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Hello

I'm Clark Teeple,
a Senior Hardware Engineer

at RightHand Robotics

Roboticist with a passion for systems-level design
I am a roboticist with a broad technical background, and experience in both the academic and product development spaces. I thrive in collaborative teams, and I particularly enjoy working on complex problems at the intersection of hardware and software. I am interested in applying my creative engineering mindset to solve impactful, real-world problems in robotics.

Education

Harvard University

2016-2021

PhD in Engineering Sciences (Robotics)

  • Dissertation Title: "Design Principles for Improving Precision and Dexterity of Soft Robotic Hands"
  • Advisor: Prof. Robert Wood

PhD in Engineering Sciences (Robotics)

Harvard University

2016-2021

  • Dissertation Title: "Design Principles for Improving Precision and Dexterity of Soft Robotic Hands"
  • Advisor: Prof. Robert Wood

Harvard University

2016-2018

M.S. in Engineering Sciences (Mechanical Engineering)

Earned en route to the PhD.

M.S. in Engineering Sciences (Mechanical Engineering)

Harvard University

2016-2018

Earned en route to the PhD.

University of Michigan

2012-2016

B.S.E. in Mechanical Engineering

3.90 GPA, Graduated Summa Cum Laude

B.S.E. in Mechanical Engineering

University of Michigan

2012-2016

3.90 GPA, Graduated Summa Cum Laude

Experience

RightHand Robotics

2022-2024

Website

Staff Hardware Engineer, R&D
Senior Hardware Engineer, R&D

As a hardware engineer in the R&D group, I utilize my cross-functional robotics expertise to develop products and features at the intersection of hardware and software. In my primary project, I am the technical lead for the development of a new high-performance, industrial-grade 3D camera product (recently announced as part of the RightPick 4 piece-picking system). I have also made countless smaller contributions to the RightPick codebase, including additional robot behavior improvements and bug fixes.

Check out my work!

RightHand Robotics

Staff Hardware Engineer, R&D
Senior Hardware Engineer, R&D

2022-2024

As a hardware engineer in the R&D group, I utilize my cross-functional robotics expertise to develop products and features at the intersection of hardware and software. In my primary project, I am the technical lead for the development of a new high-performance, industrial-grade 3D camera product (recently announced as part of the RightPick 4 piece-picking system). I have also made countless smaller contributions to the RightPick codebase, including additional robot behavior improvements and bug fixes.

Website Check out my work!

Harvard Microrobotics Lab

2021-2022

Website

Postdoctoral Fellow

Advised by Prof. Robert Wood, I am continuing my work on soft manipulation with a new focus on using simulation

Check out my work!

Harvard Microrobotics Lab

Postdoctoral Fellow

2021-2022

Advised by Prof. Robert Wood, I am continuing my work on soft manipulation with a new focus on using simulation

Website Check out my work!

Harvard Microrobotics Lab

2016-2021

Website

PhD Candidate

Advised by Prof. Robert Wood, I studied soft robotic hands for a variety of real-world applications including deep-sea sampling, precise grasping, and in-hand manipulation.

Check out my work!

Harvard Microrobotics Lab

PhD Candidate

2016-2021

Advised by Prof. Robert Wood, I studied soft robotic hands for a variety of real-world applications including deep-sea sampling, precise grasping, and in-hand manipulation.

Website Check out my work!

Product Development Projects
Industrial-Grade 3D Camera Product
(2022-2024)
Lead the development of a high-performance, industrial-grade 3D camera product as part of the RightPick 4 piece-picking system, and successfully brought it to market. As the Tech Lead for this project, I lead a cross-functional team of subject-matter experts, and coordinated the hardware design and software architecture to ensure seamless integration with the rest of the RightPick 4 system. As an individual contributor, I owned both the hardware design and industrial design of the camera system, and developed several core software features enabling its operation.
  • Systems Engineering
  • Python
  • Mechanical Design


Research Projects
In-Hand Manipulation using Soft Hands
(2019-2022)
The last few years, I have been working to understand how to design soft robotics hands with enough dexterity to perform in-hand manipulation. I am looking at all aspects of hand design including finger design (and relevant workspace), finger arrangement, and palm design.
SoMo Simulation Framework for Soft Robots
(2020-2022)
Together with Moritz Graule and a few others, we are developing a fast, accurate simulation framework for continuum robots in complex, dynamic environments.
Grasping and Manipulating Fabric using Soft Hands
(2020-2022)
Multi-dimensional compliance makes soft robotic hands well-suited for gently grasping and manipulating fabric and other thin, flexible objects.
Soft Robotic Grippers for Precise Grasping
(2017-2019)
How can we design soft hands with high dexterity using minimal added complexity? I've been exploring this question in my research, leading to several interesting insights about finger design for precision grasping.


Integration Projects
Armstron: Use a robot arm for materials testing
(2022-2022)
This ROS package and associated GUI make use of the 6-axis force/torque sensor on the Universal Robot e-series arms to apply complex loads to materials. We can essentially perform tests similar to an Instron Uniaxial Testing machine, but in all six axes.
  • ROS
  • Python
Sorotraj: Generate trajectories for soft robots
(2020-2022)
I wrote a useful tool to generate trajectory functions for use with both Ctrl-P pressure controllers (for real-world soft robots) and SoMo simulations (for virtual soft robots).
High-Level Coordination of a Robot Arm and a Soft Pneumatic Hand
(2019-2022)
I wrote some useful high-level ROS packages to coordinate a UR5e arm with my custom pressure control system for soft hands.
Ctrl-P: Smooth Pneumatic Pressure Control for Soft Robots
(2018-2022)
Smooth pressure control is a useful and straightforward way to control soft robotic fingers. I built a custom pneumatic control system for my research, including microcontroller firmware for realtime pressure control, a python-based control interface, and ROS drivers for integration with other robotic subsystems.

I have now built four systems, all of which are actively used by lab members on a daily basis. Additionally, systems can be easily chained together for applications requiring more than 10 channels.
Custom PCB for Ctrl-P systems
(2018-2022)
I designed a custom PCB to route pressure sensor signals and valve control circuits to/from a Teensy 3.5 microcontroller. This board also has several expansion pins exposed, and buttons for debugging.
  • Electronics
  • PCB Design
Documenting Everything
(2019-Present)
I needed a central place to document a bunch of random procedures and commands I use daily. I am also using this documentation site to document how I built it (doc-ception).
  • Web Dev.

Leadership

Technical Lead

RightPick 4 Industrial Camera Product, RightHand Robotics

2022-2024

Lead the development of a high-performance, industrial-grade 3D camera product as part of the RightPick 4 piece-picking system, and successfully brought it to market.

Check it out!

STEM Outreach Co-Lead

Harvard Microrobotics Lab, Harvard University

2016-2021

I help coordinate our lab's efforts to attend local STEM expos and science fairs. Our lab is excited about outreach, and I am excited about coordinating it!

Check it out!

Co-President

SEAS Graduate Council, Harvard University

2017-2019

As co-president of the SEAS-GC, I helped to plan and execute social, professional, and outreach events in an effort to improve student life at SEAS. In addition, I worked to change the focus and mission of the organization to appeal more to students, and lead efforts to improve visibility.

Check it out!

Awards & Honors

Bok Center Excellence in Teaching Award

Harvard University - 2019

Check it out!

NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

Harvard University - 2017-2020

Check it out!

RISE Best Paper Award

Research, Innovation, Service and Entrepreneurship (RISE), University of Michigan - 2016

Check it out!

Active Member of Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society

University of Michigan - 2014-2016

Check it out!

Teaching

Engineering Sciences 51 - Computer Aided Machine Design

Teaching Fellow, Harvard University

Fall 2018

An undergraduate-level class exploring the basics of mechanical engineering. In teams, students design, build, and test remote-controlled robots! I was in charge of two lab sections, held office hours, and graded assignments.

Check it out!

Outreach

Jan. 2020

Guest Presenter

Science on Screen Jr.

Coolidge Corner Theatre (Brookline, MA)

I presented exciting current research on soft robots, microrobots, and swarms as an introductions to the film Big Hero 6.

Nov. 2017, 2018, 2019

Judge

Newton Qualifier and Massachusetts Championship

FIRST Robotics Lego League (FLL)

I've judged all three areas (Robot design, project, and core values)

April 2016, 2017, 2018

STEM Expo Attendee

Cambridge Science Festival

w/ Harvard Microrobotics Lab

We were part of the "Robot Zoo". We had a booth and showed off some cool demos of robots that we make in our lab.

March 2016, 2017, 2018, 2020

STEM Expo Attendee

Boston Public Schools Science Fair

w/ Harvard Microrobotics Lab

We had a booth and showed off some cool demos of robots that we make in our lab.

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Publications

M.A. Graule, C.B. Teeple, and R.J. Wood,
"Contact-implicit Trajectory and Grasp Planning for Soft Continuum Manipulators,"
IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
2022
C.B. Teeple,
"Design Principles for Improving Precision and Dexterity of Soft Robotic Hands,"
PhD Dissertation
,
2022
C.B. Teeple, J. Werfel, and R.J. Wood,
"Multi-Dimensional Compliance of Soft Grippers Enables Gentle Interaction with Thin, Flexible Objects,"
IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
2022
M.A. Graule, T.P. McCarthy, C.B. Teeple, J. Werfel, and R.J. Wood,
"SoMoGym: A toolkit for developing and evaluating controllers and reinforcement learning algorithms for soft robots,"
IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
,
2022
C.B. Teeple, B. Aktas, M.C. Yuen, G.R. Kim, R.D. Howe, and R.J. Wood,
"Controlling Palm-Object Interactions via Friction for Enhanced In-Hand Manipulation,"
IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
,
2022
C.B. Teeple, R.C. St. Louis, M.A Graule, and R.J. Wood,
"The Role of Digit Arrangement in Soft Robotic In-Hand Manipulation,"
IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
2021
M.A. Graule, C.B. Teeple, T.P. McCarthy, G.R Kim, R.C. St. Louis, and R.J. Wood,
"SoMo: Fast and Accurate Simulations of Continuum Robots in Complex Environments,"
IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
2021
C.B. Teeple, G.R. Kim, M.A Graule, and R.J. Wood,
"An Active Palm Enhances Dexterity for Soft Robotic In-Hand Manipulation,"
IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
2021
S. Abondance, C.B. Teeple, and R.J. Wood,
"A Dexterous Soft Robotic Hand for Delicate In-Hand Manipulation,"
IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
,
2020
C.B. Teeple, T.N. Koutros, M.A. Graule, and R.J. Wood,
"Multi-Segment Soft Robotic Fingers Enable Robust Precision Grasping,"
International Journal of Robotics Research
,
2020
N.R. Sinatra, C.B. Teeple, D.M. Vogt, K.K. Parker, D.F. Gruber, and R.J. Wood,
"Ultragentle Manipulation of Delicate Structures using a Soft Robotic Gripper,"
Science Robotics
,
2019
C.B. Teeple, K.P. Becker, and R.J. Wood,
"Soft Curvature and Contact Force Sensors for Deep-Sea Grasping via Soft Optical Waveguides,"
IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
2018
J. Qu, C.B. Teeple, B. Zhang and K.R. Oldham,
"Passive Steering of Miniature Walking Robot Using the Non-Uniformity of Robot Structure,"
2018 International Conference on Manipulation, Automation and Robotics at Small Scales (MARSS)
,
2018
B.T. Phillips, K.P. Becker, S. Kurumaya, K.C. Galloway, G. Whittredge, D.M. Vogt, C.B. Teeple, M.H. Rosen, V.A. Pieribone, D.F. Gruber, and R.J. Wood,
"A Dexterous, Glove-Based Teleoperable Low-Power Soft Robotic Arm for Delicate Deep-Sea Biological Exploration,"
Scientific Reports
,
2018
J.H. Jordahl, L. Solorio, H. Sun, S. Ramcharan, C.B. Teeple, H.R. Haley, … and J. Lahann,
"3D Jet Writing: Functional Microtissues Based on Tessellated Scaffold Architectures,"
Advanced Materials
,
2018
J. Zhang, C.B. Teeple, J. Choi, S. Kang, J.E. Rivas, and K.R. Oldham,
"Design, fabrication, and dynamics of an electromagnetic vertical microactuator for endomicroscopy,"
IEEE International Conference on Advanced Intelligent Mechatronics (AIM)
,
2017
​​J. Qu, C.B. Teeple, and K.R. Oldham,
"Modeling Legged Microrobot Locomotion Based on Contact Dynamics and Vibration in Multiple Modes and Axes,"
Journal of Vibration and Acoustics
,
2017