Eric Chang

🦔 SpikeATac: A Multimodal Tactile Finger with Taxelized Dynamic Sensing for Dexterous Manipulation

We built a multimodal tactile finger that combines taxelized PVDF (4 kHz) for dynamic sensing with capacitive pads for static pressure. This design enables fast yet delicate grasping of fragile objects. We also developed an on-robot RL fine-tuning pipeline with tactile-based rewards, achieving in-hand manipulation of fragile objects like paper cylinders and egg shells.

Collaborators: Peter Ballentine, Zhanpeng He, Do-Gon Kim, Kai Jiang, Hua-Hsuan Liang, Joaquin Palacios, William Wang, Pedro Piacenza, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie

Project Website Paper Full Technical Video WSJ Article

VibeCheck: Using Active Acoustic Tactile Sensing for Contact-Rich Manipulation

The acoustic response of an object can reveal a lot about its global state, for example its material properties or the extrinsic contacts it is making with the world. In this work, we built an active acoustic sensing gripper equipped with two piezoelectric fingers: one for generating signals, the other for receiving them. By sending an acoustic vibration from one finger to the other through an object, we gain insight into an object's acoustic properties and contact state. We used this system to classify objects, estimate grasping position, estimate poses of internal structures, and classify the types of extrinsic contacts an object is making with the environment. Using our contact type classification model, we tackled a peg insertion problem, usingactive acoustic sensing as the only feedback.

Collaborators: Kaidi Zhang, Do-Gon Kim, Hua-Hsuan Liang, Zhanpeng He, Kathryn Lampo, Philippe Wu, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie

Project Website Paper

Building Underactuated Hands for NASA's Astrobee

Testing Astrobee's hand at NASA Ames' granite table test lab!

During my internship at NASA Ames (as part of the NSTGRO program), I worked on improving the design of a 3-fingered, underactuated hand for Astrobee, a free-flyer robot on the ISS. This work built off of previous work from our lab on underactuated hands. The hand has 3 fingers controlled by a single motor, and exhibits both flexion/extension and abduction/adduction. Because the fingers are underactuated and one tendon runs through the distal and proximal links, the hand naturally conforms to the shape of the object it's grasping, enabling both pinch and power grasps. We've also been integrating our multimodal tactile sensors (SpikeATac) into this hand!

Collaborators: Kathryn Lampo, Lily Bresee

Multi-feature Extraction and Super-resolution with Fast Microphone Arrays

In this work, we used MEMS microphones as tactile vibration sensors to simultaneously classify texture and estimate contact position and velocity. This was part of our early investigation into multimodal tactile sensors and was a precursor to SpikeATac.

Collaborators: Runsheng Wang, Peter Ballentine, Jingxi Xu, Trey Smith, Brian Coltin, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie

Paper

Development of an Optically Transparent Kidney Model for Laser Lithotripsy Research

We developed an optically transparent kidney model for laser lithotripsy research. This model enables visualization of kidney stone fragmentation during laser treatment, helping researchers better understand and optimize lithotripsy procedures.

Collaborators: Sabrina Tran, Junqin Chen, Gunnar Kozel, Trina Phung, Yanxi Peng, Zachary Dionise, Yuan Wu, W. Neal Simmons, Michael E. Lipkin, Glenn M. Preminger, Pei Zhong

Paper

Phase Stability, Bandgap Tuning and Rashba Splitting in Selenium-Alloyed Bournonite

During my undergraduate thesis research, I studied the naturally occurring mineral bournonite (CuPbSbS₃) as a potential sustainable material for thin-film photovoltaics and other prospective applications (e.g. thermoelectrics). In an effort to lower the band gap and create a more tunable materials system, we characterized the experimental alloying of selenium into the bournonite structure via solid-state bulk synthesis to obtain CuPbSb(S_1–xSe_x)₃. Through a collaboration with Volker Blum's group, we compared experimental findings to theoretical band structure and formation energy calculations.

Received best poster award at MRS

Collaborators: Gabrielle Koknat, Garrett Mckeown Wessler, Yi Yao, Volker Blum, David B. Mitzi

Paper

Research

In my phd, I work on building touch sensors to (hopefully) help robots be more dexterous! I'm most interested in developing compact, multimodal tactile fingers, studying new methods of tactile sensing, and exploring how to process rich, multimodal touch data in the context of manipulation.

	SpikeATac: A Multimodal Tactile Finger with Taxelized Dynamic Sensing for Dexterous Manipulation Eric T. Chang, Peter Ballentine, Zhanpeng He, Do-Gon Kim, Kai Zhang, Hua-Hsuan Liang, Joaquin Palacios, William Wang, Pedro Piacenza, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie joint first authorship ICRA, 2026 project website \| arXiv \| WSJ article highlighting the work
	VibeCheck: Using Active Acoustic Tactile Sensing for Contact-Rich Manipulation Kaidi Zhang, Do-Gon Kim, Eric T. Chang, Hua-Hsuan Liang, Zhanpeng He, Kathryn Lampo, Philippe Wu, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie equal contribution IROS, 2025 project website \| arXiv \| IEEE Xplore
	R×R: Rapid eXploration for Reinforcement Learning via Sampling-based Reset Distributions and Imitation Pre-training Gagan Khandate, Tristan Luca Saidi, Siqi Shang, Eric T. Chang, Yang Liu, Seth Dennis, Johnson Adams, Matei Ciocarlie equal contribution Autonomous Robots, 2024 (RSS 2023 Special Issue) arXiv \| Springer Link
	Train Robots in a JIF: Joint Inverse and Forward Dynamics with Human and Robot Demonstrations Gagan Khandate, Boxuan Wang, Sarah Park, Weizhe Ni, Joaquin Palacios, Kathryn Lampo, Philippe Wu, Rosh Ho, Eric Chang, Matei Ciocarlie joint first authorship arXiv preprint, 2025 arXiv
	An Investigation of Multi-feature Extraction and Super-resolution with Fast Microphone Arrays Eric T. Chang, Runsheng Wang, Peter Ballentine, Jingxi Xu, Trey Smith, Brian Coltin, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie equal contribution ICRA*, 2024 arXiv \| IEEE Xplore
	Spike-a-Tac: Development Towards a PVDF-based Tactile Finger with Distributed Vibration Sensing Eric T. Chang, Peter Ballentine, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie equal contribution ICRA 2024 ViTac Workshop: Robot Embodiment through Visuo-Tactile Perception* workshop paper \| workshop poster
	Sampling Based Exploration for Reinforcement Learning of Dexterous Manipulation Gagan Khandate, Siqi Shang, Eric T. Chang, Tristan Luca Saidi, Johnson Adams, Matei Ciocarlie equal contribution Robotics: Science and Systems*, 2023 project website \| arXiv \| Video1 \| Video2 Press: Tech Xplore, Popular Science, Time
	Towards Development of a Signal-Dense Multimodal Tactile Finger Eric T. Chang, Peter Ballentine, Ioannis Kymissis, Matei Ciocarlie ICRA 2023 ViTac Workshop: Blending Virtual and Real Visuo-Tactile Perception workshop paper
	Phase Stability, Bandgap Tuning and Rashba Splitting in Selenium-Alloyed Bournonite Eric T. Chang, Gabrielle Koknat, Garrett Mckeown Wessler, Yi Yao, Volker Blum, David B. Mitzi equal contribution Chemistry of Materials*, 2023, 35, 2, 595–608 paper
	Development of an Optically Transparent Kidney Model for Laser Lithotripsy Research Sabrina Tran, Junqin Chen, Gunnar Kozel, Eric Chang, Trina Phung, Yanxi Peng, Zachary Dionise, Yuan Wu, W. Neal Simmons, Michael E. Lipkin, Glenn M. Preminger, Pei Zhong BJU International, 2023, 132, 1, 36-39 paper
	Synthesis and Characterization of Selenium-Alloyed Bournonite CuPbSb(S1-xSex)3: a Prospective Semiconductor for Optoelectronic Applications Eric T. Chang, Gabrielle Koknat, Volker Blum, David B. Mitzi MRS Spring Meeting, 2021 Best poster award, 2nd place Symposium award
	CTHULHU: The Design and Implementation of Duke Robotics Club's 2019/2020/2021 AUVSI Competition Entry Duke Robotics Club RoboSub Competition Technical Design Report, 2019/2020/2021 2019 paper \| 2020 paper \| 2021 paper Placed 4th/1st (2020/2021) in technical design report at competition