Parallel Sessions 1: October 24, 2023, 4:15pm - 5:45pm

Sensate Media: Future of Fiber and Fabric (F3) - Professor Hiroshi Ishii, PI (Tangible Media), Professor Joseph Paradiso, PI (Responsive Environments), Jack Forman and Ozgun Kilic Afsar, Research Assistants (Tangible Media), and Irmandy Wicaksono, Research Assistant (Responsive Environments) in The Nagashima Room E15-341, Capacity 46 

The ways in which ubiquitous sensing, processing, and connectivity have deeply changed our world are profound. As these technologies scale, miniaturize, and consume even lower power, we witness another dramatic paradigm shift as they blend seamlessly into materials and sensor/actuator networks diffuse into electronic skins and textiles. Revolutions in fiber & textile fabrication, the availability of new textile materials that function as sensors and actuators, and advances in microtechnology with novel integration into stretchable electronics and even threads launch a myriad of bold applications in wearables and industrial-scale fabrics that will impact medical, environmental, aesthetic, architectural, and IoT domains.

In this virtual session, we focus on the ongoing active Media Lab research on the new generation of fiber, fabric, and e-textile technologies and applications. Although we coined the term ‘Sensate Media’ to describe this vision two decades ago, the underlying technologies have advanced enormously in recent years, enabling exciting projects that we will describe in this workshop.vvv

AI and Future of Work, Part 2 - AI + Work and Workforce - Dr. Isabella Ioaiza, Research Affiliate and (Human Dynamics) and Pierre-Alexandre Balland, Professor, (Utrecht University) in E14-633, Capacity 90 Description coming soon

Using AI to support meetings and conversations - Professor Pattie Maes, PI (Fluid Interfaces) and Research Assistants (Fluid Interfaces) in E14-244, Capacity 30 

The Fluid Interfaces Group is using AI and sensor technologies to to create real-time agents that support meetings and conversations. One project's goal is to create agents that listen in on conversations and proactively suggest previously reviewed and/or new information that may be relevant. These agents run both on smart glasses for individual use in a mobile context (private AI) as well as in a smart, immersive room setting for use by a group of people. In another project we experiment with creating agents that can support more balanced brainstorming by acting as a partner with complementary point of view or complementary expertise to a user or set of users. Our workshop will demonstrate these systems with the goal to seek interest, feedback and collaborations from the member companies.

Asset Tokenization Challenges - Dr. Thomas Hardjono (Human Dynamics) in E15-466, Capacity 30

Asset Tokenization Challenges: As the recent Terra/Luna case indicates, there are several core issues in the tokenization of private money. Another emerging frontier is the tokenization of physical-digital assets. We discuss possible directions for addressing these challenges.

Cultivating Creativity - Professor Mitchel Resnick, PI (Lifelong Kindergarten), Professor Danielle Wood, PI (Space Enabled), Professor Zach Lieberman, PI (Future Sketches), Dr. David Kong, PI (Community Biotechnology), and Manaswi Mishra, Research Assistant (Opera of the Future),  in E14-245, Capacity 60  

Five Media Lab research groups involved in the Cultivating Creativity theme are organizing hands-on workshops based on tools, activities, and ideas from their groups (Lifelong Kindergarten, Opera of the Future, Space Enabled, Future Sketches, and Community Biotechnology). After a short opening overview of Cultivating Creativity, participants will divide into five parallel hour-long hands-on workshops (one from each group), then come together again for a “show & tell” and reflections on the experience. There is a limit of 12 participants per workshop, with a maximum of 60 participants overall.

Extreme Sensing: Seeing the unseen beyond walls, oceans, and planets - Akshat Dave, Postdoctoral Associate (Camera Culture), Siddharth Somasundaram, Research Assistant (Camera Culture), Ahmed Allam, Postdoctoral Associate (Signal Kinetics), Maisy Lam, Research Assistant (Signal Kinetics), Patrick Chwalek, Research Assistant (Responsive Environments), Fangzheng Liu, Research Assistant (Responsive Environments) in E15-359, Capacity 30

This workshop, a joint effort of Camera Culture, Signal Kinetics, and Responsive Environments, explores the innovations and challenges in extreme sensing, which can detect information beyond human perception and conventional sensors. We will discuss how emerging cameras can capture additional light dimensions and reveal hidden information, such as seeing around corners and turning objects into cameras. We will also explore how flexible wireless antennas can find items inside closed boxes or behind occlusions, and how battery-free underwater sensors can monitor climate change. Finally, we will talk about deploying sensing devices in the wild to sense humans and animals across our planet and on rovers and spacecraft for explorations beyond planetary boundaries.  https://sensing.media.mit.edu

AI for Accelerating Science Discovery Workshop- Professor Ramesh Raskar, PI (Camera Culture) in E14-240, Capacity 30 

Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing many aspects of society. In this workshop, we explore how AI can assist in scientific discovery and engineering across disciplines. By formulating scientific design as an optimization problem and using simulation to test candidate designs, time-consuming scientific design processes can be vastly accelerated, with the potential to lead to new scientific discoveries not yet imagined. Join us to learn about the research enabling AI accelerated scientific discovery in autonomous driving, camera design, drug design, and more.

Women’s Health, AI & Innovation Forum - in Multi Purpose Room, Capacity 150

The Women’s Health, AI & Innovation Forum features conversations with renowned women scientists from the MIT Media Lab and provides an inside look at the breakthroughs in technology and AI that are transforming the future of women’s health and impacting lives around the world. The Forum is co-hosted by Dava Newman, Director of the MIT Media Lab, and Kim Azzarelli, co-founder of Seneca Women and Executive-in-Residence at the MIT Media Lab. Speakers include scientists Rosalind W. Picard, Danielle Wood, Canan Dagdeviren and Deblina Sarkar. 

Parallel Sessions 2: October 25, 2023, 11:00am - 12:00pm 

Altering Brain Physiology with Wearables for Health and Optimal Performance - Professor Pattie Maes, PI (Fluid Interfaces) and Research Assistants (Fluid Interfaces) in E15-341, Capacity 46 Description coming soon.

Blockchain and Privacy Enhancing Technology – What are they, and what do they mean for your business? - Chris Calabia, Head of CBDC Programs (Digital Currency Initiative) in E14-240, Capacity 30

Join the research staff from MIT Digital Currency Initiative for a brief, interactive introduction to these two emerging technologies and join us in a conversation about what they could mean for business and society.

Evaluating Generative Images through Liquid Democracy – A Case Study in Architectural Textures - Yasushi Sakai, Research Assistant (City Science) and Kei Arima (TOPPAN) in E15-359, Capacity 30 

The advancements in generative AI over the past year have been truly transformative, reshaping our everyday lives with their versatility, pinpoint accuracy, and unprecedented response speeds. Despite this rapid integration of technology into our daily routines, statistics from the 2023 Stack Overflow Developer Survey reveal that a staggering 82% of programmers are already harnessing these tools in their software development processes.

Altfield Remix introduces a novel approach: Using Stable Diffusion as a foundation, users continually refine prompts, contributing to the evolution of a vast dendrogram of "metaskin"(conceptual material textures for space). Concurrently, users can assess various  “metaskin” concepts,  an innovative term describing spatial characteristics, within an integrated evaluation system.

Your insights and participation will shape the next chapter of this digital revolution.  The workshop anticipates particiants to bring their laptop or smartphone.

Unlock the Potential of AI Through Decentralization - Professor Ramesh Raskar, PI (Camera Culture) in E14-633, Capacity 90 

Artificial intelligence has the power to transform countless facets of human life, yet its implementation in many vital societal sectors continues to lag behind other industries. Healthcare offers a prime example, where critical hurdles like data privacy, incentive misalignment, and systemic trust issues obstruct large-scale collaboration and adoption. To bridge this gap, we propose a paradigm shift: decentralized AI that enables mutually beneficial coordination between entities with complementary strengths like data, compute, and models. Join the Camera Culture group for an illuminating workshop on the current progress, remaining challenges, and promising opportunities surrounding decentralized AI. Discover how this approach can foster collaboration at scale, align incentives, and build trust. Help unlock the transformative potential of AI in the areas that need it most.

Building Positive Online Spaces: Designing social media for connectedness and self-reflection - Ila Kumar and Craig Ferguson, Research Assistants (Affective Computing) in E15-466, Capacity 30

One of technology’s great strengths is being able to connect people across geographic divides, and give people a platform to express themselves. However, ironically, social platforms often end up making people feel more alone and like they have to mask how they really feel in a veil of positivity. In this hands-on session, participants will be challenged to interact digitally in novel ways (with mediums ranging from expressive comics to social robots) that are designed to boost feelings of connectedness and unlock often-unexpressed feelings and stories. We will discuss how these techniques can be applied to participants’ unique contexts to foster community and well-being for their core stakeholders.

AI and Future Therapeutics - Professor Rosalind Picard, PI (Affective Computing), Professor Joseph Jacobson, PI (Molecular Machines), Professor Canan Dagdeviren, PI (Conformable Decoders) Professor Deblina Sarkar, PI (Nano-Cybernetic Biotrek) and Professor Kevin Esvelt, PI (Sculpting Evolution) in Multi Purpose Room, Capacity 150 Description coming soon.

Generative AI and the Practice of Law: How technology redefines legal services and risks -Robert Mahari, Research Assistant (Human Dynamics) in E15-383, Capacity 30

Generative AI promises to enable the scalable provision of legal services, unlocking novel approaches to practice and catalyzing new business models. As these technologies augment attorneys' abilities, they challenge organizations to reimagine how they consume legal services and approach legal risk. This workshop will present ongoing research on the technological transformation of the legal profession, identify areas of legal practice likely to benefit from these changes, and explore how organizations can respond to these changes and opportunities. The workshop will be interactive and invite participants to contribute their own experiences and insights.