Soon the 3mE Faculty will be full of inspiring prototypes and designs

For the first time, the 3mE Faculty is hosting the special international Reconfigurable Mechanisms Conference (ReMAR). From 20 until 22 June, scientists and engineers from all over the world involved in the area of mechanisms will come to the 3mE Faculty to reveal their theories, prototypes and designs. The aim of this conference is to investigate how to reduce the gap between machines (fast and repetitive) and robots (flexible but slow). In addition, mutual inspiration is a high on the agenda. For example, keynote speakers Theo Jansen, kinetic artist, and Metin Sitti, professor of biorobotics and director of the Max-Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Stuttgart will talk about their surprising designs. Researcher Volkert van der Wijk and professor Just Herder from the Department of Precision and Microsystems Engineering are the initiators. If you are interested in dropping by, there are still a limited number of places available. Registration is required and/or contact Volkert van der Wijk or Just Herder.

 
Summary of the programme 
Keynotes and flashy 3-minute pitches in room A, vibrant interactive presentations in the Lagerhuys (figure 1). The topic of the conference is a class of mechanisms with variable degrees of freedom. An everyday example is the magic cube (figure 2), which has many fold lines, but it cannot be operated independently: it either has one or two degrees of freedom. Operating one of these blocks affects any motion of the others. This can be exploited by creating mechanisms with multiple operation modes that will bridge the gap between machines, which are fast but can typically only perform one motion, and robots, which are not as fast but highly flexible in that they can perform almost any motion within their reach. This is relevant at many length scales and applications ranging from cranes, kinetic art and robotics (figure 3), to medical instruments and micro-devices. The conference will show the latest advances in this field, as well as related peculiar mechanisms. The keynote speakers are Theo Jansen who will demonstrate his strandbeesten; Gokhan Kiper (deployable structures); Metin Sitti (micro-biorobotics); and Jonathan Hopkins (architectured materials). Read more here.