Research
Space Enabled

Advancing justice in Earth's complex systems using designs enabled by space
Article Research

Uruguay wants to use gene drives to eradicate devastating screwworms

The project was inspired by a conversation with Media Lab Professor Kevin Esvelt, a pioneer in developing gene drives.
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Conformable Decoders

Converting the patterns of nature and the human body into beneficial signals and energy
Project Research

Microgravity Research Flights with the Space Exploration Intiative

The Space Exploration Initiative charters an annual ZERO-G parabolic flight for 10-15 projects and 25 researchers across MIT Media Lab, sev…
Article Research

Life in space: Preparing for an increasingly tangible reality

The Space Exploration Initiative supports research across and beyond MIT in two microgravity flights this spring.
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Biomechatronics

Enhancing human physical capability
Project Research

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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Responsive Environments

Augmenting and mediating human experience, interaction, and perception with sensor networks
Project Research

QTY code designs for water-soluble beta-barrel transmembrane proteins

In addition to a large number of membrane proteins that comprise most alpha-helix transmembrane segments, there are also many transmembrane…
Article Research

Protein study could help researchers develop new antibiotics

Researchers created a water-soluble version of an important bacterial enzyme, which can be used in drug screens to identify new antibiotics.
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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
Project Research

conformable Ultrasound Patch (cUSP) 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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Space Exploration Initiative

Space Exploration Initiative
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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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Nano-Cybernetic Biotrek

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

Studying the evolution of gene drive systems

How will gene drive systems evolve once released into the wild? Can they be reliably overwritten and blocked by immunizing reversal drives?…
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Affective Computing

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

CRISPR gene drives and the future of evolution

Professor Kevin Esvelt talks to science journalist Hannah Thomasy about the power—and the risks—of biotechnology.
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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

The Gravity Loading Countermeasure Skinsuit

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

Electronic Textile Sensors for Decoding Vital Body Signals: State-of-the-Art Review on Characterizations and Recommendations

Shuvo, I. I., Shah, A., Dagdeviren, C.†, “Electronic Textile Sensors for Decoding Vital Body Signals: State-of-the-art Review on Characterizations and Recommendations”, https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202100223, Advanced Intelligent Systems, 4, 2100223, 2022.
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Tangible Media

Invent new tangible and embodied interactions that inspire and engage people
Project Research

conformable Facial Code Extrapolation Sensor (cFaCES)

AbstractDevices that facilitate nonverbal communication typically require high computational loads or have rigid and bulky form factors&nbs…
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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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Media Lab Research Theme: Cultivating Creativity

Cultivating Creativity | Catalyzing a global movement enabling everyone to unlock and unleash their individual and collective creativity
Project Research

Bio-Digital Wearables for Space Health Enhancement

Living in space could have significant physical and mental impacts on astronauts. Wearables have the potential to play a critical role in m…
Project Research

Life-Nanomachine Synergism

For more details and recent updates visit:  https://web.mit.edu/deblina-sarkar/Nanoelectronics has the potential to enable radica…
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Sculpting Evolution

Cultivating wisdom through evolutionary and ecological engineering
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Mediated Matter

Designing for, with, and by nature
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…
Project Research

Candlewax Rockets: A Green Alternative for In-Space Propulsion

The Space Enabled Research Group is exploring the potential of using beeswax and candle wax as potential fuels for satellites in space. Bee…
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…
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Camera Culture

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

How to Grow (Almost) Anything - A New Model for Global Synthetic Biology Education

A Distance Learning Model for Global Laboratory-Based Synthetic Biology Education Synthetic Biology ( SynBio) tools hold the…
Archived
Project Research

Aguahoja

Programmable Water-Based Biocomposites for Digital Design and Fabrication across ScalesAguahoja is an exploration of nature’s design space.…
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Archived
Project Research

Aguahoja II

Aguahoja II builds upon the platform technology of its predecessor, enabling large-scale multi-material 3D printing with abundant, organic …
Archived
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Community Biotechnology

Community Biotechnology
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Molecular Machines

Engineering at the limits of complexity with molecular-scale parts
Project Research

CyberBiome

CyberBiome is a programmable bio-digital organ, a wearable biosynthesis platform for personalized, on-demand production of therapeutics and…
Project Research

Peristaltic Suit

​Prolonged exposure to microgravity is known to cause various acute health risks, including muscle atrophy, bone loss, cardiovascular decon…
Article Research

Patches to the rescue

MIT Technology Review reports on transdermal drug delivery research from the Conformable Decoders group, led by Professor Canan Dagdeviren.
Project Research

Targeted intracellular degradation of SARS-CoV-2 via computationally optimized peptide fusions

The COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, has elicited a global health crisis of catastrophic proportions. With on…
Project Research

Secure DNA

A world in which thousands of people can construct and release autonomous biological agents is unlikely to flourishProfessor Kevin Esvelt, …
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…
Project Research

Understanding Molecular Evolution

Humanity has harnessed evolution to sculpt domesticated animals, crops, and molecules, but the process remains a black box. Which combinati…
Project Research

Mice Against Ticks - Preventing tick-borne disease by permanently immunizing mice

Lyme disease is the most common vector-borne infection in North America. People are infected when bitten by ticks; ticks are typically infe…
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Project Research

Aguahoja III

Aguahoja III expands the capabilities of a broad library of sustainable, organic 3D materials with generative patterns that countervail str…
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Archived
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,…
Archived
Archived
Project Research

Radiofungi: Biological Pigments for Radioprotection

A major concern for manned missions is space radiation. Ionizing radiation is known to pose both acute and chronic risks to many organisms,…
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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 …
Archived
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…
Archived
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…
Archived
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 …
Archived
Project Research

Receptor S-layer Electrical Nano Sensing Array (RESENSA)

A modular, membrane protein design based biomimetic sensing system named RESENSA (Receptor S-layer Electrical Nano Sens…
Article Research

Canan Dağdeviren: “Follow your dream because life is too short to follow someone else’s”

Canan Dağdeviren, head of the Conformable Decoders research group, discusses her time at the MIT Media Lab and where her research is headed.
Article Research

New sensor mimics cell membrane functions

The device detects the same molecules that cell receptors do, and may enable routine early screening for cancers and other diseases.
Archived
Project Research

Microgravity Extrusion

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

Why are we sending a plastic-eating enzyme to space?

A collaboration with researchers from the Space Exploration Initiative is investigating biological processes to upcycle plastics.
Article Research

A global lab for teaching and practicing synthetic biology

A pandemic-fueled transformation of the MIT course "How to Grow (Almost) Anything" leads to next steps in democratizing synthetic biology
Article Research

Artist Ani Liu has some radical suggestions for what pregnancy could look like: It begins with artificial wombs

The artist's incisive exhibition at Cuchifritos Gallery addresses the biological and political realities of childbearing and rearing.
Publication Research

AgriFuge: An exploration of controlled irrigation methods for a rotating plant habitat

Somayajulu Dhulipala, Manwei Chan. Agrifuge: An exploration of controlled irrigation methods for a rotating plant habitat. IAC-22, Paris, France. IAC-22,A2,3,4,x69080.
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]
Post Research

Lara Ozkan selected as a MIT Schwarzman College of Computing Scholar

Lara Ozkan (undergraduate researcher in the Conformable Decoders group) was selected as MIT Schwarzman College of Computing’s SERC Scholar.