Gowanus Voyage: Where Mechatronics, Public Art, Community Members, and Environmental Science Meet [Focus on Education]

The scientific literacy of the public contributes to the acceptance of new scientific concepts, technologies, and methods that may influence society as a whole [1]. Thus, increasing the public´s awareness and knowledge in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields is not only essential for benefiting the economy in the long term [2]-[4] but also for improving society´s capacity to make informed political decisions on pressing issues that are often rather convoluted [5]. To this end, mechatronics based outreach in informal settings has been shown to be an effective means to acquaint the public with established technical concepts and ongoing research questions [6]-[10].