The founding question of the Nexus Research Group, how do you do authentic science with nothing, has driven three decades of original work in low-cost science instrumentation, sensors, and data acquisition. These projects make authentic, hands-on science and mathematics affordable in any classroom. As AI-generated data becomes harder to trust, first-hand measurement from real, low-cost instruments matters more than ever.
A novel RECEIVE() timing discovery lets standard Casio graphing calculators log sensor data at timed intervals without the costly EA-200 or CLAB units, connecting to Picaxe, Micro:bit, ESP8266 or ESP32. A hundred-fold reduction in the cost of classroom data logging.
A walking, talking, AI-enabled mobile science laboratory built to engage STEM learners. It supports RIGEL and digital multimeter sensors, broadcasts live data as web-served graphs, and speaks any language.
A universal sensor interface that connects wearable and environmental sensors and microcontrollers to real-time data logging and game control. RIGEL can plot live graphs, control robots, and let a student fly a virtual island using an exercycle.
Browser version: RIGEL-WEB, a self-contained single-file HTML port.
A free, single-file HTML instrument that turns the audio system in any school device into a precision timer and spectrum analyser for physics, with a built-in simulator so every experiment works without hardware.
Inexpensive digital multimeters, paired with home-made sensors costing a few cents, turn any classroom into a data-logging laboratory for science and mathematics.
Using accessible game engines, learners integrate coding, science, mathematics, art and music into real-world projects, including a 2025 human and AI creative partnership experiment.
A maker-science pedagogy in which learners build their own instruments and props, understand measurement by constructing it, and investigate questions that matter to them. It applies the Build it, Test it, Use it pedagogy.
The constraint-driven methodology identified across this body of work: turning hard constraints into the design brief by exploiting the unintended affordances of existing tools, systems, and institutions. It is the common thread linking these projects.
These projects are archived with permanent DOIs on the Research Outputs and Publications page, including the Casio Graphing Calculator Serial Interface priority disclosure (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19303911).