weaver

ATLAS students learn design skills through the lens of the apocalypse

Michael Kwolek — Fri, 11 Apr 2025 16:53:27 +0000

ATLAS students learn design skills through the lens of the apocalypse Michael Kwolek Fri, 04/11/2025 - 10:53

Michael Kwolek

With the popularity of post-apocalyptic narratives like “Fallout” and “The Last of Us” along with ongoing coverage around global climate turmoil, we are culturally primed to ponder our place in the world—and the skills we could bring to an apocalypse (zombie or otherwise.)

At the ATLAS Institute, we approach challenges as engineers and designers, and one class in particular aims to impart practical skills on students with an eye toward becoming more capable in such times of crisis.

Assistant teaching professor and BTU Lab director Zack Weaver’s new course, Hacking the Apocalypse, teaches undergraduate and graduate students how to apply design thinking to address basic survival needs. This semester’s focus is water: students are tasked to research, design and build novel systems for collecting, storing, treating and distributing water using fabrication techniques and Arduino-based electronics.

Weaver elaborates on the origin of the idea: “I was looking at geopolitics, economics and the way I applied the technologies that we teach in the [Creative Technology and Design] program with a lot of pragmatism and practicality. In my own classes, when I'm assigning prompts, it's often whimsical—it's meant to spark play and creativity.”

Water is a surprisingly complex topic, touching on geology, chemistry and climatology as well as law, ethics and politics—before you even consider the engineering, technology and design challenges associated with harnessing and using it. In fact, the class has attracted students from several different majors.

In developing the course curriculum, Weaver says he “found some really interesting reading on water policy and all kinds of design/build projects for collecting and storing water—things like rain barrels and even dew collection in the middle of the desert, which sounds impossible.“

Watershed moments

Students took a field trip west of campus to the Mountain Research Station, hosted by Jen Morse (MRS climate, water, snow technician), to learn about Boulder’s watershed and the complex monitoring systems they have in place to measure snowpack, humidity, flow rate, water quality and other data.

Elizabeth Saunders, Creative Technology and Design master’s student (social impact track), shares her impressions: “The experience was eye-opening, especially learning about the Niwot Ridge Long-Term Ecological Research Program and the Mountain Climate Program, which has been collecting climate data from the Colorado Front Range since 1952. One of the most fascinating facts I learned was that the air samples collected from the station serve as the global standard for air quality research. This underscores just how pristine and significant this environment is for understanding atmospheric changes on a worldwide scale.”

Students were surprised to discover the facility uses similar sensor technology to what they receive in the physical computing kits they buy for class. Weaver notes, “The Arduino platform makes things inexpensive and friendlier than a lot of commercial electronics,” though at the cost of reduced durability and accuracy.

The increasing accessibility of such technologies undergirds much of the popularity in DIY culture and maker spaces like the BTU Lab, and is indicative of the can-do spirit that defines the ATLAS community.

photo credit: Graham Stewart

Wave of innovation

Students also visited the Innovation Center of St. Vrain Valley Schools (SVVSD). Weaver notes, “The Innovation Center might be one of the best technology STEM programs in a public school in the world.” They offer flight simulator training, a full aeronautics program, entrepreneurship, competitive robotics, and more.

The Innovation Center even works with Boulder County Parks and Recreation to survey watersheds and test water quality and conserve the Northern Leopard Frog in Colorado’s Front Range.

SVVSD biosciences teacher, Jayme Sneider, led ATLAS students in experiencing what water quality testing looks like at scale, demonstrating what they test for and how. The class then focused on replicating that work on the DIY level to develop open source alternatives to expensive commercial technologies.

A cascade of expert insight

The class recently hosted Mark Giordano, Professor and Vice Dean for Undergraduate Affairs in the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Giordano previously held multiple roles at the Sri Lanka-based International Water Management Institute, winner of the Stockholm Water Prize—the "Nobel Prize for Water." He shared insights on water, emphasizing the importance of understanding its physical and social aspects to address global challenges.

Giordano detailed how climate change has two main impacts on weather events: intensity and frequency. “We expect that when it rains in the future it will rain even more, and then there will be longer periods between when it rains again.”

Water scarcity is a growing concern that manifests in many ways. Contrary to common assumption, Giordano noted that as much as 90% of our water goes to agriculture, not drinking water or sanitation. We may also believe water scarcity is an issue exclusive to arid places, but we have seen in recent years how inadequately-maintained infrastructure in American cities like Flint, Michigan, and Jackson, Mississippi, can create clean water scarcity even in places with abundant supply.

Water is a political issue, with implications around where it originates, where it flows and who claims ownership over it. Giordano elaborated, “You need clean water to live. You need it every day. It's not particularly expensive in most parts of the world to provide the minimal amount of water it takes to live a healthy life. Investment in basic water has really high returns, and yet over and over and over, we see it not being not being provided.”

A wellspring of water projects

Students are tasked with developing a water-related project over the course of the semester leveraging the tools and techniques they learn in class. They focus on one or more key areas: treatment, distribution, storage, power and collection.

ATLAS undergraduate student Rystan Qualls explains, “I’m working in the distribution group. We’re making a water distribution system that will allow a community in the apocalypse to send water to various sites like a garden or to the showers.”

Saunders details her project: “This semester, I am researching plant resilience and decay in extreme environments, with a particular interest in graywater and saltwater agriculture. My project seeks to answer the question: ‘How quickly can I kill plants so the future Utopian people don’t?’ While the phrasing is unconventional, the research focuses on identifying environmental stressors that lead to rapid plant degradation, with the broader goal of developing strategies for sustainable plant growth in challenging conditions.”

Other student projects range from a storm runoff irrigation system to a 3D-printed moisture evaporator to a smart rain barrel and even a 3D-printed steam engine prototype.

Flow of information

Hacking the Apocalypse - Fall 2025

Hacking the Apocalypse will run again in Fall 2025 with a focus on food.

Students will research, re-create and design novel systems for growing containers, soil mediums, soil and water quality monitoring, and indoor/outdoor urban agriculture systems utilizing fabrication techniques and electronic input/output systems based on the Arduino platform.

ATLS 4519/5519 Hacking the Apocalypse: Food (3 credit hours)

Learn More

Weaver describes his ambition for Hacking the Apocalypse: “Each class is supposed to end in documentation of the projects to a degree that you can hand it off to lay people who don't have to be particularly highly trained to understand it. This is ‘Book One.’”

The goal is to follow this semester with versions of the class focusing on other basic needs—food, clothing and shelter—before returning to water. “Then that water class will inherit everything the first class did, and their expectation will be a different set of design challenges where they have to incrementally improve or iterate on what people did before.”

As for takeaways from this semester, Saunders says, “My research in Hacking the Apocalypse builds upon my background in water policy and sustainability, as well as my ongoing work with FLOW [a legal organization dedicated to protecting the Great Lakes Basin.] My work in this class has given me hands-on experience in water purification, sustainable irrigation and the challenges of resource-limited environments.”

As the semester concludes, Weaver observes, “I'm rediscovering the whole world. I've engaged with it becauseI'm outdoors all the time. But I never understood the planet from a systems perspective, and this is just blowing my mind.”

ATLAS students can now add “apocalypse preparedness” to the engineering, design and creative skills they develop here. Though Weaver does clarify, “It's not an apocalypse class. It's about if you do certain things, you avoid the apocalypse. I'm trying to tell the students it's a utopian class.”

photo credits (unless otherwise noted): Ashley Stafford

At the ATLAS Institute, students tackle real-world challenges through design. Hacking the Apocalypse, a course led by Zack Weaver, teaches undergraduate and graduate students to apply design principles to address a surprising topic: apocalypse preparedness. Using Arduino-based electronics and fabrication techniques, students develop novel water collection and treatment systems.

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Black box designed by ATLAS students rises 101,000 feet, captures data and imagination

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Apr 2022 19:54:41 +0000

Black box designed by ATLAS students rises 101,000 feet, captures data and imagination Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 04/12/2022 - 13:54

You're standing in the middle of this vast—as far as the eye can see—grassland. And this thing that you just let go of in downtown Boulder has traveled there on its own. There's this moment of disbelief until you're right there with it. ~ Zack Weaver, CEAS lecturer, ATLAS Institute

Video from almost 101,000 feet, beginning shortly before the balloon bursts.

First students built the instrumentation. Then they attached it to a high-altitude weather balloon that took it to an altitude of 101,000 feet. Thanks to the geolocation technology they had incorporated, they were then able to locate it 120 miles away in Eastern Colorado.

The collaborative project was part of a class taught by ATLAS Lecturer Zack Weaver called Creative Technologies, a required class in the College of Engineering MS in Creative Technology and Design, offered through the ATLAS Institute.

The instrumentation they built included an Arduino microcontroller connected to sensors that measured and recorded location, temperature, air pressure and altitude. A GoPro was sent along for the ride, capturing continuous video of the four-hour flight that began outside the Boulder Public Library’s BLDG 61 Makerspace, where Weaver works, and ended in a field in Eastern Colorado 120 miles away.

The students, many of whom began the class without much of a technical background, wrote and tested the code for the microcontroller, designed and built the insulated casing that held the camera and protected the electronics and batteries from temperatures of approximately -35° Fahrenheit. The payload design allowed environmental sensors and a GPS antenna to capture and record data to an SD card. The students were then able to plot and compare flight simulation data and actual data visualized in Google Earth.

“The students learned which creative technologies could be used to pull off this feat,” Weaver said. “It’s probably not the right terminology, but they get a ‘crash course’—learning many things very quickly.”

Besides coding and electronics, students also learned wireless communication, design and fabrication techniques, including laser cutting, 3D printing and integrating electronic components into the student-designed payload. As required by the Federal Aviation Administration, the team registered the balloon flight, providing its anticipated flight path based on their models.

“This class is a blast,” said Neill Shikada, who is enrolled in the Creative Industries track of the ATLAS Creative Technologies and Design master's program. “I've come from knowing nothing about electronics to designing quite a few aspects of the instrumentation for our balloon flight."

Alejandra Guerro, a social impact master’s student, echoed Shikada’s sentiments. “I'm definitely enjoying the class,” she said. “A lot of technologies that seemed intimidating or difficult, now feel more accessible. I've learned that I can learn just about anything with enough Googling, patience and help from classmates.”

“Needle in a stack of needles”
As the pressure decreased with the rising altitude, the 7-foot-diameter balloon at ground level expanded to an estimated 25 feet before bursting. Its dizzying descent was captured on video.

Prediction software provided an estimate of the balloon’s location within a five-kilometer radius. Then, using the Automated Packet Reporting System (APRS), a ham radio network connected directly to a web server, they were able to pinpoint the balloon’s location to within one-tenth of a mile. As a backup, the team put a small commercial GPS tracker onboard that tracked the balloon's position online in real-time, but the APRS system worked perfectly.

“We added as many redundant tracking systems as possible without weighing it down more than necessary,” Weaver said. “Every gram is critical to how high the balloon can fly.”

Because the flight took approximately four hours, Weaver and some of the students had plenty of time to drive out to Eastern Colorado, initially aiming for where they thought the balloon would land and then course-correcting once they had actual coordinates.

“We dream of seeing this thing coming down, but in Eastern Colorado, it’s like finding a needle in a stack of needles,” Weaver said.

Crash course
In addition to mapping the actual flight path on Google Earth, students were asked to analyze variations and anomalies compared to the predicted flight path. While examining the data, students discovered that the sensors recorded higher temperatures than the APRS reported and concluded they were mistakenly measuring the interior of their insulated casing. They also learned the limitations of a $5 altitude sensor, which loses accuracy over 60,000 feet.

“These limitations, and the opportunity to read the data to discover them, are intentionally baked into the experience,” said Weaver. “It contextualizes the affordances and constraints of the toolset.”

“The project helped the students understand that they can’t learn all creative technologies,” he added. “We set a context that provided constraints for deciding which technologies are needed and to what extent. It helped them to not be overwhelmed by an overabundance of choices.”

The balloon flight was the key project for the first half of the Creative Technologies course; the second half is designed so students use the balloon experience as a reference for their independent design projects. There’s also a lineup of guest speakers, giving students diverse perspectives on similar types of technologies and how they are used professionally.

“I've shown them a reasonable amount of new technologies,” Weaver said. “The students will define any additional technologies they need to work with on a more individual basis. So at this point, they're in charge of the class, and I'm just there as support to run logistics and to bring in cool people for them to meet.

“I remember sometimes feeling almost complete isolation as a grad student on campus," said Weaver. "Getting off-campus and out in the world came as such a novelty. I think this group of students had that experience, particularly driving out to Eastern Colorado. And they didn't just learn how to work with electronics and design tools; they applied them, and it took them to new places."

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Maker Made 2022 features work by ATLAS community

Anonymous — Tue, 22 Feb 2022 16:52:05 +0000

Maker Made 2022 features work by ATLAS community Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 02/22/2022 - 09:52

Zack Weaver, an ATLAS lecturer who played a key role in establishing the ATLAS BTU Lab, stands in front of Maker Made 2020. Weaver is a creative technologist at BLDG 61: Boulder Library Makerspace and a curator for Maker Made.

A group of six artists and technologists connected to the ATLAS community contributed to Boulder Public Library’s Maker Made 2022, which runs through March 28.

If you go

Who: Everyone is invited

What: Maker Made 2022, a gallery show celebrating the diverse and inspiring work by local makers.

When: Runs through March 28. The exhibit is open whenever the library is open.

Where: Canyon Gallery, Boulder Public Library, 9th Street and Canyon Boulevard, Boulder

Cost: Free

The fourth annual gallery show celebrates the diverse and inspiring work by local makers, representing the collective energy and ambition of a community of inventors, designers, engineers, artists, craftspeople and tinkerers.

“There’s no better way to celebrate a period of creative output than a party and a show-and-tell, and that’s what Maker Made has become,” says Zack Weaver, one of the show’s curators and a creative technologist at BLDG 61: Boulder Library Makerspace. BLDG 61’s makerspace provides maker education to the public for free in an “inspiring and inclusive environment.”

Weaver, an ATLAS lecturer who played a key role in establishing the ATLAS BTU Lab, says inspiration for Maker Made dates back to his days as a Carnegie Mellon student of Professor Mark Gross, now director of the ATLAS Institute. Gross, along with university colleagues organized annual exhibitions, similar to the ATLAS Expo, Weaver says.

The ATLAS Connection
Creative Technology and Design graduates Luciano Mejia and Chaz Golin helped curate Maker Made 2022. Hired as "Contract Killer Creative Technologists" in late 2021, the two were major contributors to the show’s success. For exhibits by members of the ATLAS community, see below.

A group of six artists and technologists connected to the ATLAS community contributed to BLDG 61’s Maker Made 2022, which runs through March 28 at the Boulder Public Library. Zack Weaver, who played a key role in establishing the ATLAS BTU Lab and the show’s curator, says the inspiration for Maker Made goes back to his days at Carnegie Mellon with ATLAS Director Mark Gross.

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ATLAS makers print face shield parts to help protect medical personnel from the novel coronavirus

Anonymous — Tue, 14 Apr 2020 18:04:47 +0000

ATLAS makers print face shield parts to help protect medical personnel from the novel coronavirus Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 04/14/2020 - 12:04

Joining the global grassroots response to shortfalls in personal protective equipment, members of the ATLAS community are 3D printing parts for face shields to help protect local medical personnel against the highly contagious novel coronavirus.

From basements, offices and closets the whirring sounds of 3D printers is heard day and night in the homes of at least six members of the ATLAS community: Pete Pascente, master’s student; Wayne Seltzer, technologist-in-residence; Zack Weaver, instructor and creative technologist for Boulder Library makerspace (BLDG 61); Sheiva Rezvani, instructor; Camilla Friedman-Gerlicz, instructor; and Aileen Pierce, senior instructor.

Together, they are part of the worldwide maker community that is sharing designs and making personal protective equipment to compensate for the global shortage that has left medical workers unable to adequately protect themselves and their patients against the coronavirus.

These ATLAS community members are joined by members of several other campus groups who are also 3D printing face-shield parts, including the Idea Forge, the Integrated Teaching & Learning Program, the Program in Environmental Design, CU Science Discovery, the Department of Aerospace Engineering, Department of Physics, the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics and the BEEM Lab in Mechanical Engineering, said Rebecca Komarek, assistant director of Idea Forge and a coordinator for campus face shield production with the statewide Make4Covid initiative. As of April 14, Make4Covid reported it had delivered nearly 11,750 pieces of equipment, including more than 1,400 face shields made by ��ɫ��Ƶ groups.

Seltzer and Pascente originally collaborated with the NoCo Face Shield Project, a volunteer organization building protective face shields for Northern Colorado healthcare facilities, delivering their first batch of parts on March 28 to the Fort Collins Creator Hub. More recently, NoCo has joined forces with Make4Covid, which means a lot less driving. In an attempt to speed up print times, Pascente and Seltzer are beginning to experiment with larger nozzles for their 3D printers.

Between Pascente, Seltzer and Weaver, who have been at this longer than the others, they have manufactured parts for roughly 400 shields. Weaver, who is focusing on making completed face shields, cutting his own visors by hand from thin sheets of transparent plastic, has finished about 100, including a dozen delivered to Wardenburg Health Center on the ��ɫ��Ƶ campus. Seltzer and Pascente are printing headbands and curved plastic reinforcements that attach to the top and bottom of transparent visors. “The focus is to print a lot of parts and get them to people who are assembling and distributing them,” said Seltzer.

The minimal design many of the makers are using originated with physicians who collaborated with the Czech Republic Ministry of Health and 3D printer manufacturer Prusa.

“As one of many people making parts at home 24/7, I'm glad to be contributing to this project,” Seltzer said.

Other ATLAS coronavirus-related projects:
Instructions for making a simple "no-sew" mask, by CTD student Ruhan Yang

Joining the global grassroots response to shortfalls in personal protective equipment, members of the ATLAS community are 3D printing face shields to help protect local medical personnel against the highly contagious novel coronavirus.

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