In preparation for a fluid and evolving contemporary design practice, this course introduces physical prototyping and computational design strategies for an era of environmental transformation and climate crisis. Across platforms and instruments, exercises and readings emphasize process development as a core competency in architecture. A lecture component provides a technological overview, situated in a long-term cultural perspective and a theoretical framework. Focused lab modules provides exposure to a range of prototyping and fabrication resources at SOA, where students gain hands on experience.

This class acquaints the student with the state-of-art concepts and algorithms to design and analyze origami systems (assemblies, structures, tessellations, etc). Students will learn how to understand, create and transform geometries by folding and unfolding concepts, and thus apply origami concepts to solve engineering and societal problems. In addition, using origami as a tool, we will outreach to some fundamental concepts in differential geometry.

An introductory course with several demonstration and hands-on components of fabrication with autonomous and robotic systems. Covers formal methods of fabrication and programming of moderately complex elements, including related fabrication platforms, extrusion platforms, various designs of material, structure, and programming of toolpath. The course is centered around lectures with laboratory/virtual studio individual and team-based assignments involving computer-controlled additive manufacturing and robotic systems, student reading, and peer-reviewed presentation and reporting assignments.

Within a broad context of historical, social, and ethical concerns, a survey of normal childhood development and selected disorders from the perspectives of the physician, the biologist, and the bioethicist. There is an emphasis on the complex relationship between genetic and acquired causes of disease, the environment, medical practice, social conditions, and cultural values. The course features visits from children with some of the conditions discussed, site visits, and readings from the original medical, scientific, and bioethical literature.

What do informed citizens and future leaders of our society need to know about physics and technology? This course is designed for non-scientists who will someday become our informed citizens and decision-makers. Whatever the field of endeavor, they will be faced with crucial decisions in which physics and technology play an important role. This course will present the key principles and the basic physical reasoning needed to interpret scientific and technical information to make the best decisions. Topics include energy and power, atomic and subatomic matter, wave-like phenomena and light, and technologies based on advances in physics.

What do informed citizens and future leaders of our society need to know about physics and technology? This course is designed for non-scientists who will someday become our informed citizens and decision-makers. Whatever the field of endeavor, they will be faced with crucial decisions in which physics and technology play an important role. This course will present the key principles and the basic physical reasoning needed to interpret scientific and technical information to make the best decisions. Topics include energy and power, atomic and subatomic matter, wave-like phenomena and light, and technologies based on advances in physics.

Musical instruments reside at the intersection of varied topics: sound, perception, embodiment, music theory, social values, and more; how has their design influenced the development of music and how might they be reinvented to spur new ideas? We will explore these questions through readings, listening, analysis, labs, and composition. Specific topics include: harmony and the keyboard; tuning and temperament; preparing the piano, digital and analog. More generally, we will consider the productive tension between qualitative and quantitative understandings of musical concepts.

This course will teach STEM & non-STEM majors how to write about research in STEM fields with clarity and a bit of flair. Goal will be to learn to convey technical topics to non-experts in a compelling, enjoyable way while staying true to the underlying facts, context and concepts. We'll do this through readings, class discussion, encounters with professional writers and journalists of all sorts, across several different media. Most important of all, students will practice what they learn in frequent writing assignments that will be critiqued extensively by an experienced science journalist.

Technology and images surround us and evolve constantly. How can we use them to tell the stories we want to tell? Students will learn techniques from design professionals, engaging directly and collaboratively with creative technologies, to design experiences of live performance, public art, and interactive or immersive installations. We will examine philosophies of world-building and storytelling, as students develop their own practice.Technologies covered may include projection mapping, multimedia, motion capture, 3D immersive environments, interactivity and sensors, lighting, and programming for creative applications.