Research
Space Exploration Initiative

Space Exploration Initiative
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...
Post Research

Curating the human experience of space—present, future, and fiction

Xin Liu discusses the Space Exploration Initiative's upcoming arts exhibition at Ars Electronica
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 durin...
Project Research

TESSERAE: Self-Assembling Space Architecture

The future of human habitation in space, from Low Earth Orbit (LEO) to planetary systems far beyond, lies in self-assembling, adaptive, a...
Project Research

Orbit Weaver

Gravity is the anchor of all existences on earth, pulling the chaotic world to one single point in every moment of life.  Even ...
Project Research

Food for Space

Food in space has moved beyond that which is simply developed down on Earth for space purposes. A new food culture will emerge as a resul...
Post Research

Rhapsody in Zero G

Reimagining research for life in space
Research
Tangible Media

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

Liquid Resin Fabrication in Microgravity

The future of human life outside of Earth will heavily depend on the ability to fabricate and manufacture things. Yet fabrication in spac...
Project Research

Scratch in Space

The Scratch Team invited young people from around the world to create Scratch projects designed specifically to be played in zero gr...
Project Research

Search for Extra-Terrestrial Genomes (SETG)

The widespread synthesis of common organic building blocks in space could have biased life beyond Earth towards chemical similarities to ...
Project Research

Social Robots in Space: Initial Explorations

Can we enable social connectivity between astronauts and people on Earth through an embodied agent?Astronauts actively communicate with t...
Project Research

Orbit Weaver Suit

​​​​​​​​​The Orbit Weaver Suit for zero gravity was designed by Media Lab Director's Fellow Andrea Lauer in collaboration with ...
Project Research

Grappler: Arrays of bistable elements for landing distributed sensor networks on low gravity bodies

Can a modified snap bracelet be used to land infrastructure on an asteroid? It is notoriously difficult to stick a landing on a low ...
Project Research

Smells for Space: Olfactory Timecapsule for Earthly Memories

Each new technology forces us to confront who we are as humans.  As technological innovations in deep space exploration keep advanci...
Project Research

Nanoscale Imaging of Biomolecules in Zero G

Expansion microscopy (ExM) is a new imaging modality developed by MIT Media Lab's Synthetic Neurobiology group. ExM allows biomolecules t...
Project Research

VR Maze in Zero Gravity

The brain uses space to index, organize, and retrieve memories. However, our sense of space depends on our perception of gravity. We...
Gallery Research

Space Exploration Initiative Zero Gravity Flight

Research projects deployed in zero gravity, November 2017.
Archived
Project Research

ZeroN: Levitated Tangible Interface

Imagine a physical object that floats through the air, unconstrained by gravity, which can move freely to display the motion of a planet ...
Archived