I am Ali Shtarbanov and my mission is to remove barriers to creativity and to make innovation and prototyping in emerging fields faster and more accessible for everyone. I develop general-purpose tools and platforms that enable makers, researchers, artists, and designers to rapidly turn ideas into reality. Inspired by platforms like Arduino and Raspberry PI that liberated electronics and computing for everyone, my current work focuses on building and deploying on a global scale novel hardware & software platforms for rapid prototyping with soft robotics, programmable materials, and wearable haptics. Read more on the about page.
I am an HCI Researcher and System Designer pursuing a Ph.D. at MIT Media Lab. I have a background in Electrical Engineering, Physics, and Haptics
Research Projects and Collaborations
Framework for Design and Deployment of Impactful Development Platforms
(Publication pending)
ModiStrap Robotics Platform
(Publication pending)
Modular and Reconfigurable Platform for Multimodal Wearable Haptic Feedback Interactions
Multimodal Texture-Changing Robotic Platform
for Shared Human Experiences
AI-empowered Modular Robotic Garment
for Capture and Entrainment of Breathing Techniques
A Sample of FlowIO-Enabled Projects by Users
This is a small sample of user projects that were enabled by my FlowIO Platform, with minimum or no direct involvement on my part.
Research Project from Stanford in Nature Robotics
M.S. Thesis from Weißensee Academy of Art, Berlin
M.S. Thesis from MIT Architecture
M.S. Thesis from KTH, Sweden
Term Project by MIT Students published in ACM DIS
Term Project by Harvard Students
Term Project by Harvard & MIT Students
Art Project from Harvard GSD
Research Project from Cornell published in ACM CHI
Older Works of Mine
PaperTouch
Capacitive-Touch Storytelling & Drawing Interface
Concepts
WaterBended
Interactive Interface + Storyboard for an Escape Room that uses static electricity to bend water. Product Design Course at MIT
ParticleFlow
Interactive Challenge + Storyboard for an Escape Room based on the Chladny Plate Phenomenon. Graduate Product Design Course at MIT
WaterLevitator
Interactive Interface + Storyboard for an Escape Room based on the Hydrodynamic Levitation Effect. Product Design Course at MIT
MovieNet
Personalized Movie Recommendations via Physiological Responses of Viewers
General-Purpose PCB Designs
Universal MCU Shield
A wiring shield that drastically simplifies wiring complexity during rapid prototyping with most microcontrollers
Vortex Generator Driver
A driver board suitable for any speaker-based vortex generator with up to 6 transducers
