Dr. Joseph Jacobson
Joseph Jacobson is Associate Professor at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he leads the MIT Media Lab’s Molecular Machines Group and is a founding member of the Center for Bits and Atoms. His lab at MIT has co-pioneered developments in Genomically Re-Coded Organisms (The first forms of life which run a different genetic code) and Next Generation (chip based) Gene Synthesis for a range of applications including programming cells to produce new pharmaceuticals, renewable chemicals, fuels and food. His lab is currently focused on the application of machine learning, AI to design small molecule and protein therapeutics. In the private sector Jacobson was a co-founder of E Ink Corporation, Gen9 (now part of Gingko Bioworks) and DeepCure and was a founding director of the non-profit foundation, One Laptop Per Child (OLPC), which designs and builds laptops for education for kids around the globe. He was educated at Brown University (B.S.), MIT (Ph.D. Physics) and Stanford (Post-Doctoral Fellow).