HEART LAB MEMBERS
DR. DHANYA NAIR
Assistant Professor
Fowler School of Engineering
Dr. Nair is the director of HEART Lab. Her overarching research goal is to develop haptic interfaces to study the sense of touch.
She earned her PhD in Electrical Engineering from Texas Tech University, with emphasis on semiconductor testing. Prior to joining Chapman, she worked at:
Intel as a Process Engineer
Blast Motion as a Yield Analysis Consultant
Weber State University as Asst. Professor
GRANT STANKAITIS
Research Assistant / Consultant
A 2020 graduate from the Computer Science program at Chapman, Grant has a passion for prototyping and hardware development. He loves to create and contribute to projects that can positively impact the world. Grant is currently pursuing a MS in Electrical Engineering at UH Manoa.
Grant has significantly contributed to the hardware and firmware design and development of the Haptic Sleeve project at HEART Lab.
BRINLY XAVIER
Undergraduate Research Assistant
Brinly Xavier is a Junior Data Analytics student at Chapman University. As a Research Assistant, Brinly has contributed in the software development of the Haptic Sleeve project, and in the design of this website!
Previous Members
HEART Lab had its humble beginnings from the projects (developed out of curiosity) at Weber State University.
A special shout-out to the WSU students for their enthusiasm and creative designs!
SUNY LY, ORLANDO SALAS, JACOLBY GRIFFIN
Tactile Display v1 (Senior Project: Fall 2017 - Spring 2018)
This team designed and developed the first version of the Braille Display, taking the idea from scratch to a working prototype.
They created the 6x6 tactile grid and designed the hardware and software necessary to control each of the individual pins using DC input.
JASON BLOOD
Mobile to Tactile Interface (MS Project: Fall 2017 - Spring 2018)
Jason designed and developed an Android app and the firmware that helps integrate the tactile grid with a touchscreen device. The app selects a region touched on the screen, down converts the image beneath it to a 6x6 pixel, and represents it on an LED grid (as a visual substitute for the tactile grid).
LANDON FOUST
Peizoelectric Characterization (Research Assistant: Summer 2018 - Fall 2018)
Landon developed an automated LabVIEW system integrated with a High Precision Laser Displacement Sensor for characterizing the peizoelectric actuators used in the tactile grid. The findings helped us map the DC voltages to pin deflection precisely.
BRAXTON GREENWELL, CORI MCCONKEY
DC Braille Tactile Display (Senior Project: Spring 2019 - Fall 2019)
This team took the Tactile Display project one step further. They developed a software that converts keyboard inputs into corresponding braille character, and designed a high voltage DC power grid to provides the precise deflection required.
SEAN DUBACK, ROBERT GEOFFRION
Motion Tracking System (Senior Project: Spring 2019 - Fall 2019)
This team designed and developed a glove and the Learn-to-Write software that tracks user's pen movement and provides a vibratory feedback to their wrist to help correct their motion.