At summer invention camp he invented an automated egg cracker and a remote-controlled submarine. While in grade school he started an inventor’s club. They took apart old computers. “It was loads of fun until we got shut down because I accidentally blew all the fuses in the library,” he says. Clites is now an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles. He still likes to figure out how things work. His latest invention is a medical procedure that makes it possible for people without feet to feel like they have biological feet. He still regularly blows fuses.
WHAT IS YOUR FIELD CALLED, AND WHAT ARE YOU UP TO THESE DAYS?
I am in rehabilitation robotics—a field in which it is immediately possible to see the impact of my work on people’s lives. Currently, I’m designing an advanced prosthetic leg for runners. This new leg will allow people with leg amputation to run in different conditions, just like people with intact biological limbs do.
I’VE HEARD THAT PROSTHETIC FEET DON’T HAVE TOES. HOW CAN SOMEONE RUN ON A PROSTHETIC FOOT WITHOUT TOES?
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Continue reading your story in the magazine
Tales for Sails
COULD DOGS BE A READER’S BEST FRIEND?
NICOLE PATTON-TERRY READING RESEARCHER
Nicole Patton-Terry loves helping kids learn to read. She is associate director of the Florida Center for Reading Research at the Florida State University. Patton-Terry works on teams with researchers, students, teachers, designers, parents, and community members. Together they study reading and develop tools that help children read.
READING THEIR WORLD
Before reading the words
A FUNNY THING HAPPENS
HOW JOKES AND WORDPLAY REVEAL THE INNER WORKINGS OF OUR READING MINDS
Demystifying
One reason a smart person may still struggle to read
A New Way to See BRAILLE
Remarkable discoveries are turning brain science on its head.
The true story of a young scientist: BOY NATURALIST
“Be a hunter and explorer.” This is the advice, says world-renowned entomologist E.O. Wilson in his 1994 autobiography, Naturalist, that he gives to his science students. “If you have the will, there is a discipline in which you can succeed.”
MAGDALENA SORGER
EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGIST
SHAPING DICE
More faces, more fun?
EDWARD O. WILSON
BIOLOGIST, NATURALIST, AUTHOR, SCIENCE PIONEER
