Faculty & Research Highlights, Winter 2026

Guided by a humanity-centered approach to design,  Design Lab faculty work within creative, interdisciplinary research groups that apply rigorous design methods and expand design thinking tools to include design-doing—addressing challenges faced by people from all walks of life and across a range of environments.

In 2026, faculty research and public scholarship engaged this approach across the following areas:

✦  Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)
✦  Artificial Intelligence and the New Information Age
✦  Health and Healthcare Innovation
✦  Climate Adaptation
✦  City and Regional Futures
✦  Design Education
✦  Social Justice and Equity
✦  Design for Creativity and Media

Faculty shared this work through peer-reviewed publications, books, exhibitions, films, and public lectures, and through presentations at leading venues spanning design, computing, social science, and the humanities—including conferences such as CHI, CSCW, DIS, UIST, HCOMP, SIGCSE, as well as forums in urban studies, public health, environmental research, media arts, and policy. Faculty also curated exhibitions, authored scholarly and public-facing books, and contributed expert perspectives to regional, national, and international policy conversations.

Across these domains, Design Lab researchers applied design-doing to explore responsible technologies, cultural and environmental systems, and new models of care, governance, education, and creative practice—advancing design as both a scholarly and civic endeavor.

This quarter, Design Lab faculty published research spanning digital health ethics education, wastewater surveillance for infectious disease, assistive robotics for chronic illness, and interventions to improve physical activity and mental health access. These projects exemplify our commitment to human-centered innovation that addresses pressing health and social challenges.

JOURNAL ARTICLE · ACM TRANSACTIONS ON HUMAN-ROBOT INTERACTION
Telepresence robots, reimagined through the eyes of people living with Long Covid
Paper: Envisioning Telepresence Robots for Long Covid: A Critical Disability Lens
Pratyusha Ghosh, Arthi Haripriyan, Alex Chow, Signe Redfield, Laurel D. Riek

The work examines how telepresence robots can be designed to support individuals with Long Covid through a critical disability perspective, centering the lived experiences and needs of people navigating chronic illness and accessibility challenges.

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JOURNAL ARTICLE · JOURNAL OF MEDICAL INTERNET RESEARCH
The ethics of digital-health research are missing from most student curricula
Paper: Educating Students About Digital Health Research Ethics: Curricula Review and Expert Interview Study
Yier Zhu, Brian McInnis, Tanya Punater, Brittany York, Camille Nebeker

The research combines curricula review with expert interviews to identify gaps in how students are trained to navigate the ethical challenges of digital health research involving wearable devices, mobile apps, and sociotechnical systems, providing recommendations for strengthening ethics education in this emerging field.

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JOURNAL ARTICLE · PLOS ONE
Wastewater can flag a Hepatitis A outbreak before the first patient is ever diagnosed
Paper: Assessing the sensitivity and predictive value of wastewater in detection of Hepatitis A cases in San Diego County
Aishwarya Ramesh, Ravi Goyal, Sarah Stous, Hannah R. Thomas, Seema Shah, Eliah Aronoff-Spencer, Mark E. Beatty, Natasha K. Martin

The study evaluates how wastewater surveillance can detect Hepatitis A virus, which is shed through stool before symptom onset, providing an early warning system that could enable public health officials to identify outbreaks before clinical cases are reported.

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