Research — MIT Media Lab

We are an antidisciplinary research lab working to invent the future of

human-machine interaction
health
art
learning
artificial intelligence
architecture
robotics
consumer electronics
kids
networks
music
wearable computing
entertainment
politics
history
cognition
economy
archives
design
bioengineering
storytelling
social science
data
machine learning
technology
developing countries
interfaces
prosthetics
sensors
social media
human-computer interaction
social robotics
computer science
wellbeing
imaging
environment
space
privacy
ethics
civic technology
civic media
urban planning
engineering
transportation
communications
synthetic biology
affective computing
neurobiology
augmented reality
energy
data visualization
virtual reality
computer vision
blockchain
biotechnology
banking and finance
systems
3d printing
agriculture
biomechanics
prosthetic design
wiesner
open source
crowdsourcing
biology
cryptocurrency
genetics
fashion
food
gaming
government
collective intelligence
makers
social change
behavioral science
zero gravity
performance
language learning
public health
manufacturing
ecology
nonverbal behavior
perception
internet of things
construction
industry
security
mapping
extended intelligence
climate change
long-term interaction
ocean
visualization
social networks
physiology
data science
gesture interface
autonomous vehicles
orthotic design
networking
point of care
medicine
racial justice
bionics
holography
civic action
trust
human augmentation
pharmaceuticals
neural interfacing and control
hacking
interactive
community
mechanical engineering
autism research
clinical science
rfid
member event
academia
primary healthcare
clinical trials
trade
open access
cognitive science
alumni
soft-tissue biomechanics
randomized experiment
startup
chemistry
member company
voice
real estate
biomedical imaging
sports and fitness
gis
electrical engineering
mechatronics
publishing
natural language processing
fabrication
event
materials
marginalized communities
exhibit
metamaterials
microbiology
installation

Research

Social Machines

Promoting deeper learning and understanding in human networks

Research

Fluid Interfaces

Designing wearable systems for cognitive enhancement

Research

City Science

Looking beyond smart cities

Research

Affective Computing

Advance human wellbeing by developing new ways to communicate, understand, and respond to emotion

Project Research

Personalized Animated Movies

Storytelling is a fundamental way in which human beings understand the world. Imagine watching a movie telling the story of your life, ho...

Research

Space Exploration Initiative

Project Research

Cilllia: 3D-printed micro pillar structures for surface texture, actuation, and sensing

In nature, hair has numerous functions such as providing warmth, adhesion, locomotion, sensing, and a sense of touch, as well as its well...

Project Research

Personal Food Computer

The OpenAg™ Personal Food Computer is a tabletop-sized, controlled environment agriculture technology platform that uses robotic systems ...

Project Research

AlterEgo

AlterEgo is a non-invasive, wearable, peripheral neural interface that allows humans to converse in natural language with mach...

Project Research

Theme | CityScope

City Science researchers are developing a slew of tangible and digital platforms dedicated to solving spatial design and urban planning c...

Research

Open Agriculture (OpenAg)

Open Agriculture Initiative (OpenAg)

Project Research

Designing social robots for older adults

Most countries are projected to see the number of people ages 65 and older surpass the population under the age of 15 by 2050. The limita...

Research

Signal Kinetics

Extending human and computer abilities in sensing, communication, and actuation through signals and networks

Project Research

PopBots: An early childhood AI curriculum

How can we add the missing "T" and "E" in preschool STEAM education?

Project Research

Machine Behavior

Machines powered by artificial intelligence (AI) increasingly mediate our social, cultural, economic, and ...

Article Research

Understanding machine behaviour

CIFAR Fellows Hugo Larochelle and Matthew Jackson argue for a new scientific discipline to study the broad effects of AI.

Project Research

Paper Dreams

Paper Dreams explores the various modes of creativity that can be enabled by artificial intelligence.A fair amount of current research ha...

Project Research

Engineering Dreams

Our dream is a sci-fi future, where dreams are controllable. We are working to build technology that interfaces with the sleeping mi...

Research

Center for Extreme Bionics

Research

Biomechatronics

Enhancing human physical capability

Project Research

Neural interface technology for advanced prosthetic limbs

Recent advances in artificial limbs have resulted in the provision of powered ankle and knee function for lower extremity amputees and po...

Project Research

Terrain-Adaptive Lower Limb Prosthesis

Although there have been great advances in the control of lower extremity prostheses, transitioning between terrains such as ramps or sta...

Project Research

Transdermal Optogenetic Peripheral Nerve Stimulation

Optogenetic techniques have recently been applied to peripheral nerves as a scientific tool with the translatable go...

Project Research

Neural Interfaces

Nerve-Muscle Graft Chamber and micro-channel arrays tor interface to peripheral nerves for prosthesis control. This research effort ...

Project Research

MultiDIC: a MATLAB Toolbox for Multi-View 3D Digital Image Correlation

Three-dimensional Digital Image Correlation (3D-DIC) is a non-contact optical-numerical technique for evaluating the dynamic m...

Publication Research

Rahwan, Iyad, Manuel Cebrian, Nick Obradovich, Josh Bongard, Jean-François Bonnefon, Cynthia Breazeal, Jacob W. Crandall, et al. “Machine Behaviour.” Nature 568, no. 7753 (April 2019): 477. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1138-y.

Post Research

Studying the behavior of AI

A new paper frames the emerging interdisciplinary field of machine behavior

Project Research

BrainBeat: Breath-based music therapy

Can we sonfiy calming breathing and passively influence a state of calm?Deep breathing has been scientifically proven to affect the heart...

Project Research

Research Area | Medical Imaging Technologies Using Unorthodox Artificial Intelligence for Early Disease Diagnoses

Our published research findings listed below share key examples for reducing dependence on specialized medical devices, biological &...

Research

Open Ocean

Project Research

SPRING: A Smart Platform for Research, Intervention, and Neurodevelopmental Growth

SPRING is a custom-built hardware and software platform for children with neuro-differences. The system automates data acquisition, optim...

Project Research

Modulating peripheral and cortical arousal using a musical motor response task

We are conducting EEG studies to identify the musical features and musical interaction patterns that universally impact measures of arous...

Project Research

An EEG and motion-capture based expressive music interface for affective neurofeedback

This project examines how the expression granted by new musical interfaces can be harnessed to create positive changes in health and well...

Project Research

RoboChain: A secure data-sharing framework for human-robot interaction

A learning framework for secure, decentralized, computationally efficient data and model sharing among multiple robot units installed at...

Project Research

SkinBot: A wearable, skin-climbing robot

We introduce SkinBot: a lightweight robot that moves over the skin's surface with a two-legged suction-based locomotion mechanism and cap...

Project Research

Experiential Lighting: New user interfaces for lighting control

The vision of pervasive computing is now mainstream. These connected devices permeate every aspect of our lives. Yet, we remain tethered ...

Research

Opera of the Future

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

Project Research

Designing robots in mixed reality

This is a joint proposal from graduate students Vik Parthiban (Media Lab) and Andrew Spielberg (MIT CSAIL, Distributed Robotics Laborator...

Research

Tangible Media

Seamlessly coupling the worlds of bits and atoms by giving dynamic physical form to digital information and computation

Research

Viral Communications

Creating scalable technologies that evolve with user inventiveness

Project Research

Spatial Flux: Body and architecture in space

Structurally, zero gravity means that we do not have to contend with architecture's greatest arch-nemesis, gravity. This opens up a new w...

Project Research

Printflatables: Printing human-scale, functional, and dynamic inflatable objects

Printflatables is a design and fabrication system for human-scale, functional and dynamic inflatable objects. The user begins with specif...

Project Research

Tools to investigate societal impacts of robots and AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) agents in an embodied form, such as Jibo, Amazon Alexa, and Google Home, are increasingly becoming part of o...

Project Research

Artificial listener with social intelligence

A social robot modifies its behavior to change what you think about it!

Research

Object-Based Media

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

Project Research

Escape Pod

The esc-Pod (or Escape Pod) is an exploratory platform for researchers investigating moments of refuge within our bustling work liv...

Project Research

AI, Automation, Labor, and Cities: How to map the future of work

Should workers worry about automation and AI?Many workers, policy makers, and researchers are asking themselves exactly this question. Bu...

Research

Human Dynamics

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

Article Research

Why we should show machines some respect

Kate Darling explores the human implications of the ways we treat robots and other machines.

Project Research

Research Area | Novel Ethical, Secure and Explainable Artificial Intelligence based Digital Medicines and Treatments

We have described validation of novel machine learning architectures for designing faster, safer, and more efficacious digital medicines ...

Research

Health 0.0

Publication Research

Toward understanding the impact of artificial intelligence on labor

Frank, Morgan R., David Autor, James E. Bessen, Erik Brynjolfsson, Manuel Cebrian, David J. Deming, Maryann Feldman, et al. “Toward Understanding the Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Labor.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, March 25, 2019, 201900949. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1900949116.

Project Research

Dormio: Interfacing with Dreams

Sleep is a forgotten country of the mind. A vast majority of our technologies are built for our waking state, even though a third of our ...

Project Research

Personalized Machine Learning for Autism Therapy

EngageME: Personalized machine learning and humanoid robots for measuring affect and engagement of children with autismEngageME is a proj...

Project Research

Personalized Machine Learning for Future Health

The view on Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) diagnosis has shifted towards a more dynamic process in which clinical and pathological markers evol...

Research

Mediated Matter

Designing for, with, and by nature

Research

Camera Culture

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

Archived

Project Research

Amoetecture

Amoeba Wall: a context aware wall system. Amoetecture is a set of amoeba-like dynamic spatial elements, including transformable floors, c...

Archived

Project Research

Predicting Bonding in Conversations

We show that using thin slices (< 1 minute) of facial expression and body language data, we can train a deep neural network to predict...

Research

Scalable Cooperation

Reimagining human cooperation in the age of social media and artificial intelligence

Communications Futures Program

Archived

Project Research

Personalized Robot Storytelling Companion

Could a social robot collaboratively exchange stories with children as a peer and help improve their linguistic and storytelling skills? ...

Publication Research

Personalized Machine Learning for Robot Perception of Affect and Engagement in Autism Therapy

Rudovic, O., Lee, J., Dai, M., Schuller, B. , Picard, R. W., " Personalized machine learning for robot perception of affect and engagement in autism therapy," Science Robotics, June 2018.

Research

Collective Learning

Transforming data into knowledge

Publication Research

Spectrally distinct channelrhodopsins for two-colour optogenetic peripheral nerve stimulation

B. E. Maimon, K. Sparks, S. S. Srinivasan, A. N. Zorzos, H. M. Herr, Spectrally distinct channelrhodopsins for two-colour optogenetic peripheral nerve stimulation. Nature Biomedical Engineering 2, 485–496 (2018).