Outreach activities
Our talented students don't just wander the halls of their labs looking for an idea that will make them famous. They also share their enthusiasm and their results during outreach activities.

Audience: general public
Type of action: workshop
The European Researchers' Night (ERN) is an annual event initiated by the European Commission, which invites the public to share a moment with researchers during the same evening in various European cities. The idea is to make the profession of researcher known to the general public, during a convivial moment of encounter.
In the context of the 2021 edition, ESR6 organised a stand at Suceava, where he presented a few devices from his laboratory. He explained to the audience how the devices work and how he use them for the project. Also, he discussed some of his project's objectives and about using vibration as feedback in various devices.

Audience: Students
Type of action: workshop
A hackathon is a social coding event that brings computer programmers and other interested people together to improve upon or build a new software program.
This event was organised at the University of Suceava at the end of 2021. ESR6 presented the VIREO application that he developed as a part of the project. He trained the students in the use of this application during the competition.




Audience: children
Type of action: workshop
The Brain Awareness Week (BAW) is the global campaign to increase general public awareness of the progresses and benefits of brain research.The campaign is coordinated at international level by the Dana Foundation (https://www.brainawareness.org), and at national level by the Belgian Brain Council. Every March, the Brain Awareness Week unites the efforts of partner organizations world-wide in a celebration of the brain for people of all ages.
In the context of the 2022 edition, a group of 6 young researchers has proposed to organize a workshop in High school. The name of the workshop is ”Touch and pain, neurosciences at the skin level”, in connection with the theme of the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology recently awarded to David Julius and Ardem Patapoutian for the discovery of touch and pain receptors.
The activity (about 2 hours) would consist of three 30-40 minute workshops held three times in parallel, to accommodate a total of three groups of students (5th and/or 6th grade). The workshop was delivered the 15/03/2022 in the ”Institut Dominique Pire”, in Brussels. Find below a short description of the 3 parallel sessions:
Title | Description | Researchers in charge |
The sense of touch and Surface Haptics technologies | Overview of the somatosensory system and presentation of haptic technologies with a focus on Ultrasonic Vibration. A demonstration follow the presentations. | Detjon Brahimaj Giulia Esposito |
Multisensory haptics and virtual reality | How psychophysics and magnetic resonance neuroimaging are used to study the brain processes underlying multisensory haptic perception. A demonstration follow the presentations. | Emmanuel Coulon IqraShahzad |
Pain, Thermoception and TRP channels | Cellular and molecular study of the functioning of TRP ionized channels and different techniques to study the involvement of these channels in the perception of pain in humans. | Farah Issah Solenn Gousset |

Audience: Students and young people interested in science
Type of action: workshop
The MILSET Expo-Sciences Europe (ESE) aims to promote science projects created by children and young people from all over the world through an exhibition in a multicultural environment. This event is also an opportunity to meet institutions that wish to help young people with their projects.
The University of Suceava participated in the organisation this event which took place at Suceava from 24 to 30 July 2022. On the occasion of the tour of the Machine Intelligence and Information Visualization Research Laboratory, ESR6 presented his own research within the multiTOUCH project.


Audience: general public
Type of action: workshop
The European Researchers' Night (ERN) is an annual event initiated by the European Commission, which invites the public to share a moment with researchers during the same evening in various European cities. The idea is to make the profession of researcher known to the general public, during a convivial moment of encounter.
In the context of the 2022 edition, ESR6 Mihail Terenti presented his research from the multiTOUCH project as part of the larger team of the Laboratory of Machine Intelligence and Information Visualization.

Audience: Doctoral & post-doctoral students
Type of action: workshop
Place : LMPT at the University of Haute Alsace in Mulhouse
The project GDR TACT (Le Toucher: Analyse, Connaissance, simulaTion) (GDR TACT) aims to bring together skills from academic, hospital and industrial partners with common issues relating to the sense of touch.
In this context, ESR1 was invited to participate in the training session organised by GDR TACT. ESR1 was also invited to participate in the demo session by presenting his demo prototype: Roughness perception in active touch with stereoscopic vision and surface deformation.




Audience: children
Type of action: workshop
Place: Colege Roi Baudouin in Brussels
Brain Awareness Week (BAW) is a global campaign to increase general public awareness of the progress and benefits of brain research.
In the context of the 2023 edition, 2 ESRs have proposed to organize a workshop in a High school. The name of the workshop is ”Touch and technology, neuroscience at the skin level”. The activity (about 2 hours) consists of two 30-40 minute workshops to accommodate two groups of students (6th grade). The demonstration session allowed students to touch the device and interact with it. To better visualize the ultrasonic vibrations in the haptic surface, the researchers used sugar powder and illustrated and explained why the sugar was moving on a specific configuration.