Arisaka Lab - UCLA Physics and Astronomy Dept

Faculty Member(s) / Advisors

• Katsushi Arisaka 

Graduate or Undergraduate

• Graduate

Students

• Blake Madruga

Challenges met

There were two projects that we assisted with. The first was a VR headset experiment. Blake and his team were trying to set up an experiment whereby they could monitor brain activity whilst using a VR headset. In addition, they attached two webcams on a swivel, that would be used to create the VR environment. These webcams could be turned on the swivel, significantly altering the perception of the person wearing the headset. They wanted to monitor the brain's activity while a person's vision was so manipulated. They compared it to the experiment where subjects were given glasses that flipped their vision upside down. After a few days of wearing these glasses, the subject's brains would adapt and reflip their vision. This is the behavior they were trying to observe, and we printed their very unique components. Prior to our prints, they were trying to MacGyver the who setup with duct tape and whatever else they could use.

The second project we helped with was with Blake's custom-designed microscope. Blake is designing a microscope to observe...........

We printed an attachment/sample holder that was designed specifically for his experimental microscope. As with the VR headset, we went through several iterations; each of these iterations would likely have cost the labs hundreds if not thousands of dollars. Failing that, Blake would have to machine the parts himself, something he said he did not have the skillset for.

Pictures