Facilities

S-lab Facilities

S-lab is an innovation and entrepreneurship hub, where students can work, create, meet, share, and build. Facilities span multiple locations: Thimann Labs, Carter Labs and the Arboretum, as well as a number of partner facilities through the IDEA Hub network of incubators: Arts, Physical Sciences, Humanities, and Sociology. These campus work spaces, available to all Hub team members, provide access to hardware and software for hands-on development and innovation in design, manufacturing, communications, and data visualization; encompassing both indoor and outdoor project space. We offer training, consumables, and access to equipment, with the ability to purchase other parts quickly and at cost.

About the Facilities:


 

Thimann Labs 

Thimann Labs is S-lab’s primary location housing the electronics lab, wet lab, meeting spaces, rapid prototyping workshop, machine shop, classroom, and rooftop greenhouse

Computer Lab

S-lab’s computer lab is locate in E2-581. Here you will find machines that support all your CAD needs as well as the Adobe Suite, HOMER, and Granta Design.

Arboretum

S-lab’s two power producing greenhouses are located at the UCSC arboretum in the New Zealand collection. They serve as a microgrid for renewable energy studies as well as greenhouses for plant related research. Students have access to monitoring equipment, tools, as well as indoor and outdoor space for new renewable generation and/or agricultural projects. Update: These Greenhouses will be moving to Coastal Sciences Campus in 2020!

Affiliated Labs

Carter Labs: Carter Labs is a material and device fabrication and characterization facility, allowing members to perform spectroscopy, sputter a new device layer, and perform failure testing with temperature dependence, among other techniques.

CITRIS: The UCSC branch of the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society has long been supporting renewable energy and resource efficiency projects both on campus and in the community. They offer facilities appropriate for work on high voltage electronics, 3D prototyping and PCB design, as well as classroom and meeting space.

The IDEA Hub Partner Facilities

These facilities offer a variety of different prototyping equipment from 3D printers to welders to digital media.

OpenLab is a facility for students interested in developing collaborative projects across the Arts and Sciences focused on creative and cultural innovation. Sharing facilities with the Baskin Visual Arts Department, students have access to five maker spaces: a woodshop, a metal shop, a state-of-the-art foundry, a studio space, and a digital design lab (the Hive).

The Community Media and Mapping Lab is for students interested in developing digital information tools to promote social enterprise. Facilities consist of tech lab space in the Everett Program housed in Social Sciences II.

The VizLab facilitates student engagement in Digital Humanities through the use of visual technologies. The space includes a large-scale visualization wall, Virtual Reality hardware, and advanced graphics software options. In this space, students can develop content and tools to virtually interact with the world, promote cultural and historical sustainability, and change the way we see space. Students will also be able to check out hardware necessary for creating visual content including 360 cameras, GoPros, and other media capture devices. This lab is housed in the Digital Scholarship Commons in McHenry Library and supported by the University Library and Institute for Humanities Research.