Hello. My name is Elena Sabinson.
And today we are going to talk about "pheB"
Plant Human Embodied Biofeedback.
A Soft Robotic Surface for Emotion Regulation in Confined Physical Space
This paper is co-authored by Isha Pradhan and Dr. Keith Green
from the Architectural Robotics Lab at Cornell University.
Why pheB?
Here we have several images of our prototype pheB,
and today we are going to start by talking about the motivations and frameworks behind our design.
Many of us find ourselves in the position where we have a lot less access to nature.
And at the same time, we are increasingly living in cities with high rates of urban density.
In our daily lives, we are spending an increasing amount of time interacting with digital technologies.
This is the condition that many of us find ourselves living in,
a reduction of interaction with our natural settings
and an increase of people living within confined urban spaces.
Given this,
there is an urgent need to rethink the design of domestic settings,
this is prompted by climate change , our growing population,
rapid urbanization, global pandemics such as Covid-19, and limited access to nature.
There are two frameworks that guide our work: interoception and biophilia
Interoception is the ability to sense one's own internal physiological states,
for example, the ability to feel your own heartbeat.
Biophilia is the hypothesis that humans have an intrinsic attachment to nature.
When we refer to confined physical space homes
they may look something like this.
For example, a microhome, a small apartment of around 200 square feet or less
often found in tall vertical cities, of areas with large rapid urbanization.
Looking further into the future, we might consider spacecrafts or submarines
capsule habitats that allow us to live in extreme environments
that are not currently inhabitable to people.
These confined spaces can stress inhabitants due to separation from nature and prolonged social isolation.
We know that nature has a restorative effect,
and we know that humans suffer with their emotional wellbeing when they don't have access to their community.
Our hypothesis is that embedding ecologically-rich, interactive biofeedback interfaces
into domestic architecture can enrich the experience of living in a confined, isolated space.
We have two primary goals.
First, to improve the emotional wellbeing of inhabitants of confined physical space
through biofeedback & other cyberphysical mediated behavioral interventions.
And second to provide a connection to nature
that can amplify the restorative effects through biophilic elements in a small footprint.
We have two primary research questions.
One. Do tangible, embodied interaction modalities
increase the effectiveness of mindful breathing practices and biofeedback?
And two. Do tangible, embodied representations
of a plant’s internal states amplify the restorative effects of nature through an expressive interaction?
Design Concept
pheB provides inhabitants with therapeutic support
manifested as gentle, responsive behaviors of a soft robot,
which is shaped by computational transformations of electrical signals emitted by both plants and humans.
Here we see an overview of our design system.
In the center, a human figure is standing in front of a rendered image of a pheB surface.
Biodata is collected, both from a human user in the form of a heart rate signal,
and the plant electrical signal that is emitted by integrated plant life.
These two biodata signals are used to input into an air control system,
which controls the inflation patterns of the pheB surface.
Here we see pheB embedded in different interior spatial arrangements
to assess different architectural typologies and how they might steer our design.
For example, in the submarine, we envision pheB might be a wall to wall swath.
In a microhome, pheB might be installed as a floor to ceiling panel.
Or perhaps in a spacecraft, pheB might be seen as a rail encircling the room.
Prototyping pheB
To date we have established proof of concept
for the use of simple, inexpensive surface-mounted electrodes
to record the electrical signals emitted by plants in response to shifts in their environmental stimuli.
In the image on the right, you see a plant signal plot recorded
from a plant's electrical signals that were output in response to the lights being turned on and off in the environment.
When the lights were on, the plant emits a higher voltage
when the lights are turned off, immediately the voltage is reduced.
This means that we can use these patterns
of state changes to create different behaviors in our pheB surface.
Fabrication
pheB is a pneumatic silicone surface
made through an underlying grid
of interior air chambers
which can inflate to create its behavior.
We created a computational algorithm
using Rhino3D and Grasshopper
which allows us to create many different grids
and corresponding molds
which can be used to cast the silicone surface
used to generate the final prototype.
Here's a closer look at our Biophilic Surface Development.
One of the ways that we are reinforcing the biophilic sensibility of our design
is by using images of nature for design generators.
Here we took a bitmap image of nature
and brought it into our CAD software
where we traced identified features
and used those as repulsive or attractive forces
for our grid surface.
pheB's behavior is controlled in part
by the underlying grid pattern of the surface.
Larger cells lead to larger inflation swells.
Whereas smaller cells leas to smaller areas of inflation.
In order to get the most out of our early prototypes,
we performed diagrammatic analysis
to asses how the underlying grid
resulted in the corresponding behavior of the pheB surface.
We also looked at strategies for different air channel pathways
to control the behavior of the pneumatic surface.
Depending on how the air travels from one cell to the other,
different intrinsic behaviors emerge from the design.
User Testing
The development of our online questionnaire
and an early in-person pilot study.
To iterate on our design,
we first wanted to assess user's perceptions of the pheB surface.
While our computational algorithm,
allows us to quickly iterate and create a series of different designs,
the cost of silicone, and the time to produce a final prototype is still relatively high.
Thus, we decided to create a series of digital images
to assess user perceptions.
Here we see three different animated gifs of the pheB surface
shown at different scales.
Here, user's were asked
on their preferences for different widths
shown in a horizontal orientation
a vertical orientation,
And finally, pheB is seen in several different colorways
participants were asked to group the images of pheB in three categories: exciting, relaxing, and neutral.
Guided Breathing Exercises
In addition to assessing user preferences for the design of pheB
we also wanted to evaluate how effective pheB was at leading guided breathing exercises.
To test this, participants were asked to perform guided breathing exercises in two conditions.
First, a 2D visualization
and second, with the pheB surface.
which provides a more tangible, embodied interaction.
In the 2D visualization, a circle is used to help pace user's inhalations and exhalations.
In the embodied interaction, users follow pheB's inflation to pace their own breathing.
Participants performed the breathing exercises
through an online questionnaire and during our in-person pilot study, which had 5 participants.
After the breathing exercises were conducted,
participants were invited to touch and interact with the prototype.
Feedback was elicited through unstructured interviews.
We found that participant's responded positively to the design.
Many compared pheB to natural analogues,
such as jellyfish, plant cells, and a crater on mars.
This suggests that pheB does invoke a biophilic sensibility
possible of inducing restoration.
Early results also suggest
that pheB led breathing exercises increased user's perceptions of co-embodied breathing.
One participant noted that
pheB was doing what they were feeling.
This may indicate that pheB was a more effective guide than the 2D visualization.
Currently, we are working to develop more algorithms to control pheB's movement.
Using Matlab, we have created a sinusoidal wave algorithm
so that pheB can simulate the soothing pattern of ocean waves through its inflation pattern.
We plan to test the restorative effect of this behavior.
We are also working towards a longitudinal study,
where users will spend time with pheB in a confined space
to evaluate its therapeutic effectiveness.
We believe this work contributes knowledge toward developing novel biofeedback modalities
and offers a design exemplar for interactive artifacts that nurture meaningful relationships with nature.