Shanel Wu working in a garden
PhD, Creative Technology and Design '23
ATLAS Institute
shanel.wu@colorado.edu

Shanel M. Wu听(pronouns: they/them/their)听is a PhD student in the ATLAS Institute at CU Boulder researching smart textiles. After graduating from Harvey Mudd with a Bachelor of Science in physics and computers in 2016, they taught math and science, as well as freelanced听as an independent fiber artist, instructor and knitwear designer. They are also a self-taught knitter, crocheter, spinner and designer of knitting patterns. Advised by Laura Devendorf, Shanel researches the intersections of cutting-edge technology and handicraft in the Unstable Design Lab. Their work seeks to foreground issues of sustainability and justice in the emergent smart textiles technological domain.

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Publications

Eldy S. Lazaro Vasquez,听Lily M Gabriel,听Mikhaila Friske,听Shanel Wu,听Sasha De Koninck,听Laura Devendorf, and听Mirela Alistar. 2023. "". In:听Adjunct Proceedings of the 2023 ACM International Joint Conference on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing &听the 2023 ACM International Symposium on Wearable Computing (UbiComp/ISWC '23 Adjunct).听(October 08, 2023).

Eldy S. Lazaro Vasquez,听Netta Ofer,听Shanel Wu,听Mary Etta West,听Mirela Alistar听and听Laura Devendorf.听2022. Exploring Biofoam as a Material for Tangible Interaction. In听Designing Interactive Systems Conference (DIS 鈥�22), Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 1525-1529.听听(June 13-17, 2022鈥擵irtual Event, Australia).听

Shanel Wu听and听Laura Devendorf. 2020. Unfabricate: Designing Smart Textiles for Disassembly. In听Proceedings of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems听(CHI 鈥�20). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 1鈥�14. DOI:听(Honolulu, Hawaii (virtual) 鈥� April 25-30, 2020).

Mikhaila Friske,听Shanel Wu听and听Laura Devendorf.听2019. AdaCAD: Crafting Software For Smart Textiles Design. In听Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems听(CHI '19). ACM, New York, NY, USA, Paper 345, 13 pages. DOI:听听(Glagow, UK 鈥� May 4-9, 2019) [Best Paper Honorable Mention Award]

鈥嬧赌�Additional Publications

In the news

The four projects presented by ATLAS at DIS'22
ATLAS research front and center at DIS鈥�22

June 29, 2022

Researchers from ATLAS Institute's Unstable Design, THING, Living Matter and Superhuman Computing labs presented four papers, including three that received 鈥淗onorable Mention鈥� awards, at the ACM conference on Designing Interactive Systems (DIS '22).

Biofoam
DIS'22: Living Matter and Unstable Design labs introduce biofoam

June 21, 2022

Exploring biofoam as a Material for Tangible Interaction, authored by Eldy S. Lazaro Vasquez, Netta Ofer, Shanel Wu, Mary Etta West, Mirela Alistar and Laura Devendorf introduced the DIS audience to biofoam, a water soluble and biodegradable material that can be made conductive.

Shanel Wu
Shanel Wu chosen as OSHWA Open Hardware Trailblazer Fellow

June 16, 2022

ATLAS PhD Candidate Shanel Wu (they/them) recently was awarded a $50,000 Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA) Traiblazer Fellowship. Wu, a member of Assistant Professor Laura Devendorf's Unstable Design Lab, will use the fellowship to support their dissertation project, making open hardware interfaces for the loom and using that as a case study to explore issues of doing open hardware in academia.

Shanel Wu bends over by a log. Wu wove the vest she is wearing on a traditional 4-shaft floor loom, integrating digital air quality sensors for outdoor workers in polluted environments.
Shanel Wu: Designing e-textiles with sustainability in mind

Feb. 9, 2022

ATLAS PhD student Shanel Wu is tackling how to reduce the waste from the rapidly expanding e-textile industry by investigating design practices that make it easier to recycle or reuse electronics and the textiles in which they are embedded.

Shanel Wu demonstrates tablet weaving at a research showcase for human-computer interaction and information science.
ATLAS PhD Student Shanel Wu discusses their smart textiles work in Gist Yarn podcast

April 12, 2021

Shanel Wu, ATLAS PhD student, discusses their work with smart textiles, weaving, computational craft and hardware hacking in this fiber arts podcast.

Smart textile
E-Textiles, Smart Textiles, Flexible Hybrid Electronics: Who鈥檚 Saying What?

Aug. 14, 2020

In a project led by ATLAS PhD student, Shanel Wu, the Unstable Design Lab and LOOMIA jointly ran a survey asking those working in e-textiles how they liked to talk about their work. The results are a fascinating exploratory poke into the interdisciplinary nature of the emerging e-textiles field.

2020 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems logo
ATLAS research helps define the future of human-computer interaction

May 1, 2020

At a time when the field of human-computer interaction is becoming more important than ever, ATLAS researchers are making substantial contributions, contributing nine papers and two workshops to CHI '20.

Photo of Boulder Public Library
Mikhaila Friske,听Shanel Wu and Nathalia Capreuguer Fran莽a organize Antiuniversity Now: (re)claimed workshop series.

June 17, 2019

Mikhaila Friske and Shanel Wu, PhD students and researchers in the Unstable Design Lab, along with Nathalia Capreuguer Fran莽a, a visiting research student from Universit脿 di Trento, organized Antiuniversity Now: (re)claimed workshop series at the Boulder Public Library, June 21-22.

Nicole Johnson and Abigail Zimmermann-Niefeld
ATLAS PhD students honored by National Science Foundation

April 10, 2019

ATLAS PhD student Nicole Johnson and affiliated ATLAS PhD student Abby Zimmerman-Niefield have been selected as 2019 National Science Foundation's Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) fellows.