Nitin Sawhney completed his doctoral dissertation from MIT on January 2003. He has been a research assistant at the MIT Media Laboratory since 1996 and was awarded the Martin Fellowship for Sustainability with the MIT Laboratory for Energy and the Environment in 2002-2003. His research interests include Pervasive Computing, machine learning, CSCW and HCI. He often works in challenging interdisciplinary areas at the intersection of computation, design and social sciences.
Nitin's doctoral thesis was titled "Cooperative Innovation in the Commons", which focused on design platforms, pedagogical approaches and understanding intellectual property mechanisms that support distributed collaboration and innovation in sustainable technology. As part of this research, Nitin co-founded the ThinkCycle initiative, developed the online collaboration platform and co-taught the Design that Matters studio courses at MIT that tackle real-world problems in underserved communities. Nitin also founded and served as Program Co-chair for the international development by design conferences held in MIT and Bangalore, India in 2001-2002.
Nitin received his B.E. and M.S. degrees at Georgia Institute of Technology. At the Media Lab, he has developed responsive systems used in everyday social settings, such as Wearable Audio Computing and Aware Community Portals for shared workspaces. He has previously worked on mobile computing, speech and auditory research at the Media Lab, Fuji-Xerox Labs, GVU Lab and Mitsubishi Electric Research. He has also conducted ethnographic studies of communication in everyday domestic settings.
Nitin was awarded an International Patent for his research at Fuji Xerox, and the first Engelbart Best Paper Award at the Hypertext Conference in 1996. Over the past few years, he has worked with non-profit organizations to assist with grassroots developmental projects in India. Nitin also participates with local activist groups on awareness of socio-political issues in the Middle East and South Asia. Nitin enjoys vegetarian food, playing squash, jogging and cycling around Cambridge.
Nitin was born in New Delhi, India on October 27, 1971 and lived in Iran and Bahrain before coming to the US to pursue his university studies in 1989.
Advisors: Sandy Pentland (Human
Design) and Bish Sanyal (Urban Studies & Planning)
Previous Advisor: Chris
Schmandt (Speech Interface)
MIT Media Laboratory
E15-384B, 20 Ames Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
email:
phone: 617.258.5956
fax: 617.253.8874
http://www.media.mit.edu/~nitin
Research & Teaching Statement (PDF)
Resume 2003 (PDF)
Updated: Feb 28, 2003