Black in Robotics Legacy Fellowships

BiR Legacy Scholarship - US/Canada 2024

This is a scholarship for a student at the undergraduate or graduate level interested in pursuing a career in robotics. The student must be actively enrolled in a Canadian or United States university on the list of eligible schools (see below). The amount will be for up to $50k CAD (Canadian) ~= $36k USD (United States). This amount will be paid by a third party to your university to cover Tuition and Tuition related expenses only.

Due Date: Jan 15, 2024

Award Notice date: Jan 31, 2024

Eligibility

1. Applicants must be actively enrolled in an eligible institution (below) for the AY 23-24 and/or AY 24-25. Proof of enrollment must be provided (e.g. latest transcript, or admissions acceptance letter and proof of enrollment if starting in Fall 2024).

2. Applicant may be at the undergraduate level, graduate Masters, or graduate PhD

3. Applicant should be a member of BiR (free to join!): https://blackinrobotics.org/join-us

4. Eligible institutions may be found on this list: https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/charities-giving/other-organizations-that-issue-donation-receipts-qualified-donees/other-qualified-donees-listings/list-prescribed-universities-outside-canada.html 

Award Details

• Award amount: $50k CAD (Canadian) ~= $36k USD (United States)

• The selected awardee will be placed in contact with a Canadian non-profit who will then connect with you and your university to directly pay for your tuition and tuition fees.

Application Materials

• Have your recommender (university faculty or robotics-related job manager preferred) email blackinrobotics@gmail.com with your letter of recommendation by the due date. Indicate their name and email in the form above

• Transcript from the current institution (if attending in Fall 2024, you may submit a combined pdf with your latest institution transcript and proof of admission (pdf) to the incoming institution).

• Personal Statement (1 page). Tell us about your career goals, how will your current pursued degree help you achieve these goals? Tell us about your journey to robotics, and how this funding will be particularly helpful for you.

Recipients Spring 2024

Jasmin Palmer, Stanford University, PhD Candidate Mechanical Engineering

Jasmin received a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering with a concentration in Controls, Instrumentation, and Robotics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University. Jasmin is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University and conducting research with faculty supervisor Professor Allison Okamura in the Collaborative Haptics in Robotics in Medicine (CHARM) Lab.

Jasmin’s Ph.D. research centers around human-computer interaction and haptics, the science of and relating to the sense of touch. Developing technology that provides beneficial haptic feedback to human operators requires a multi-pronged and interdisciplinary approach. Her work leverages concepts from psychology and neuroscience to understand human perception, experimental design, and statistical analysis, and also applies her engineering background in dynamic modeling of physical systems and mechatronic system development in order to develop novel designs for wearable devices. The goal of her thesis is to develop an adaptable simulation framework that provides realistic haptic feedback for humans to perform various dexterous manipulation tasks in dynamic virtual reality (VR) and mixed reality (MR) environments using wrist-worn tactile devices.

Jasmin wants to become an inspiration for other women of color to pursue careers in STEM fields. Jasmin also enjoys composing music, playing the flute, and studying foreign languages.

Kyle Johnson, University of Washington, PhD Candidate Computer Science & Engineering

I research millimeter-scale robots optimized for resource constrained applications by leveraging the properties in low-power systems like backscatter communication, electromagnetic actuation, or leaf-out origami’s bistability. Autonomous swarms of battery-free insect-scale microrobots have the potential to outperform larger robots during search and rescue missions, gas leak detection, wireless networking, 3D mapping, space exploration, smart agriculture, and environmental monitoring. One decisive advantage of using microrobots is lower material cost, allowing for greater deployment numbers. Microrobots can also navigate in confined spaces at manufacturing facilities or disaster sites, and operate around humans without impact hazard. These low-power microrobots are also favorable for energy harvesting, enabling battery-free operation and extended usage times. Batteryless devices also greatly reduce the amount of e-waste per robot. My research focuses on addressing the size, weight, power, sensing, and communication limitations of current microrobots to design fully autonomous microrobots capable of swarm behaviors. My research focuses on developing autonomous robotic platforms and algorithms for swarms of insect-scale devices that can fly, glide, roll, and/or jump through the use of hybrid actuation designs. My work has thus far proven that by miniaturizing robots to the insect-scale, we can significantly reduce the cost and energy requirement for locomotive robots. Autonomous mobility is achieved at this scale by combining a power harvesting circuit, low-power actuation mechanism, and intermittent computing firmware. These devices achieve power, mobility, and control autonomy, enabling the implementation of TinyML algorithms to unlock more complex multi-robot swarm behaviors. AI has also proven to be a helpful design exploration and software development tool, and it shows potential in optimizing circuit designs for both cost and efficiency. AI can also be implemented on-device to enable operation times orders of magnitude greater than is currently available.

As a Black engineer in a STEM field, I'm responsible for advocating for issues that are relevant to my community and culture. As a computer scientist, I question how the data we analyze for large-scale projects ends up influencing the equity of agriculture, public education, determinants of health, and other community-focused issues. At NASA, I have worked to help develop a machine learning algorithm that utilized Atmospheric Infrared Sounder instrument data to analyze the CO2 content of specific global regions more efficiently. To formally educate myself on the disparities in educational opportunities, I studied racism, education, and development in Cape Town, South Africa during the summer of 2019. When I returned to the states, I founded a student group named after one of the hard-working students I met in South Africa: AVELA. AVELA - A Vision for Engineering Literacy & Access (AVELA) connects undergraduate students with graduate mentors to provide more opportunities for K-12 students to pursue their interests in STEM by leading workshops, camps, and other forms of educational outreach. AVELA maintains community representation with the populations we work alongside, and financially supports the students who participate. We currently have a network of 300+ undergraduate and graduate students who receive our weekly text messages and emails. During the 2022-2023 academic year, more than 100 different students from Black and Latine backgrounds participated in AVELA (37% male and 63% female/non-binary). AVELA members were able to teach, mentor, and tutor 1200+ K-14 students in more than 50 classrooms and community centers across Washington state. AVELA students have gone on to work at companies like Microsoft, NASA, Amazon, Boeing, IBM, Texas Instruments, Nvidia, and many others. I aspire to be a role model for students like myself, who didn't have a mentor to help guide them through their academic pursuits; as in the words of Maya Angelou, “when you learn, teach. When you get, give.”