Under the leadership of ECE Professors John Madden, Karen Cheung and Konrad Walus, the Bionics@UBC ICICS research cluster brought together many of its international collaborators for a workshop entitled “Advanced Prosthetics and Soft Robotics”  at the 2018 Emerging Technologies Conference, held from May 9-11 in Whistler, BC. ET-CMOS (Emerging Technologies-Communications, Microsystems, Optoelectronics, Sensors)  is a conference dedicated to hosting academic researchers and industry leaders to discuss emerging technologies, with topics including wearable sensors and electronics, organic electronics, bio-integration devices and many others.

Following the workshop, Bionics@UBC led a roundtable discussion to engage national and international collaborators in a cross-disciplinary discussion of the challenges and opportunities faced in creating highly-functional human-machine hybrid systems. This grand challenge generates a wide range of opportunities, both academic and commercial, in fields such as soft robotics, flexible sensors, artificial muscle, and brain-computer interfaces.