IMT Atlantique inter-semesters 2022 — LowTech & SoftRobotic

Within the intersemestres, IMT Atlantique trains its engineers to adapt and open up to the complex world around them.

We have been invited to organise workshops for students from the ITM campuses in Nantes, Brest, and Rennes, and from the École du Bois for the second consecutive year.

For this edition, artists Selma Lepart and Nathalie Guimbretière were able to launch their research project combining Soft Robotics and LowTech. The aim is to explore an innovative field of robotics in a creative and engaged way for a sustainable future.

By learning to prototype soft robots, the students were led to discover a new world of possibilities, to understand the techniques and to adopt them in order to think of a relevant use:
The low-tech perspective requires them to question the modes of production and to modify their perception of innovation
The creative techniques of soft robotics challenge them to be responsive, imaginative and cooperative

In a few days, the five groups of engineers successfully created fun and useful devices.