Research + Pizza Features Carolyn Seepersad on Empathic Engineering, 3/6

Event: Research + Pizza features Carolyn Seepersad talking about her research into empathic engineering design. The event is free and open to the public.

When: Noon, Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Where: The University of Texas at Austin, Perry-Castañeda Library, Room 2.500 (map).

Background: Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Dr. Carolyn Seepersad discusses ways to help engineers innovate and create better user experiences by using empathic techniques in product design and testing.

A former Rhodes Scholar and National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow, Seepersad oversees the Product, Process and Materials Design Lab, where research is focused on developing methods and computational tools for engineering design.

The group has been conducting experiments to test the effect of empathic experiences on engineering innovation.  Empathic experiences involve interacting with products under challenging circumstances (e.g., earplugs to simulate noisy environments, oven mitts to mimic limited dexterity) with the intention of helping designers better understand and improve product-user interactions.  

Free Pizza (while it lasts) generously provided by program supporter Austin’s Pizza.

Research + Pizza a lunchtime lecture series featuring research presentations by faculty from across the university.