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Article Research

How some skills become second nature

Patterns of gaze and attention can reveal how some people unconsciously figure out how to master a task, new research shows.
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Fluid Interfaces

Designing Systems for Cognitive Augmentation
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Media Lab Research Theme: Life with AI

Life with AI | Designing the future of smart systems to improve the human experience
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Media Lab Research Theme: Future Worlds

Future Worlds | Design and action for the future we want to live in
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Media Lab Research Theme: Decentralized Society

Decentralized Society | Architecting the new internet for the good of the people
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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: Connected Mind + Body

Connected Mind + Body | Revolutionizing the future of mental and physical wellbeing
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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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Camera Culture

Making the invisible visible–inside our bodies, around us, and beyond–for health, work, and connection
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What if Eye? Computationally Recreating Vision Evolution

We evolve artificial embodied agents inside video-game worlds to replay millions of years of evolution and create new forms of artificial a…
Article Research

Why have so many different eyes evolved? Gamelike simulation could provide answers

“Powerful” method for studying evolution could help researchers understand how species developed specialized eyes
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A “scientific sandbox” lets researchers explore the evolution of vision systems

The AI-powered tool could inform the design of better sensors and cameras for robots or autonomous vehicles.
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Responsive Environments

Augmenting and mediating human experience, interaction, and perception with sensor networks
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Tangible Media

Invent new tangible and embodied interactions that inspire and engage people
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👋 CoCo — A New Real-Time Co-Creative Platform for Young People

CoCo is a new live co-creative learning platform designed to empower educators to support young people in both physical and remote set…
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Valdemar Danry receives 2025 Google North America PhD Fellowship

With this funding, Valdemar will continue his work on AI for supporting human reasoning and critical thinking.
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Affective Computing

Advancing human wellbeing by developing new ways to communicate, understand, and respond to emotion
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Co-designing Generative AI for Healthy Aging

The rapid advancement of Generative AI (GenAI) technologies presents new opportunities to support daily living for older adults. This proje…
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Multisensory Intelligence

Creating human-AI symbiosis across scales and sensory mediums to enhance productivity, creativity, and wellbeing
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RAISE

Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education: promoting equity in learning, education, + computational action to prepare diverse K-12
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Nano-Cybernetic Biotrek

Inventing disruptive technologies for nanoelectronic devices and creating new paradigms for life-machine symbiosis
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New England Journal of Medicine Series: Wearable Digital Health Technologies

Researchers in the Affective Computing group have been invited to edit a series of articles in the New England Journal of Medicine.
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Personal Robots

Building intelligent personified technologies that collaborate with people to help them learn, thrive, and flourish.
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Human Dynamics

Exploring how social networks can influence our lives in business, health, governance, and technology adoption and diffusion
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MemPal: Wearable Memory Assistant for Aging Population

We're living in an aging society with cognitive loss placing stress on caregivers to monitor older adults struggling with memory decline.&n…
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Project Research

MirrorFugue

MirrorFugue is an installation for a player piano that evokes the impression that the "reflection" of a disembodied pianist is playing the …
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Article Research

TeleAbsence: Poetic encounters with the past

MIT researchers lay out design principles behind the TeleAbsence vision and how it could help people cope with loss
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A brief history of expansion microscopy

Since its 2015 debut by an MIT team, expansion microscopy has advanced research on kidneys, seeds, Alzheimer’s, viruses, and more.
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AttentivU

​There are currently  UROP openings for this project. AttentivU is a neural AI platform for wireless non-invasive sensing of pers…
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Theme | Attention, Memory & Learning

Several of our projects aim to support learning and creativity. While some systems focus on a specific skill to be strengthened, e.g.,…
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Project Research

Nanoscale mapping of bio-molecular building blocks of brain

For more details and recent updates visit:  https://web.mit.edu/deblina-sarkar/For understanding the brain structure, it is neces…
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MemPal selected for 2024 Prototypes for Humanity exhibition

MemPal was selected in the Health category.
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Brain Switch

The Brain Switch is a real-time, closed-loop brain-computer system allowing for real-time correspondence of simple user needs to a caretake…
Article Research

Whither BCIs?

Researcher Nataliya Kosmyna and other experts discuss the potential of and safeguards needed for brain-computer interfaces (BCIs).
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Rosalind Picard on the ACM ByteCast

On the ACM ByteCast, Professor Rosalind Picard and host Scott Hanselman talk about her work in the Media Lab's Affective Computing group.
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Alexandra Rieger: Innovating Omnisensory Medicine at MIT & Harvard

PhD student Alexandra Rieger discusses her research combining music, engineering, neuroscience, and design.
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AI Systems that Use Questioning to Improve Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is an essential human skill. Despite the importance of critical thinking, research reveals that our reasoning ability suf…
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‘Brain-computer interface’ allows user to move objects with mind

Professor Pattie Maes and research scientist Nataliya Kosmyna demonstrate a wearable brain-computer interface called AttentivU.
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How sensory gamma rhythm stimulation clears amyloid in Alzheimer’s mice

The study, co-authored by Ed Boyden, finds stimulating key brain rhythms with light + sound could drive clearance of an Alzheimer’s protein.
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Imaging method reveals new cells and structures in human brain tissue

The new imaging method is based on expansion microscopy, which was developed in Professor Ed Boyden’s lab in 2015.
Project Research

▓▒░ TeleAbsence

People die twice.First, when they die.Then when they are forgotten.Rokusuke Ei (1933-2016)
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Thinking Cap

Find out more about the new version of the system, "The Thinking Cap 2.0" here.Peoples' mindsets, meaning their beliefs about their own int…
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MIT AI for Filmmaking Hackathon 2023 Brings Dreams to Life

Ruihan Zhang, a student in the Molecular Machines group, was lead organizer of this event in collaboration with MIT Film Makers Association
Article Research

Inside your dreamscape

Dream-hacking techniques can help us create, heal and have fun. They could also become tools of commercial manipulation.
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That moment when you’re nodding off is a sweet spot for creativity

A new study finds people are more creative after waking from the earliest stage of sleep, especially when guided to dream about a topic.
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Here's how to use dreams for creative inspiration

Researchers from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces group and Harvard Medical School find that brief naps appear to enhance creativity.
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Quick catnaps may spark creativity

The NIH reports on research from the Fluid Interfaces group and Harvard Medical School investigating the effect of naps on creativity.
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Neuroscientists warn advertisers are trying to 'weaponize sleep' by plugging into your dreams

“The potential for misuse of these technologies is as ominous as it is obvious.”
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"Dream glove" boosts creativity during sleep

In a new study, researchers from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces group & Harvard Medical School find that brief naps can enhance creativity
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Want to be more creative? Try dream-hacking while you sleep

The Washington Post reports on research from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces group & Harvard Medical School that naps could aid creativity.
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Behind the veil of hypnagogic sleep

Media Lab postdoc Adam Haar Horowitz discusses using “dream engineering” techniques to give people more control over their dreams.
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Targeted Dream Incubation

Targeted dream incubation (TDI) is a methodology for guiding (or “incubating”) dreams towards specific themes. Please read the FAQ below to…
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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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Sonic enrichment at the zoo

This project is a collaboration between the MIT Media Lab and the San Diego Zoo to design and build interactive sonic enrichment systems fo…
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Researchers studying electrical signals in human brains are getting a little closer to reading our minds

On The World by PRX and WGBH, researcher Nataliya Kosmyna talks about advances in and potential applications for brain-computer interfaces.
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Horse sense about AI

In Psychology Today, author William Poundstone considers research from the Fluid Interfaces group in light of the Clever Hans effect.
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Influencing human–AI interaction by priming beliefs about AI can increase perceived trustworthiness, empathy, and effectiveness

AbstractAs conversational agents powered by large language models become more human-like, users are starting to view them as companions rat…
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JoyBranch

The Joy Branch project explores different user interfaces to allow parrots to shape their sonic environment.  Animal agency—contr…
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Article Research

Rébecca Kleinberger, From DJ Macaw to Video-Flocking: Leveraging audio technology for animal’s social and cognitive enrichment

Alum Rébecca Kleinberger discusses her work at the intersection of new technology, animal-computer interaction, and the sonic environment.
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The future of intelligence (artificial and otherwise)

Media Lab Professor Alex 'Sandy' Pentland, MIT CSAIL Director Daniela Rus, and Prof. Josh Tenenbaum discuss the future of intelligence.
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For multimedia artist Nicole L'Huillier, sound is a portal for change

Opera of the Future PhD candidate Nicole L'Huillier discusses her multimedia artwork with WBUR.
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The ethics and tech of dream seeding

In Discovery Magazine, Media Lab postdoc Adam Haar Horowitz and other researchers discuss the possible ethical issues of influencing dreams.
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Does dream inception work?

Using Dormio, a project from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces research group, poet Will Dowd set out to pioneer a new reading experience.
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Virtual reality system lets you stop and smell the roses

Media Lab alum Judith Amores talks to Scientific American about a lightweight, wireless interface to deliver scents to VR users.
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Unlocking the Power of Goosebumps: The Surprising Emotional Effects of Aesthetic Chills

A new study suggests that experiencing aesthetic chills, or goosebumps, during stimuli like music and films can lead to increased emotions.
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Social Machines

Promoting deeper learning and understanding in human networks
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CoCo: A real-time co-creative learning platform for young people

Media Lab PhD students Manuj Dhariwal + Shruti Dhariwal introduce a new paradigm of creative collaboration in digital learning environments
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A chatbot that asks questions could help you spot when it makes no sense

Researchers from Fluid Interfaces presented this research at the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems.
Publication Research

The Thinking Cap 2.0: Preliminary Study on Fostering Growth Mindset of Children by means of Electroencephalography and Perceived Magic

Nataliya Kosmyna, Alexandra Gross and Pattie Maes. “The Thinking Cap 2.0”: Preliminary Study on Fostering Growth Mindset of Children by means of Electroencephalography and Perceived Magic using Artifacts from Fictional Sci-Fi Universes. In Proceedings of the 2020 Conference on Interaction Design and Children (IDC ’20). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 761–767.
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Project Research

Paper Dreams

Paper Dreams explores how human creativity can be supported by artificial intelligence.Prior research on AI and creativity has primarily fo…
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