Research
Space Exploration Initiative

Space Exploration Initiative
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Biomechatronics

Enhancing human physical capability
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Space Enabled

Advancing justice in Earth's complex systems using designs enabled by space
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Camera Culture

Making the invisible visible–inside our bodies, around us, and beyond–for health, work, and connection
Project Research

Dormio: Interfacing with Dreams

InspirationSleep is a forgotten country of the mind. A vast majority of our technologies are built for our waking state, even though a thir…
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Media Lab Research Theme: Connected Mind + Body

Connected Mind + Body | Revolutionizing the future of mental and physical wellbeing
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Media Lab Research Theme: Cultivating Creativity

Cultivating Creativity | Catalyzing a global movement enabling everyone to unlock and unleash their individual and collective creativity
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Media Lab Research Theme: Future Worlds

Future Worlds | Design and action for the future we want to live in
Project Research

Candlewax Rockets: A Green Alternative for In-Space Propulsion

Wax-based hybrid rocket propellants, including paraffin (common candlewax) and beeswax show promise as high-performing hybrid rocket propel…
Project Research

A tailored, electronic textile conformable suit for large-scale spatiotemporal physiological sensing in vivo

The rapid advancement of electronic devices and fabrication technologies has further promoted the field of wearables and smart textiles. Ho…
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3DKnITS: Three-dimensional Knitted Intelligent Textile Sensor

Three-dimensional Digital Knitting of Intelligent Textile Sensor for Activity Recognition and Biomechanical MonitoringWe present an ap…
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Conformable Ultrasound Patch (cUFP) For Cavitation-Enhanced Transdermal Drug Delivery

Ultrasound-induced transdermal drug delivery (sonophoresis) has long lingered in the by-lanes of academic and industrial research, and has …
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Project Research

Envirome Monitoring with CRISPR Biosensors

In recent years, there has been an increase in low-cost and open-source electronic and chemical sensors that hobbyists, concerned citizens,…
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Archived
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Space Fabrics: resilient electronic textiles for distributed sensing in low Earth orbit

Overview: The outermost skin of a space-based structure is designed using materials known to protect against the harsh elements of space. S…
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Archived
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Fluid Expressions - Art and Craft in Microgravity

When imagining human life in space, how will we express our humanity and creativity in an alien environment? Can the art we make both refle…
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Archived
Project Research

H0TP0T

By Larissa Zhou and Adam ZacharFood is crucial to maintaining the physical and psychological health of humans in space. Eating food pr…
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Archived
Project Research

Reconfigurable space structures

Rapid prototyping platforms such as 3D printers used for digital fabrication are today able to manufacture custom objects for specific task…
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Archived
Project Research

Zenolith - An Interplanetary Time Device

On Earth, morning, noon, and night have their own specific meanings. The feeling of a second or a minute passing by, the shortening of the …
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Archived
Project Research

Self Assembling Space Frames

Ever wish you could toss your folded up tent and have it self-assemble mid-air?  Well...you can. In a zero gravity environment.Self As…
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Archived
Project Research

Harmony in Precarity

By Po-Hao ChiHow could microgravity/hypergravity shape our perceptual experience of listening with weightlessness? How can we seek to explo…
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Archived
Project Research

Miniature Optical Steered Antenna for Intersatellite Communication (MOSAIC)

The Miniature Optical Steered Antenna for Intersatellite Communications (MOSAIC)By Shreeyam KackerThe Miniature Optical Steered Antenn…
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Archived
Project Research

Moving Liquids With No Moving Parts

Solid-state microfrabricated devices are in development to replace contemporary heavy mechanical components for use in spacecraft propellan…
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Archived
Project Research

Ø-scillation: oscillating chemistry in zero gravity and beyond

How did life originate? Nobody knows. Life might not even be native to our Earth - it might have come from asteroids or the interstellar me…
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Archived
Project Research

AgriFuge

By Somayajulu Dhulipala and Manwei ChanAs humanity explores deeper into space, long-duration missions will require horticulture activities …
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Archived
Project Research

Panspermia

By Nancy Valladares and Rae Yuping HsuThis project is an art performance that seeks to rethink imaginaries of multispecies surviv…
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Archived
Project Research

SpaceHuman 2.0

SpaceHuman is a soft robotics device designed to facilitate the exploration of environments with reduced gravity in a view of democratizati…
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Archived
Project Research

ELI: Electronic Life-detection Instrument

Life on Mars, if it exists, could have been transferred between Earth and Mars due to meteorite impacts. The Search for Extra-Terrestrial G…
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Archived
Project Research

The Telemetron

Today, the environments that humans occupy in space are designed for survival. Humans are carefully shuttled to and from space, and during …
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Project Research

conformable Multimodal Sensory Facemask (cMaSK)

Facemasks are used to reduce exposure to viruses and other environmental hazards such as air pollution, and integrating wearable electronic…
Project Research

Augmented Reality with X-Ray Vision

X-AR is an augmented reality (AR) system that gives humans "X-Ray Vision" X-AR is a new AR headset that enables users to see things th…
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Conformable Decoders

Converting the patterns of nature and the human body into beneficial signals and energy
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Signal Kinetics

Inventing, building, and deploying wireless sensor technologies to address complex problems in society, industry, and ecology
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Nano-Cybernetic Biotrek

Inventing disruptive technologies for nanoelectronic devices and creating new paradigms for life-machine symbiosis
Article Research

Crafting the technology of the future: Irmandy Wicaksono

Media Lab PhD student Irmandy Wicaksono talks to Society of Craft about his work, which blends engineering with fabric arts.
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Viral Communications

People and intelligent machines in a creative, symbiotic loop
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Responsive Environments

Augmenting and mediating human experience, interaction, and perception with sensor networks
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Affective Computing

Advancing human wellbeing by developing new ways to communicate, understand, and respond to emotion
Article Research

New research from the Signal Kinetics research group is featured on "Science Without the Gobbledygook"

Physicist Sabine Hossenfelder discusses X-AR, the new research from the Media Lab’s Signal Kinetics group.
Article Research

MIT researchers develop augmented reality headset to help users see hidden objects

Using augmented reality, the X-AR system developed by the Signal Kinetics research group can guide users to find hidden objects.
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Human Dynamics

Exploring how social networks can influence our lives in business, health, governance, and technology adoption and diffusion
Project Research

Microgravity Extrusion

Traditional additive manufacturing processes, especially those that make use of liquid resin as the feedstock, are constrained by the gravi…
Project Research

The Gravity Loading Countermeasure Skinsuit

By Rachel BellisleOverview:The Gravity Loading Countermeasure Skinsuit (GLCS or “Skinsuit”) is an intravehicular activity suit for astronau…
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Social Machines

Promoting deeper learning and understanding in human networks
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Tangible Media

Invent new tangible and embodied interactions that inspire and engage people
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Personal Robots

Building intelligent personified technologies that collaborate with people to help them learn, thrive, and flourish.
How computational tools help to capture, visualize, and analyze human experiences.
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Opera of the Future

Extending expression, learning, and health through innovations in musical composition, performance, and participation
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Project Research

Essence Wearables: Biometric Olfactory Interfaces for Day and Night

Human-computer interaction (HCI) has traditionally focused on designing and investigating interfaces that provide explicit visual, auditory…
Archived
Publication Research

Frisson: Leveraging Metasomatic Interactions for Generating Aesthetic Chills

Jain, A., Schoeller, F., Zhang, E., & Maes, P. (2022, November). Frisson: Leveraging Metasomatic Interactions for Generating Aesthetic Chills. In Proceedings of the 2022 International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (pp. 148-158).
Publication Research

Modulating Interoceptive Signals for Influencing the Conscious Experience
Article Research

Augmented reality headset enables users to see hidden objects

The device could help workers locate objects for fulfilling e-commerce orders or identify parts for assembling products.
Article Research

E Ink’s latest color displays have me dreaming of electronic paper magazines

Media Lab spinoff E Ink’s new generation of color displays were introduced at CES 2023.
Inventing the future of digitally augmented objects and environments.
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Publication Research

A conformable sensory face mask for decoding biological and environmental signals

Kim, J., Marcus, C., Ono, R., Sadat, D., Mirzazadeh, A., Jens, M., Fernandez S. V., Zheng, S., Durak, T., Dagdeviren, C.†, “Conformable Multimodal Sensory Facemask for Decoding Biological and Environmental Signals”, Nature Electronics, 5, 794–807, 2022. [Cover Image]
Article Research

What the well-dressed spacecraft will be wearing

Spacecraft wrapped in sensor-rich electronic textiles could double as scientific instruments
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Project Research

Using Shadows to See Behind Objects

The full text of our paper is available here.Sometimes the thing that we want to see is hidden behind something else. A neighboring vehicl…
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Archived
Project Research

Make the Breast Pump Not Suck Hackathon

In September 2014, 150 parents, engineers, designers, and healthcare practitioners gathered at the MIT Media Lab for the "Make the Breast P…
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Center for Civic Media
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Object-Based Media

Changing storytelling, communication, and everyday life through sensing, understanding, and new interface technologies
Project Research

Tapis Magique: A Choreomusical Interactive Carpet

Ancient textiles have played a major role in the social, economic, and religious structures of communities around the world. Iconic, indige…
Project Research

KnittedKeyboard II

Spanning from the early Musical Telegraph and Electronic Sackbut, to the late EMS Synthi AKS and Moog Synthesizers, electronic music and mu…
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Project Research

Physio FreeFall

This project seeks to examine the effects of altered gravity on an individual’s physiology during parabolic flight. Specifically, we will c…
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Archived
Project Research

KnittedKeyboard

In this work, we have developed  a textile-based interactive surface fabricated through machine knitting technology. Our prototype exp…
Archived
Article Research

How E Ink developed full-color e-paper

Spinoff E Ink’s Edzer Huitema + Ian French describe the technical challenges of creating full-color e-paper displays suitable for consumers.
How buildings and cities can become more intelligently responsive to the needs and desires of their inhabitants.
Archived
Article Research

Industry Talk | Tapis Magique: a choreomusical interactive carpet

Pressure-sensitive, knitted electronic textile carpet generates 3D sensor data based on body gestures, drives an immersive sonic environment
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Project Research

Gravity Proof: Speculating Cosmic Futures

Gravity Proof is a performance and mission to prepare and cook bread in space. Inspired by ancient recipes and archaeological bread re…
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Project Research

MetaSense

MetaSense: Integrating Sensing Capabilities into Mechanical Metamaterial. J. Gong*, O. Seow*, C. Honnet*, J. Forman, S…
Article Research

Engineers create 3D-printed objects that sense how a user is interacting with them

Advance incorporates sensing directly into an object’s material, with applications for assistive technology and “intelligent” furniture.