Audrey's Story

"I also helped program the robot’s path-planning and arm motion, making sure that the robot could navigate the space and perform tasks using its attached arm. I’ve never worked with ROS before, so it was a big jump for me to go from plug-and-play electronics to wiring and programming robotic systems from scratch. I learned a ton about applying packages and transforming existing code to suit your needs. I also have never really worked much in simulation before, so it was really cool to see my robot’s digital twin on the computer to verify the real robot’s behavior. This simulation element was super important since the robot itself isn’t something you’d want behaving unexpectedly; after all, the entire robot weighs well over 300 kilograms! After we finished the robot for open day, I was given a lot of freedom to use the University’s resources to make whatever I wanted! I pulled data from my CT scan I got last year and made a one-to-one scale model of my skull using a 3D nylon printer. That project taught me how to sculpt in Blender. I also was able to print a scale model of my robotics team’s autonomous boat back at MIT!"