Former students:
Yuhe Cui (PhD student at MIT’s Mechanical Engineering)
Jimmy Guo (MSc student at Georgia Tech’s HCI program)
Monica Protean (Strategy & AI consulting)
Maryam Jahadakbar (Informatics PhD student at UIUC)
Cindy Su (UI Engineer at Trabus Technologies)
Collaborators:
Yixiao Wang - Industrial Design | Georgia Tech
Daniel Portugal - ESDI | UERJ
Current members:
Carlos Aguiar
Carlos Aguiar is an Assistant Professor of Industrial Design at the School of Art + Design and an Affiliate Faculty of Informatics at the School of Information Sciences at UIUC. He is the founder and director of the Design, Technology, and Society (DTS) Lab, where he leads research at the intersection of design, technology, and society. His work explores how artifacts mediate human interactions, cultural values, and societal norms, with a particular focus on designing technologies for social impact and examining the human-artifact relationship. His projects engage with participatory design, speculative design, and critical design methodologies, tackling issues of accessibility, sustainability, and social justice. Through the DTS Lab, Carlos mentors students from diverse disciplines, fostering collaboration between design, science and technology studies (STS), and human-computer interaction (HCI). He holds a Ph.D. in Design and Human Behavior from Cornell University, an MSc in Design Computing from the University of Washington, and a Bachelor of Architecture and Urbanism from Estácio de Sá University in Brazil.
Kendall Rusch
Kendall is an undergraduate student pursuing a BFA in Industrial Design, and a member of Alpha Rho Chi, a professional fraternity for Architecture and the Allied Arts. She is passionate about the intersection of health, sustainability, and accessibility in design. Additionally, Kendall is dedicated to designing empathetic solutions that enhance user experience and limit environmental impact.
Rachel Knox
Rachel Knox is a junior undergraduate student in Industrial Design. She is interested in exploring how playful technology can be integrated into traditional aids and tools for children, with the goal of enhancing their engagement and interaction. Rachel is focused on innovative, child-centered solutions that blend practicality with imaginative design.
Deekshitha Paruchuri
Deekshitha is a junior undergraduate student pursuing dual degrees in Industrial Design and Cognitive Psychology. Her passion lies in design research, particularly exploring how medicine and technology can intersect to create transformative solutions, especially for children. Deekshitha’s long-term goal is to pursue a master’s degree in industrial design followed by a Ph.D. in Design Thinking.
Matt Ying
Matt is a senior undergraduate student in Industrial Design. He is interested in the evolving interplay between consumer products and technology, as well as how they were integrated together to provide a better quality of life. He hopes to explore and experiment in products that are slowly having significance in the next few generations.
Owen Harry
Owen is a senior studying industrial design at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He is interested in consumer electronics, competitive robotics, and manufacturing processes with skills in parametric modeling, product visualization, and rapid prototyping. Owen is heading to Denmark to start his internship at The Lego Group.
Fatemeh Zare
Fatemeh holds a Ph.D. in Architecture and has over 10 years of teaching experience. She is currently examining the link between computational design agents, designers, and the emergent design product, framed by actor-network theory. In particular, she is interested in the interaction between non-humans and humans in the design process and how this transforms the underlying design principles. She is working on the “Artifacts, Designers, Users” project.