Rakesh Patibanda joins us as a visiting Research Fellow from Monash University, Australia, arriving  just before the early May Day Bank Holiday. This isn’t his first visit to the UK though! In 2024, Rakesh attended the Dagstuhl seminar on Designing Computers’ Control Over Our Bodies and later spent time as a visiting researcher at UCLIC (University College London), where he presented his PhD work at a research symposium and completed the final chapters of his dissertation.

Rakesh’s journey into human-computer interaction began early. As a child, he was given a choice between a TV or computer, and opting for the latter, unknowingly set the course for a research career in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), particularly at the intersection of play, speculative design and human augmentation technologies.

His connection with Nottingham dates back to his time as a Master of Design (by research) student at RMIT University where Paul Tennent – Associate Professor at the Mixed Reality Lab (MRL), in the School of Computer Science – acted as his external examiner. It was then that Rakesh first learned about Professor Steve Benford and the lab’s influential work. Years later, during his PhD in HCI at Monash University, Steve would again play a role – this time as one of his thesis examiners. Supervised by Professor Florian ‘Floyd’ Mueller at the Exertion Games Lab and Professor Elise van den Hoven, who runs the Materialising Memories program at University Technology Sydney (UTS), Rakesh’s research focused on designing playful experiences where people share bodily control with technology. Inspired by the conceptual overlap with MRL’s soma design agenda, he became increasingly curious about exploring these connections more deeply.

Before beginning his academic journey, Rakesh co-founded GoLive Games Studio in India (2011–2015), where he helped launch culturally grounded digital experiences inspired by Indian stories and traditions. The studio was recognised with a ‘Best Start-Up’ award from Proto.in and secured over $425K in funding. It was also incubated at IIIT-Hyderabad’s Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE). During this period, Rakesh also served as Lead UX Design Consultant for 7 Cups, where he helped design the early version of a ‘Someone To Talk To’ platform connecting users to online therapy and mental health support.

Following his Master’s, Rakesh returned to RMIT University as a Senior Digital Media Designer and researcher, where he shaped digital engagement strategies across higher education through design-led innovation.

During his stay at Nottingham, Rakesh will take part in our Glitching the Soma workshop, a 3-day exploration of how digital technologies can expose glitches in the human mind-body as sources of personal enlightenment, aesthetic experience and/or wellbeing. The workshop will follow a soma design process, engaging with this idea through a series of body-focused activities that serve to de- and re-familiarise our somatic experience across several diverse and complementary applications including music, games, immersive experiences, living with pain and human-robot interaction. As part of the workshop agenda, Rakesh will introduce Electrical Muscle Stimulation (EMS) – a body-actuating technology that transforms the body into both the site and destination of interaction – as a means of glitching the soma and reconfiguring bodily experience in novel ways.

“I’m really looking forward to sharing my expertise”, Rakesh said. “In particular, I’m excited to explore how glitches – those intentional disruptions in bodily control – can open up new ways of sensing and relating to the body. It has been a pleasure to work with Steve and the Somabotics team on what I hope will be the start of many exciting adventures together.”