CSAIL Spotlights
- MIT Big Data Initiative Launches Transportation Challenge, Privacy Working Group at White House Event
November 12, 2013The Big Data Initiative at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) today announced two new activities aimed at improving the use and management of Big Data. - From an MIT Classroom to a Multimillion Dollar Acquisition
October 25, 2013Locu, an online platform for promoting local businesses, was founded by students from CSAIL and the Sloan School of Management in 2010. Just three years later the company was acquired by GoDaddy. - Wireless Center Previews Next Generation Technology
October 09, 2013On Monday, October 7, the MIT Center for Wireless Networks and Mobile Computing (Wireless@MIT) hosted a one-day event showcasing new advances in wireless systems and mobile technology. The event featured talks by MIT faculty and researchers, as well as demonstrations of next generation wireless and mobile systems. - Taking a New Look at Subway Map Design
September 24, 2013Dr. Ruth Rosenholtz's research group is applying the computational model they developed to better understand peripheral vision to test the usability of potential new MBTA subway maps. - MEET Builds Ties, Fosters Innovation in the Middle East
September 20, 2013During a visit to Israel and Palestine in March 2013, President Barack Obama made a speech to a crowd of 2,000 young Israelis in Jerusalem in which he encouraged the nation’s youth to push for peace. In his talk, the President paid tribute to an educational program near and dear to the heart of the MIT community: The Middle East Education through Technology (MEET) program founded at MIT with... - A Computer Scientist’s Approach to Medicine
September 13, 2013For years Dr. Stephanie Seneff has been known throughout the computer science world for her work in natural language processing. Now, she is using the novel computer science techniques she developed to better understand how drugs and environmental toxins impact human health. - CSAIL Researchers Develop New Ways to Streamline, Simplify 3D Printing
July 23, 2013New CSAIL research to be presented at the 2013 SIGGRAPH computer graphics conference could transform the field of 3D printing. - Team MIT Completes First Hurdle in DARPA Robotics Challenge
June 27, 2013A team from MIT has advanced to the next stage of the prestigious DARPA Robotics Challenge (DRC), a competition sponsored by the Department of Defense to promote innovation in robotics technology for disaster-response operations. The MIT team beat out more than one hundred other teams in the first stage of the competition – the Virtual Robotics Challenge (VRC) – to gain one of six prized spots in... - Flying Like the Birds
November 13, 2012How does a bird handle the wind, hanging effortlessly while battered by gusts and darting through clusters of trees with seamless precision? Associate Professor Russ Tedrake wants to understand how birds can operate under such conditions and create machines that can do the same. His current goal is to develop an aircraft that can fly like a bird, darting through trees and narrowly avoiding... - Unlocking The Key To Human Intelligence
August 20, 2012What if machines could think like us - comprehending social cues, visual prompts and spoken words just like a human would? For CSAIL Professor Patrick Winston, the Ford Professor of Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science and leader of the Genesis Group at CSAIL, uncovering the true nature of human intelligence is the next grand challenge. - CSAIL Tackles Big Data
June 01, 2012In May 2012, CSAIL announced a major new initiative to tackle the challenges of the burgeoning field known as “big data” -- data collections that are too big, growing too fast, or are too complex for existing information technology systems to handle. - All In A Day’s Work: Design and Print Your Own Robot
April 24, 2012Professor Daniela Rus is leading an ambitious new project to reinvent how robots are produced and designed. Funded by a $10 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF), the project will aim to develop a desktop technology that would make it possible for the average person to design, customize and print a specialized robot in a matter of hours. - MERS Tackles The Human-Robot Divide
September 26, 2011You might not have to wait until 2062 to travel to work in an aerocar like George Jetson, thanks to work currently underway at CSAIL. An autonomous personal air taxi capable of ferrying you to Paris by 5pm with a flyover of London may sound futuristic, but it is a current project of CSAIL Principal Investigator Brian Williams and his Model-based Embedded and Robotic Systems (MERS) group. - Health Care of the Future
August 02, 2011In 1974 Professor Peter Szolovits made a prediction: By the 1980s a majority of large hospitals would have adopted the use of electronic medical records. While the necessary technology did not progress as quickly as expected to allow for this transition, the U.S. government is currently making a major push to ensure that hospitals switch from paper folders stuffed with memos to a secure and... - Future Directions for Selected Topics in Computer Science
May 14, 2011On May 14-15 2011, CSAIL hosted a workshop at the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in Cambridge, MA, sponsored by the Office of The Assistant Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (formerly DDR&E). The goal of the workshop, organized by Ed Lazowska (U Washington) and Victor Zue (MIT CSAIL), was to provide perspectives on barriers to advancement and potential breakthroughs... - Computation and the Transformation of Practically Everything
March 11, 2011"Computation and the Transformation of Practically Everything," April 11-12, 2011, will celebrate the evolution of the Information Age and MIT's contributions. The event will bring together early and recent pioneers from a variety of fields to review the role computation has played in the past and present and to explore frontiers that lie ahead. - Zooming in With Computational Photography
February 18, 2011Remember the Polaroid camera- that black box capable of spitting out an image within seconds of snapping the shutter? Once the star of social gatherings, a Polaroid camera now sits on a shelf in Bill Freeman’s office at CSAIL, a relic of a time gone by. - Perching Glider Takes a Cue from the Birds
September 28, 2010It isn't everyday that a computer scientist wins one of the most coveted awards in aeronautics. But when Rick Cory started in Associate Professor Russ Tedrake's Robot Locomotion Group as a Ph.D. student, he wasn't out to conduct robotics as usual. - Sikuli Rethinks Programming
April 22, 2010For as long as there have been computers, there has been coding. And with coding comes repetition—lots of it. That's always been the basic fact of a programmer's existence, even as computers have become ever more friendly from a user's perspective. - When Signals Cross
April 01, 2010The human body and the systems that maintain it are, at their most basic, bundles of crackling electricity. Impulses, currents and waves can be found in every part of our world, and they offer much in the way of information if they can be properly read and interpreted. - Women In Computer Science
February 18, 2010In the public eye, computer scientists are often portrayed as dry, secluded – and almost always male. But behind the outdated stereotype, the lab is full of real world applications, exciting collaborations, and researchers of both genders who are working hard to advance the state of the field. For this profile piece, we take a closer look at the work and paths of some prominent female researchers. - W3C: Maintaining a Web of Humanity
November 25, 2009While the “C” in CSAIL stands for computer, it’s not solely what goes on inside a computer that CSAIL researchers care about – especially when what’s running on the computer is the World Wide Web. - Multicore Computing
July 09, 2009Professor Anant Agarwal has a tendency to think big. One recent piece of work has just been donated to the MIT Museum after being documented in the 2007 Guinness Book of World Records as the largest microphone array on the planet – and that was just one component of a larger project. - The Center for Robotics: Intelligence in Action
July 06, 2009The CSAIL Center for Robotics brings together leading experts in robotics who are engaged in research aimed at creating robots that can drive cars, walk, fly, or swim; grasp and assemble arbitrary objects; perceive the world and find their way in buildings and streets; coordinate and form teams; and even change their shape to suit their task. - Agile Robotics: Autonomous Forklift
May 30, 2009The field of robotics began relatively modestly. Its founders attempted to create simple machines capable of performing tasks or interacting with the world. But in doing so, the first roboticists opened the door to an amazing area of study, rich with possibilities for extraordinary contributions to the greater good. - Semantic Communication: Uncertainty in the Digital Age
May 24, 2009CSAIL Professor Madhu Sudan is thinking about communication. His project posits that communication is possible between beings with no common bond of language or shared history. Its direct substantiating case examines a theoretical instance of the third kind, placing extraterrestrials and their instruments in contact with humans and their computers in a quest for understanding. - Quantum Computing
May 24, 2009Quantum computing is one of the most fascinating – if counterintuitive – final frontiers in the computing world today. Saddled with technical limitations and the potential impossibility of their pursuit, experimentalists and theoreticians alike have found themselves beset from all sides by uncertainty. In Professor Scott Aaronson’s view, this is where some of the most fascinating work occurs. - Precision Agriculture: Sustainable Farming in the Age of Robotics
April 22, 2009Early in the fall of 2008, students began gathering before a raised platform of fake grass. The artificial turf was adorned with evenly spaced tomato plants, nestled in sensible terra cotta pots. - Industry Affiliates Program: Bridging the Lab and the Marketplace
September 14, 2008The value of academic research is traditionally measured by its contribution to the world’s inventory of knowledge, through theses, papers, and physical artifacts. At CSAIL, we also view research as a practical matter – placing additional emphasis on designing and building technologies and solutions that have real-world impact. In many cases, this requires establishing partnerships with industry... - Project Qmulus: Building An Integrated Virtual Information Environment
July 07, 2008Imagine having complete access to your own personalized environment – your notes, presentations, music, TV recordings, photo albums, recipes – from anywhere in the world, anytime. Making this dream a reality is the goal of Project Qmulus, CSAIL’s five-year, $20 million collaboration with Taiwan-based Quanta Computer Inc., the world’s largest original design manufacturer of notebook computers.
