Humboldt Fellow from the US conducts research in robotics to one day harvest energy from ocean waves

Stuttgart – Lawrence Smith, a postdoctoral researcher from the US, joins the Robotic Materials Department in Stuttgart as a Humboldt Research Fellow. The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (AvH) awards this fellowship to highly qualified scientists and scholars from abroad, enabling them to conduct research in Germany for an extended period. The Humboldt Research Fellowship Program for Postdocs fosters partnerships between international researchers and leading German research institutions by providing financial support for postdoctoral research and offering living benefits, language learning opportunities, and cultural immersion experiences.

“To me, this fellowship symbolizes Germany's commitment to supporting fundamental scientific research, and its interest in and openness to international talent,” says Smith. “Because my research project is focused on tapping into clean energy sources to power our future, the fellowship also provides a means for me to narrow the focus of my future career onto this critical area of research and technology development.”

Smith’s proposed research focuses on harvesting mechanical energy in ocean waves using soft, flexible generators. The Robotic Materials Department, led by Christoph Keplinger, is a global leader in the development and fabrication of electrostatic transducers – devices which can convert electrical energy to mechanical energy, and vice versa. As an example, the team of scientists creates artificial muscles called HASELs (Hydraulically Amplified Self-healing ELectrostatic actuators), which allow robots to mimic the natural and elegant biological motion we observed in nature. HASELs grip, flex, hop and swim, leveraging the advantages of soft, inexpensive and power-dense materials. The Robotic Materials department also specializes in devices that work in the opposite direction, converting untapped mechanical energy, such as vibrations and ocean waves, into electrical energy.

“It's because of this deep expertise in the physics of electrostatics, and the far-reaching practical knowledge of working with tricky materials such as thin films, dielectric oils, conductive inks and hydrogels that the Robotic Materials Department is the perfect match for my proposed research,” Smith continues.

Smith studied mechanical engineering at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo and earned his doctoral degree in the same field at the University of Colorado, Boulder, with a few years in between spent working in medical device engineering in California.

“My previous research interests included the computational design of soft structures, specifically how to create designs from compliant, stretchy materials similar to those found in nature. Our intuition and our traditional design workflows are ill-suited to navigating this challenging design space, and human design teams struggle to create mechanical designs that utilize soft, rigid and fluid materials simultaneously. There's an obvious synergy between my prior research in creating design tools that can help navigate these complex design spaces, and my proposed AvH work,” Smith concludes.

The Fellowship will support his stay in Germany and energy harvesting research for a period of 24 months. Lawrence, his wife Katie, and their cat Penny live in Stuttgart-Süd, and are looking forward to settling more deeply into Stuttgart life in the coming months!