Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, September, 2020 / Cataloged from student-submitted PDF of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages [48]-[53]). / This thesis presents the design, implementation, and evaluation of RVExp, a system that leverages radio perception to design efficient exploration controllers in highly occluded and non-line-of-sight settings. RVExp relies on eye-in-hand vision sensor and battery-less RFID tags attached to the object of interest. Since RF (radio frequency) signals can traverse everyday occlusions, RVExp uses the RFIDs' signals to locate an object through occlusions. At the heart of RVExp's design is a novel radio-visual planner that uses the RFID's location to semantically explore the environment and plan an efficient trajectory toward an occluded target object. The controller can efficiently discover obstacles by biasing a Gaussian belief space planner using the RFID's location. I have built RVExp end-to-end and evaluated its performance in challenging real-world environments. The results show the feasibility of RF-guided exploration and its superiority over standard exploration. / by Junshan Leng. / S.M. / S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences

Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2016. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 61-63). / Video has become so easy to make and distribute that it is becoming the most common way to describe many processes and ideas. However, it is often not effective at doing so. Within a context of a larger document, video is rarely a good citizen compared to text or images. It takes over the users attention and rarely points to other parts in the document.The video itself may be poorly made or it may demand too much time and investment on the part of the viewer relative to the content it provides. This thesis attempts to tackle this problem for a specific but useful circumstance: academic publishing. In this thesis, I develop and study two novel methods of using interactive video within an academic document for instruction and peer review. StepByStep explores how we can create a better tool for instruction and documentation of methods. A key property of good documentation is that it is easily skimmable for relevant information. StepByStep breaks down a video into steps and arranges them spatially so that users can skim and scroll through the steps to find what they're looking for. VideoComments is an attempt to create an alternative method of leaving feedback to a document. By pairing a video recording of a user along with their actions on the document, we allow users to reference images and embeds easily, quickly switch between different parts of the document and record their thoughts in real-time. Finally, this thesis creates an infrastructure in which interactive video applications such as StepByStep and VideoComments can be integrated into academic publishing standards and platforms. / by Thariq Shihipar. / S.M.

Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2016. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 99-109). / Thesis: S.M.. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Computation for Design and Optimization Program, 2016. / Labor market institutions are central for modern economies, and their polices can directly affect unemployment rates and economic growth. At the individual level, unemployment often has a detrimental impact on people's well-being and health. At the national level, high employment is one of the central goals of any economic policy, due to its close association with national prosperity. The main goal of this thesis is to highlight the need for frameworks that take into account the complex structure of labor market interactions. In particular, we explore the benefits of leveraging tools from computational social science, network science, and data-driven theories to measure the flow of opportunities and information in the context of the labor market. First, we investigate our key hypothesis, which is that opportunity/information flow through weak ties, and this is a key determinant of the length of unemployment. We then extend the idea of opportunity/information flow to clusters of other economic activities, where we expect the flow within clusters of related activities to be higher than within isolated activities. This captures the intuition that within related activities there are more "capitals" involved and that such activities require similar "capabilities." Therefore, more extensive clusters of economic activities should generate greater growth through exploiting the greater flow of opportunities and information. We quantify the opportunity/information flow using a complexity measure of two economic activities (i.e. jobs and exports). / by Abdullah Almaatouq. / S.M.

Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2016. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 131-136). / Biodesign is a growing field that harnesses the re-engineering capabilities of synthetic biology and the principles of design to create functional products on a variety of scales. It is now possible to precisely modify and program living organisms to create products useful for medicine, fabrication, and more. These capabilities are today inspiring designers to consider, and design for opportunities associated with, the incorporation of biological and otherwise living matter into the built environment. Standard Computer Aided Design (CAD) software used in design and engineering often does not have resolution required for living systems, whereas many known bioCAD software do not allow for larger scales. In addition, simulations and animations are usually limited to a short timescale, and do not allow for predictive models over days or weeks. For creating environments in which living materials or systems, from bacterial biofilms to functional swarms, can intertwine with synthetically fabricated constructs, rapid prototyping software must be developed that can allow for both design and simulation in different conditions over time. This thesis is an attempt at creating a design methodology and finding a software platform for inclusion of living material systems in manufacturing of products on multiple scales. Existing biological CAD software is surveyed and applied to two case study projects engaging multiple scales (i.e. human scale, and architectural scale) for which the digital fabrication of living materials provides additional functionality and augments the biological or ecological environment. In the process, novel work is presented in the areas of apiary management and 3D printing with biology. Additionally, several computational approaches, including rule based and agent-based techniques, are applied to both projects and evaluated for accuracy and usability. This research took place in Mediated Matters newly constructed BL2 Wet Lab, and serves as a demonstration of research that lies at the intersection of additive manufacturing and synthetic biology. / by Sunanda Sharma. / S.M.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2016. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 149-160). / This thesis introduces and examines methods for the capture and reproduction of music on the piano that maintain a tight coupling between the body, the sound, and the physical instrument. For expert musicians, the body plays an indispensable role in the physical act of playing and the understanding of both musical structure and expressivity. However, many music learning technologies mistakenly assume that playing music is "playing the notes" and neglect the role of the body in the development of the musical mind. Drawing from research in telepresence, tangible interfaces, and augmented reality, I propose to bring the body back into the picture, literally and metaphorically, by augmenting a digital player piano with projection mapping. My platform synchronizes dynamic imagery with the piano's moving keys and acoustic sounds. I here focus on two main projects: MirrorFugue and Andante. Inspired by reflections on the lacquered surfaces of a grand piano, MirrorFugue simulates the presence of a virtual pianist whose reflection is actually playing the physically moving keys. It encourages anyone to take the seat left empty at the piano, to feel in his or her own body how music is expressed through the body of the performer, and to play along. Andante presents music as miniature figures that appear to walk and dance on the piano keyboard, physically striking a key with each stop. It conveys the expressivity in rhythms and phrases as well as musical structures through the bodies and movements of the figures. Both installations are designed as immersive "sandboxes" for the playful exploration of musical ideas. Beyond my projects, this thesis explores the parallels between music learning and learning and large. I discuss the connections between theories of music learning (particularly Dalcroze Eurhythmics) with theories of general mental development (Jean Piaget, Jerome Bruner, Seymour Papert, and Marvin Minsky), as well as how strategies from music learning could inform the art of learning in general. / by Xiao Xiao. / Ph. D.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2016. / This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections. / "September 2016." Cataloged from student-submitted PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 148-156). / In this dissertation, I explore the theme of wonder in technology, learning and self-expression through the lens of paper electronics, which is circuit building on paper using conductive tapes and circuit components as electronic craft materials. This new medium blends the interactive functionality of electronics with the expressive flexibility of the paper medium. I present an overview of the paper electronics medium as well as its extension in the form of electrified books, books with circuitry integrated with its pages and spine. I then described the design of a paper electronics toolkit called circuit stickers and how this toolkit was deployed through a company called Chibitronics. Finally, through the circuit stickers toolkit, I investigate and evaluate the paper electronics medium as a learning tool and approach, expressive medium and method to engage more diverse communities in technology creation. These investigations show that paper electronics has indeed impacted learners, educators and creators across many backgrounds and disciplines. It has enabled educators to teach a broad range of subjects and skills in new ways. Artists have used paper electronics to explore electricity and interactivity for self-expression, demonstrating the aesthetic flexibility and expressive potency of this medium. Finally, it has engaged creators from diverse communities and backgrounds including educators, Makers, and crafters. It enables not only new approaches to learning and creating technology, it also engages new types of creators in inventing surprising technological artifacts--ones that inspire new experiences, objects and opportunities for wonder. / by Jie Qi. / Ph. D.

Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2017. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. Page 104 blank. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 100-103). / The need for computer science education is greater than ever. There are currently over 500,000 unfilled computer science jobs in the United States and many schools do not teach computer science in their classrooms. Computers are powerful tools, and computational thinking-skills of problem-solving, logic, and abstraction that form the foundation of computer science-can be applied across other disciplines. Many current approaches to computer science education use computer screens. Though computer science education is important and effective from a young age, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends we limit screen time in children; and research shows that excessive screen time is detrimental for a child's development. A 2006 research study by Angeline Lillard published in Science showed that Montessori students scored higher on academic, cognitive, social, and behavioral tests than students in a traditional elementary school setting. The Montessori Method is characterized by mixed-age classrooms, child-driven learning, and a series of sensorial, physical materials. Developed nearly 100 years ago by Dr. Maria Montessori, the Montessori curriculum does not explicitly include computer science in its curriculum. This research examines the Montessori Method as a way to teach computer science for early childhood education. Interpreting and extending Dr. Montessori's original pedagogy, I have developed a curriculum with new learning materials for young children that breaks down the fundamentals of computational thinking into a set of discrete concepts that are expressed in tactile, hands-on ways. This research evaluates this approach through direct observation and teacher feedback; and suggests the potential for this Method as an effective approach to teach computational concepts to young children. / by Kimberly Smith. / S.M.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2017. / This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections. / Cataloged from student-submitted PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 115-122). / Much of human social communication is channeled through our facial expressions, body language, gaze directions, and many other nonverbal behaviors. A robot's ability to express and recognize the emotional states of people through these nonverbal channels is at the core of artificial social intelligence. The purpose of this thesis is to define a computational framework to nonverbal communication for human-robot interactions. We address both sides to nonverbal communication, the decoding and encoding of social-emotional states through nonverbal behaviors, and also demonstrate their shared underlying representation. We use our computational framework to model engagement/attention in storytelling interactions. Storytelling is an interaction form that is mutually regulated between storytellers and listeners where a key dynamic is the back-and- forth process of speaker cues and listener responses. Listeners convey attentiveness through nonverbal back-channels, while storytellers use nonverbal cues to elicit this feedback. We demonstrate that storytellers employ plans, albeit short, to influence and infer the attentive state of listeners using these speaker cues.We computationally model the intentional inference of storytellers as a planning problem of getting listeners to pay attention. When accounting for this intentional context of storytellers, our attention estimator outperforms current state-of-the-art approaches to emotion recognition. By formulating emotion recognition as a planning problem, we apply a recent artificial intelligence method of inverting planning models to perform belief inference. We computationally model emotion expression as a combined process of estimating a person's beliefs through inference inversion and then producing nonverbal expressions to affect those beliefs.We demonstrate that a robotic agent operating under our belief manipulation paradigm more effectively communicates an attentive state compared to current state-of- the-art approaches that cannot dynamically capture how the robot's expressions are interpreted by the human partner. / Jin Joo Lee. / Ph. D.

Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2017 / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 175-183). / This thesis introduces, demonstrates and implements translational design computation: a theoretical approach and technical framework for mediating living and nonliving matter through design computation. I propose that computational design can act as a "language" for the enablement of design at the intersection of the material and the biological domains. I support and validate this proposition by formulating, deploying and evaluating a triad of strategies as follows: (1) Programmable Matter-utilizing computational design in combination with synthetic material systems to enable biologically inspired and informed design; (2) Programmable Templating-utilizing computational design in combination with, and at the intersection of, synthetic and biological systems in order to facilitate their synergetic relationships; and (3) Programmable Growth-utilizing computational design in combination with biological systems to grow material architectures. / Each of these design strategies is demonstrated through specific design challenges. For Programmable Matter; a data-driven material modeling method that allows to reinterpret visual complexities found in nature is presented and subsequently extended to a design framework for the 3D printing of functionally graded structures. For Programmable Templating; a design approach for creating a macrofluidic habitat, exploring phototrophic and heterotrophic bacterial augmentation templated by continuous opacity gradients, is presented. Following, spatio-temporal templating of engineered microorganisms via 3D printed diffusion gradients is investigated. Finally, for Programmable Growth; a framework is proposed with the objective of importing computer-aided design capabilities to biology. Enforcing the design-centric approach, a design collection called Vespers-a reinterpretation of the practice of the ancient death mask-is presented and discussed in the context of the introduced concepts. / Thesis contributions are not limited to innovations in computational design and digital fabrication but also to materials engineering and biology by proposing new ecological perspectives on and for design. / by Christoph Bader. / S.M. / S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences

Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2017. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 75-77). / Cities are our future. Ninety percent of the world's population growth is expected to take place in cities. Not only are cities becoming bigger, they are also becoming more complex and changing even more rapidly. The decision-making process in urban design and urban planning is outdated. Currently, urban decision-making is mostly a top-down process, with community participation only in its late stages. Furthermore, many design decisions are subjective, rather than based on quantifiable performance and data. Urban simulation and artificial intelligence techniques have become more mature and accessible. However, until now these techniques have not been integrated into the urban decision-making process. Current tools for urban planning do not allow both expert and non-expert stakeholders to explore a range of complex scenarios rapidly with real-time feedback. To address these challenges, a dynamic, evidence-based decision support system called CityMatrix was prototyped. The goals of CityMatrix were 1) Designing an intuitive Tangible User Interface (TUI) to improve the accessibility of the decision-making process for non-experts. 2) Creating real-time feedback of multi-objective urban performances to help users evaluate their decisions, thus to enable rapid, collaborative decision-making. 3) Constructing a suggestion-making system that frees stakeholders from excessive, quantitative considerations and allows them to focus on the qualitative aspects of the city, thus helping them define and achieve their goals more efficiently. CityMatrix was augmented by Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques including Machine Learning simulation predictions and optimization search algorithms. The hypothesis explored in this work was that the decision quality could be improved by the organic combination of both strength of human intelligence and machine intelligence. The system was pilot-tested and evaluated by comparing the problem-solving results of volunteers, with or without Al suggestions. Both quantitative and qualitative analytic results showed that CityMatrix is a promising tool that helps both professional and nonprofessional users understand the city better to make more collaborative and better-informed decisions. CityMatrix was an effort towards evidence-based, democratic decisionmaking. Its contributions lie in the application of Machine Learning as a versatile, quick, accurate, and low-cost approach to enable real-time feedback of complex urban simulations and the implementation of the optimization searching algorithms to provide open-ended decision-making suggestions. / by Yan Zhang. / S.M.