Dr. Peter Coppin

Dr. Peter Coppin, Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Design, is a designer, visual artist, and cognitive scientist. His work seeks to improve information access through a better understanding of how individuals make use of their diverse perceptual-motor capabilities to interact with interfaces and other designed artifacts (such as diagrams in problem solving or sonic interfaces to financial charts and graphs). Dr. Coppin’s work is informed by his career journey, which cuts across engineering, design, and the visual arts. Dr. Coppin has authored numerous articles that focus on the perceptual-cognitive aspects of information interfaces with applications in diverse areas such as diagrammatic reasoning, research on dyslexia, learning technology, telescience, human-robot interaction, and data analytics. His design work with government agencies and industry has included numerous projects related to the visualization of complex Earth and planetary datasets for NASA. Recent work tackles the challenge of accessible data analytics: Interfaces that enable low vision or blind individuals to access charts and graphs without visual perception.  Dr. Coppin’s work has been funded by multiple NASA programs, the US National Science Foundation, the Heinz Endowments, the R.K. Mellon Foundation, the Buhl Foundation, the Laurel Foundation, the Center for Innovation in Data-Driven Design, the Ontario Ministry of Training and Colleges, MITACS, and NCE GRAND. Dr. Coppin’s work in electronic media art-design has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including Prix Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria), the SIGGRAPH Touchware Exhibition (Orlando, Florida, USA), MIR: Art & Space (Bolzono Italy), and the Adler Museum (Chicago, Illinois, USA).