@willayangy

PhD student @UChicagoCS in the Actuated Experience Lab @AxLab_UChicago

 Chicago, IL
willayang.com
Joined December 2015
  • Tweets58
  • Following303
  • Followers494
Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Ken Nakagaki
@ken0324Jul 22
.@willayangy just appeared on FOX 32 Chicago’s local live news show, ChicagoLIVE, sharing her newly published work, BloomBeacon🌸, developed at @AxLab_UChicago, in a 15-minute interview! Thank you to @Bret_Buganski for hosting Willa and highlighting her work! @fox32news @UChicago
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
The University of Chicago@UChicagoJul 19
What can a simple toy teach us about human-robot interaction? UChicago researchers are using PopTuber, a system that transforms plastic pop tubes into dynamic 3D shapes with just five motors, advancing shape-changing materials. Your Sunday Watch: ms.spr.ly/6013vNJSV

PopTuber: Discretely Reshaping High Resolution 3D Curves with “Serial Multistable” Tubes [TEI2026]

Paper Title: PopTuber: Discretely Reshaping High Resolution 3D Curv...

youtube.com
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Grateful to be featured by @UChicago 🌸 BloomBeacon “blooms” an interactive touch display from a compact device on demand.
The University of Chicago@UChicagoJul 16
Straight out of a science fiction movie, this interactive hologram—called the BloomBeacon by its creators at UChicago—spins into shape when you need it and disappears when you don’t. Learn more: ms.spr.ly/6018v2iJM
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Ken Nakagaki
@ken0324Jun 17
Thanks for featuring @AxLab_UChicago 's #CHI2026 paper by @willayangy ! Flexible Displays, Flexible Lives: How BloomBeacon Reimagines Interaction cs.uchicago.edu/news/flexibl…

Flexible Displays, Flexible Lives: How BloomBeacon Reimagines Interaction - Department of Computer...

Imagine reaching for a record or glancing at a map and seeing a display bloom from a slender line, offering interactive guidance—and then vanishing moments later. In a world crowded with digital...

cs.uchicago.edu
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PopTuber at Midwest Robotics Workshop! Great to meet so many robot and hardware lovers!
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Arduino
@arduinoJun 1
Researchers from @AxLab_UChicago have developed an Arduino MKR WiFi 1010-controlled system that bends pop tubes into 3D curves and shapes on demand. Introducing the PopTuber! axlab.cs.uchicago.edu/projec…

PopTuber

Discretely Reshaping High Resolution 3D Curves with “Serial Multistable” Tubes

axlab.cs.uchicago.edu
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
hackaday
@hackadayJun 1
Like a Wire Bender, But For Pop Tubes ift.tt/jAHn3ZR

Like A Wire Bender, But For Pop Tubes

Are you familiar with pop tubes? Resembling the corrugated section of a bendy straw, they are at the core of PopTuber, an intriguing research project from the Actuated Experience Lab at the Univers…

hackaday.com
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I’ll take that. Wild is the word. When I first pitched the idea it sounded wild and it still does ;)
DFRobot
@dfrobotcnMay 28
Very cool research from @axlab_uchicago. BloomBeacon makes a touchable POV display with soft spinning arms: LEDs on one side, capacitive pads on the other, blooming into a mid-air UI surface. Wild HCI idea. 🤖For more details: hackaday.com/2026/05/23/touc… #HCI #POV
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Arduino
@arduinoMay 29
Developed by researchers at @AxLab_UChicago, penPal is an Arduino MKR WiFi 1010-controlled robotic handheld drawing tool that's capable of generating a variety of marks and textures: axlab.cs.uchicago.edu/projec…
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
hackaday
@hackadayMay 23
Touchable POV Display Blooms In Mid Air ift.tt/g4QBIjL

Touchable POV Display Blooms In Mid Air

Typically, when we think of touch screens, we think of LCDs or OLEDs with a resistive or capacitive sensing layer laid over the top. However, a team from the University of Chicago has developed an …

hackaday.com
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Ken Nakagaki
@ken0324May 25
.@willayangy's BloomBeacon - touchable, interactive PoV display technology, presented in #CHI2026, is featured on Hackaday! @AxLab_UChicago @UChicago @UChicagoCS
hackaday
@hackadayMay 23
Touchable POV Display Blooms In Mid Air ift.tt/g4QBIjL

Touchable POV Display Blooms In Mid Air

Typically, when we think of touch screens, we think of LCDs or OLEDs with a resistive or capacitive sensing layer laid over the top. However, a team from the University of Chicago has developed an …

hackaday.com
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Excited to present and demo BloomBeacon 🌸 at #CHI2026! Today 4:30- is our last demo session! Find me at demo #1188! BloomBeacon deploys an interactive touch display from a compact device, allowing users to easily place and relocate it to augment their environment on demand.
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Ken Nakagaki
@ken0324Apr 12
What if everyday surfaces could dynamically 'bloom' to display information? 🌸 BloomBeacon is a Persistence-of-Vision display that lets you touch the display image directly — embedded right into your environment. #CHI2026 paper from @AxLab_UChicago, led by @willayangy [1/5]
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As one of the SV Chairs, I cannot express how lucky I feel to have worked with such a wonderful group of people! Thank you thank you and thank you!
TEI Conference@tei_confMar 11
🙌 Meet the amazing Student Volunteers of #TEI2026! Thank you for all your hard work helping make the conference happen. 🥰
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PopTuber won the Best Demo Award! Thank you to everyone who stopped by and liked it!
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Ken Nakagaki
@ken0324Mar 10
This is PopTuber, a machine that dynamically reshapes poptubes, corrugated tube-like fidget toy whose shape can be digitally defined by a series of multi-stable bellow mechanisms. A Demo by @AxLab_UChicago 's Willa at #TEI2026 in Chicago @tei_conf
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PopTuber, PopTuber… my beloved PopTuber
Ken Nakagaki
@ken0324Mar 10
This is PopTuber, a machine that dynamically reshapes poptubes, corrugated tube-like fidget toy whose shape can be digitally defined by a series of multi-stable bellow mechanisms. A Demo by @AxLab_UChicago 's Willa at #TEI2026 in Chicago @tei_conf
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Willa Yunqi Yang retweeted
Junyi Zhu@JunyiZhuMIT16 Nov 2024
I am joining University of Michigan, EECS department as an Assistant Professor starting Jan 2025, leading the Sensing, Intelligence, and eXperience (SIX) Lab. We are recruiting PhD students (fall 2025), master & undergraduate researchers! More information: junyizhu.com
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Thrilled to receive the People’s Choice Honorable Mention for TorqueCapsules demo! We’ve exhibited it at museums, science festivals, art exhibits—and people loved it! So proud of the love and excitement we’ve gotten, and grateful the UIST community values it too! #UIST2024
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In our previous exhibits, adults and seniors were amazed when TorqueCapsule screwed open a jar and realized how helpful it could be, and kids were in awe of how TorqueCapsule magically brings toys to life!
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