of fertility in India. This project involved 16 cartographers and GIS experts from 13 global organizations such as the World Bank, UN, NASA, CDC. His team findings revealed that even the most expert map-makers find choosing appropriate binning methods challenging; this is due to limited knowledge, lack of awareness of harmful implications of using arbitrary binning methods, and organizational protocols conflicting with cartographic principles and map-maker’s preferences. His research team invented “Resiliency”, a new “goto” binning method. As a result of this research, the World Bank invited him, Dr. Clio Andris, and Dr. Alex Endert [fellow team members] to give a talk, and the United Nations offered to integrate this new map-making method into their website.

Sachin Pendse is a Ph.D. student in Human-Centered Computing and is advised by Munmun De Choudhury and Neha Kumar. Pendse is addressing mental health challenges and the positive role that technology can play. There are diverse and effective approaches to treating mental health concerns, but the process of being diagnosed and finding care can be extremely intimidating. Individuals in distress are confronted with diverse barriers, including the stigma associated with being labeled as mentally ill, the trial-and-error process of determining the medication or forms of therapy that work best for an individual, and economic or cultural factors that limit access. Navigating the pathway to care can be an ordeal as taxing as the experience of mental illness itself. He is working to better understand where technology-mediated support may be able to reduce and eliminate mental health-related barriers. He examines the role that identity and culture play in how people experience distress, and studies people from diverse backgrounds, including people in geographically sparse areas, people with limited financial means to access care, and people from minority backgrounds. He is using a mixed methods approach to understand the role that technology-mediated mental health support systems (such as helplines, online support communities, or Google search results) play in helping connect individuals in distress with effective, culturally valid support as they journey upon a pathway to care.

Alexandra Teixeira Riggs is a Ph.D. student in Digital Media, advised by Anne Sullivan. One of Riggs’s research projects, entitled “Button Portraits: Embodying Queer History with Interactive Wearable Artifacts,” is a wearable experience that explores Atlanta’s queer history using artifacts from the Gender and Sexuality Collections at Georgia State University. The project uses archival buttons from the collection to reveal oral histories of two Southern queer activists, linking the activists’ own objects to specific audio fragments. As a case study, “Button Portraits” offers insights on how wearability, embodiment, and queer archival methods can shape the design and experience of tangible historical narratives and their ability to call for reflection on our relationships to archival materials and history. By designing tangible experiences that center around queer community, history, and identity, she hopes to continue to express, loudly and proudly, that queer and trans people have always existed and will continue to exist, and that the design of technology, importantly, must center these histories, communities, and identities.

Arianna Mastali is a master’s student in Human-Computer Interaction, advised by Melody Jackson. Mastali has been working on a wearable activity and gait detection monitor for sled dogs and other canine athletes, called WAG’D. During her last undergraduate semester, she discovered the field of animal-centered computing. The WAG’D device consists of an IMU and a load cell and is focused on measuring gait anomalies and pull force in order to minimize injuries within sled dog racing. Her research team conducted several interviews with mushers and veterinarians who have been a part of the Iditarod in order to learn about the most common injuries in sled dogs and the existing methods to detect them. This work has significance as it will not only help better detect injuries, but will help dog owners and veterinarians better monitor dogs in order to prevent injuries.

Josey Benandi is a master’s student in Human-Computer Interaction, advised by Agata Rozga. Benandi is currently working on a project called the Care Coordination Study, which is funded by the AI-CARING Institute through the National Science Foundation. This project involves conducting qualitative research in the form of semi-structured interviews with people diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment and their informal caregivers, so that we may better understand how these folks manage their day-to-day activities, what challenges they face in doing so, and how they go about overcoming those challenges. The Care Coordination Study has been a joint effort between myself, Dr. Agata Rozga, Dr. Tracy Mitzner, and other students, where Josey has taken the lead role in all research activities. She is seeking to create a qualitative codebook of the findings which will serve as a guide for other researchers within AI-CARING and beyond whose work may require precedent real-world data regarding the experiences of those diagnosed with and those coordinating care for those diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment. 
 

About the James D. Foley Endowment
The James D. Foley Endowment, established in 2007, is named for Dr. James D. Foley, professor and founder of the GVU Center (now integrated with IPaT as of January, 2023) at Georgia Tech. The award was established by Dr. Foley's colleagues and GVU alumni to honor his significant contributions in the field of computing, his influence on the work of others, and his dedication to the development of new research directions.

Funds from the Foley Endowment are used to support the students and research activities of the Institute for People and Technology (IPaT), including the Foley Scholars Fellowships, awarded annually to two graduate students on the basis of personal vision, brilliance, and potential impact. Foley Scholars are selected by an advisory board comprised of alumni, current faculty, and industry partners during the fall semester.