于天宇 Tianyu Yu

My name is Tianyu Yu 于天宇.

I am currently a master student in Information and Art Design at Tsinghua University, advised by Prof. Haipeng Mi, and an HCI researcher in Future Lab at Tsinghua University. I have been research assistant and visiting student in many labs, including HCIE Group at CSAIL MIT, Tangible Media Group at Media Lab MIT, Morphing Matter Lab at CMU, and Pervasive HCI Group at Tsinghua University. I received a B.Eng. in Automation and a B.F.A. in Product Design from the interdisciplinary program of Creative Design and Intelligent Engineering in Tsinghua University with outstanding award.

The evolution of physical interfaces between humans and computing devices is always ongoing. I’m interested in exploring novel materials and hardware that enable unique interactivities beyond conventional computing devices, and the computational design and fabrication technologies that provide powerful tools for people to propel the trend forward. I believed that computers in the future should bridge the digital and physical worlds in a seamless and natural manner, thus truly ‘weaving computation into the fabric of everyday life’.

View my Projects | CV | Google Scholar

Education

Tsinghua University | 08/2016 – 07/2021

🏆 Outstanding Undergraduate Awards (Top 1%)

I was enrolled in a 5-year interdisciplinary undergraduate program of Creative Design and Intelligent Engineering, where we took courses from Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (main part), Mechanical Engineering, and Industrial design, awarded with the following two bachelor degrees. (The program has changed to a 4-year program since 2020.)

  • Bachelor of Engineering in Automation
  • Bachelor of Fine Arts in Product Design
  • Minor in Musical Engineering and Technology

Tsinghua University | 08/2021 – Present

  • Master in Information and Art Design | 08/2021 – Present

Research Experience

Future Lab, Tsinghua University | 07/2021 – Present

Research assistant, Advisor: Prof. Haipeng Mi, Prof. Yingqing Xu

  • Led the project of Themotion (CHI ’23), which proposed a novel design and fabrication method of using thermofluidic composites to create animation effects on two and three-dimensional surfaces and everyday material surfaces.
  • Co-led the project of ViviPaint, a toolkit for thermochromic painting.

HCI Engineering Group, CSAIL, MIT | 07/2023 – 10/2023

Visiting student | Advisor: Stefanie Mueller

  • Proposed the ongoing project of Thermaterial, which focused on sustainable thermal interfaces using tunable thermal-conductive materials to design and leverage ambient heat transfer.

Morphing Matter Lab, Carnegie Mellon University | 03/2022 – 05/2023

Research assistant | Advisor: Prof. Lining Yao, Dr. Qiuyu Lu

  • Worked on the project of Sustainflatable (UIST’23🏅️), which focused on an energy-harvesting non-electrical pneumatic interface, providing programmable inflatable shape changes, responsive to long-term environmental changes.

Pervasive HCI Group, Department of Computer Science, Tsinghua University | 03/2020 – 10/2020

Research assistant | Advisor: Prof. Chun Yu, Prof. Yuanchun Shi  

Tangible Media Group, Media Lab, MIT | 07/2019 – 010/2019

Visiting student | Advisor: Prof. Hiroshi Ishii, Hila Mor

  • Worked on the project of Venous material (CHI ’20), which focused on a self-contained color-changing microfluidic material responsive to external pressure.

Research Projects

How can we use computational design and fabrication technologies to embed information and interaction into materials and hardware, “weaving computation into the fabric of everyday life”?

Watch more projects on mechanical design, product design, interaction design, etc.!

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