The College of Sciences is pleased to announce the launch of the AI4Science Center. The center will promote research and collaboration focused on using state-of-the-art artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) techniques to address complex scientific challenges.

“AI and ML have the potential to revolutionize scientific discovery, but there is a clear need for foundational research centered on AI/ML methodologies and application to scientific problems,” says Dimitrios Psaltis, professor in the School of Physics.

Psaltis will co-lead the center with Molei Tao, professor in the School of Mathematics, and Audrey Sederberg, assistant professor in the School of Psychology.

The new center will combine expertise and resources from various disciplines to foster the creation of robust, reusable tools and methods that can be used across scientific domains. Specifically, the center will organize seminars and an annual conference in addition to providing seed funding for collaborative projects across units. 

Nearly 40 faculty members from the College’s six schools have already agreed to participate in activities proposed by the center; additional faculty involvement is expected from across the Institute.

The center builds upon initiatives such as Tech AI, the Machine Learning Center, and the Institute for Data Engineering and Science, which seek to boost Georgia Tech’s leadership in cutting-edge, AI/ML-powered interdisciplinary research and education.

The College’s seed grant program will sponsor the center for three years, starting in fiscal year 2026. Created in 2024, this program funds new centers that seek to increase the College’s research impact and advance its strategic goal of excellence in research through a focus on novel interdisciplinary areas or discipline-specific topics of high impact. The AI4Science Center is the third initiative to be seeded by this program, following the funding of the Center for Sustainable and Decarbonized Critical Energy Mineral Solutions and the Center for Research and Education in Navigation in 2024.

“The AI4Science Center was selected for its approach, timeliness, organization, and strong support from all six of the College’s schools,” says Laura Cadonati, associate dean for Research and professor in the School of Physics. “Faculty enthusiasm about this initiative reflects the growing importance of AI/ML tools in research today and the desire for more interdisciplinary collaboration in this space at the College and beyond.”

Laboratories are central to Georgia Tech’s mission of driving groundbreaking research, innovative discoveries, and life-saving technology. However, these labs are also significant consumers of resources. With nearly 900,000 square feet of campus lab space, labs use, on average, 10 times the electricity and four times the water of a typical classroom. They also produce most of the hazardous waste on campus. In 2023, Environmental Health and Safety (EH&S) brought the issue to the attention of the Office of Sustainability, which led the charge in 2024 to launch a My Green Lab working group and sponsored three campus labs to work toward certification, including the School of Biological Sciences Instructional Labs, the Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience’s Molecular Evolution Core Facility, and the Takayama Lab.  

My Green Lab is an international community of scientists dedicated to making laboratories more sustainable and resource-efficient. To achieve My Green Lab certification, each lab conducted an initial assessment to evaluate their current sustainability practices and identified areas of improvement, including waste, water, and electricity. Labs were encouraged to adopt measures such as defrosting and cleaning refrigerator coils, using timers for test equipment, and promoting best practices. Alicia Wood-Jones, Lab and Safety Officer for EH&S, was a key leader in the working group. Known for her work on the Chemical Reclamation Committee, Wood-Jones’ vision and drive are instrumental in finding innovative solutions to long-standing challenges in lab decommissioning. 

She thanks her colleagues, including the EH&S Lab and Chemical Safety Team, “for their help and vision. We believe that even small steps forward can make a big difference here at Georgia Tech. I am so appreciative to all involved. I look forward to future collaborations with lab members on campus.”  

Katherine Nguyen and her team in the Takayama Lab construct multicellular models and dissect cell signaling pathways to understand disease physiology. While pursuing this research, the lab team activated measures to responsibly manage their lab resources, such as recycling in the lab, keeping centrifuges at room temperature when not needed, and consolidating orders. 

“I’m incredibly happy and proud to have been a part of this program and appreciate everyone’s hard work to try to make Georgia Tech a more sustainable campus,” she said. “Our lab was the first academic lab at Georgia Tech to get certified. Sometimes, graduate students want to be greener, but don’t know how to or feel like we have the power to. My Green Lab helped identify feasible options for labs to reduce their waste. Even if labs couldn’t make every single change, any improvement is a positive change.”  

Sustainability efforts at the Molecular Evolution Core Laboratory are led by Anton Bryksin, Shweta Biliya, and Adam Fallah. The lab is pioneering Tip-Cycle, a program that sterilizes and recycles pipettes for reuse. This lab also monitors campus blackwater for diseases such as Covid-19, using thousands of pipettes in their work. Faced with resource constraints during the pandemic, these researchers developed innovative solutions to maximize resource efficiency. “We’ve always wanted to make our lab practices more sustainable, but weren’t sure where to start. My Green Lab gave us the tools and guidance to turn that intention into action. This certification represents the dedication of our entire team to create a more sustainable environment,” said Biliya, a Georgia Tech research scientist.  

The My Green Lab initiative offers an approach for transforming campus labs into more efficient spaces while producing less hazardous waste. By prioritizing sustainability in our labs, Georgia Tech can have both a global reputation for research and responsible resource management.  

Visit the Office of Sustainability for more information on My Green Lab. 

About Tech AI
Tech AI is Georgia Tech's hub for artificial intelligence research, education, and responsible deployment. With over $120 million in active AI research funding, including more than $60 million in NSF support for five AI Research Institutes, Tech AI drives innovation through cutting-edge research, industry partnerships, and real-world applications. With over 370 papers published at top AI conferences and workshops, Tech AI is a leader in advancing AI-driven engineering, mobility, and enterprise solutions. Through strategic collaborations, Tech AI bridges the gap between AI research and industry, optimizing supply chains, enhancing cybersecurity, advancing autonomous systems, and transforming healthcare and manufacturing. Committed to workforce development, Tech AI provides AI education across all levels, from K-12 outreach to undergraduate and graduate programs, as well as specialized certifications. These initiatives equip students with hands-on experience, industry exposure, and the technical expertise needed to lead in AI-driven industries. Bringing AI to the world through innovation, collaboration, and partnerships. Visit tech.ai.gatech.edu.

Founded in 2014, CREATE-X has grown from a visionary concept into a transformative program that has empowered more than 34,000 students to launch more than 560 startups, achieving a total portfolio valuation of over $2 billion. The report, “CREATE-X: A Decade of Success,” reviews the first 10 years of impact and mission. 

CREATE-X was established to instill entrepreneurial confidence in Georgia Tech students and provide them with the knowledge, skills, and experiences needed to create their own future. From its humble beginnings with eight teams, the program has expanded to include three distinct branches: Learn, Make, and Launch. These branches cater to the multifaceted needs of entrepreneurial students, offering courses, mentorship, seed funding, and opportunities to develop and launch startups.

Through our value pillars of experiential education, entrepreneurial confidence, and real-world impact, we strive to enable our students to solve the problems they are passionate about solving. And as we look to the future, CREATE-X aims to become the nation’s top startup campus, launching 300 startups each year. 

Our commitment to nurturing student innovation and expanding entrepreneurial education remains steadfast. We invite all Georgia Tech students, faculty, alumni, and the public to join us in this exciting journey. Together, we create the future.

Download our report.

Interested in creating your own startup?

Georgia Tech students, faculty, researchers, and alumni interested in developing their own startups are encouraged to apply to CREATE-X’s Startup Launch. The program provides $5,000 in optional seed funding, $150,000 in in-kind services, mentorship, entrepreneurial workshops, networking events, and resources to help build and scale startups. The program culminates in Demo Day, where teams present their startups to potential investors. The deadline to apply for Startup Launch is March 19, 2025. Spots are limited. Apply now for a higher chance of acceptance and early feedback. 

For students interested in taking a CREATE-X course, consider exploring Startup Lab, Idea to Prototype, and CREATE-X Capstone Design. These courses can be taken in any order to fit your schedule, and they offer opportunities for funding and other resources. The deadline for applications and registrations for these courses is Jan. 6 for Spring 2025 and May 12 for Summer 2025. 

And as always, we invite you to attend our CREATE-X events. CREATE-X hosts workshops and events throughout the year, focusing on brainstorming and receiving feedback on startup ideas, networking and building a team, understanding the legal landscapes of startups, hearing founder insights, and witnessing the latest innovations at Georgia Tech. We hope to see you there.

Interested in supporting CREATE-X?

Faculty members interested in getting involved with CREATE-X can participate as teachers or mentors in various programs such as Startup Lab, CREATE-X Capstone, Idea to Prototype, and Startup Launch. Faculty can also apply for the next cohort of the Jim Pope Fellowship when it opens in the spring. For additional information or inquiries, contact the director of CREATE-X, Rahul Saxena, at rahulsaxena@gatech.edu.

For those interested in donating to or partnering with CREATE-X, your generosity and collaboration is greatly appreciated. Donations to CREATE-X can be made through Georgia Tech’s Give Campus portal. For questions and requests to collaborate, please email create-x@groups.gatech.edu.

CREATE-X appreciates the unwavering support from our community, donors, and partners. Your contributions have been instrumental in shaping the entrepreneurial landscape at Georgia Tech. 

To our students, we encourage you to continue being bold, creative, and fearless in your pursuits. CREATE-X is here to support you every step of the way, providing the resources, mentorship, and opportunities you need to turn your ideas into reality. 

Effective January 1st, Gregory Sawicki will serve as interim executive director of the Georgia Tech Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (IRIM). Sawicki is a professor and the Joseph Anderer Faculty Fellow in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering with a joint appointment in the School of Biological Sciences.

“Professor Greg Sawicki will make a great interim executive director of IRIM. He brings experience with robotics and collaborative research to this role,” said Julia Kubanek, professor and vice president for interdisciplinary research at Georgia Tech. “He'll be a strong partner to faculty, students, and the EVPR team as we explore the future of IRIM and robotics over the next several months."

Sawicki succeeds Seth Hutchinson who will be taking a new position at Northeastern University in Boston. Hutchinson, professor and KUKA Chair for Robotics in Georgia Tech’s College of Computing, has served as executive director of IRIM for six years. During Hutchinson’s tenure as executive director, IRIM expanded its industry outreach activities, developed more consistent communications, and grew its faculty pool at Georgia Tech to include a diverse cohort from across the Colleges of Engineering and Computing and the Georgia Tech Research Institute. 

"I am extremely excited to step into this leadership role for IRIM, maintain our research excellence in the foundational areas of robotics, and proactively leverage opportunities to grow across campus and beyond in novel, creative interdisciplinary directions,” said Sawicki. “This will involve new initiatives to incentivize connections with GTRI and other IRI's on campus, to build new industry partnerships, and continue to strengthen the M.S./Ph.D. program in Robotics by engaging with Schools beyond those with a traditional footprint in robotics education and research.”

Sawicki directs the Human Physiology of Wearable Robotics (PoWeR) Lab where he and his group seek to discover physiological principles underpinning locomotion performance and apply them to develop lower-limb robotic devices capable of improving both healthy and impaired human locomotion. By focusing on the human side of the human-machine interface, his team has begun to create a roadmap for the design of lower-limb robotic exoskeletons that are truly symbiotic – that is, wearable devices that work seamlessly in concert with the underlying physiological systems to facilitate the emergence of augmented human locomotion performance.

Sawicki earned a B.S. in mechanical and aerospace engineering from Cornell University in 1999, an M.S. in mechanical and aeronautical engineering from the University of California - Davis in 2001, and a Ph.D. in neuromechanics at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor in 2007. Sawicki completed his postdoctoral studies in integrative biology at Brown University in 2009.

Sawicki has been recognized for his interdisciplinary research and teaching, recently receiving a $2.6 million Research Project Grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to study optimization and artificial intelligence to personalize exoskeleton assistance for individuals with symptoms resulting from stroke. * Sawicki was also selected as a 2021 George W. Woodruff School Academic Leadership Fellow, and the 2022 College of Sciences Student Recognition of Excellence in Teaching and the 2023 American Society of Biomechanics Founders’ Award for excellence in research and mentoring. Sawicki has also been featured as an expert voice on exoskeletons and human neuromechanics in numerous print and television news releases.

--Christa M. Ernst

*Joint Award with Aaron Young, Assistant Professor in the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering

Anna Doll is the education curator at the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking, located in Georgia Tech’s Renewable Bioproducts Institute. Doll’s day-to-day responsibilities, and the many projects she handles at the museum, bring tremendous value not only to the Georgia Tech community, but also to the papermaking community around the world. 

With a degree in art education and a minor in art history, Doll began her career as an elementary school art teacher in Pinellas County, Florida. She then became the director of Museums for the Folk Pottery Museum of Northeast Georgia and the Sautee Nacoochee Cultural Center History Museum and Heritage Site. 

In 2019, Doll joined the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking team as its education curator. At the museum, she creates and manages programs that include educational tours, private and public workshops on papermaking, specialized workshops through creative collaborations with artists, collaborations with other campus units for STEAM activities, and community events for kindergarten through senior adult audiences. 

"I didn't know a whole lot about papermaking when I first started here," admits Doll, "but I knew how to be an education curator." Her ability to swiftly absorb the history and concept of papermaking and translate it into engaging educational experiences has been instrumental in her success. Below are a few highlights of Doll’s projects.

Museum Tours 
Doll’s daily activities include educational tours of the papermaking museum for groups of all ages. The tours range from introducing the papermaking process to elementary and middle school students to sharing the history and heritage of papermaking with adults. In addition, she conducts virtual programs for groups interested in the history of paper and the technological advances of the papermaking process since its invention many centuries ago. 

Workshops
Doll is the point of contact for public and private workshop bookings. She also develops the concepts for these sessions, catering to groups with various interests (e.g., Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, people with disabilities, teachers, artists, college students, and public groups). This spring, Doll’s workshops included Suminagashi, Production Papermaking, Petal Fold Book, Paper Casting, and Magic Box: Jacob’s Ladder.

In addition to conceptualizing and conducting tours and workshops, she designs curricula and other resources involving paper art and science for K-12 teachers to integrate into their art classes. 

Big Paper Workshop – Convening Artists, Educators, and Community Members for a Transformative Experience in Papermaking
This spring, Doll and her colleague Jerushia Graham created a communal workshop called “Big Paper.” Offered on multiple days, this project included five college groups from Georgia and Alabama and community groups from metro Atlanta who got to create a large sheet of paper from pulp. Participants beat plant material by hand to prepare the fiber and worked with Tom Balbo, founding director of the Morgan Conservatory, to create a huge 4’x6’ sheet of paper that was mailed back to them once it was dry. 

Through her work at the museum, Doll has cultivated relationships with various artists, all of whom collaborate with the museum to conduct workshops and create and showcase art exhibits.

Additional Collaborations Across Campus
Doll partners with other units on campus to create programs. She collaborated with the Georgia Tech Library on a program called “Tech's Tactile Thursdays.” Hosted on the first Thursday of each month, it allows students, faculty, and staff to work on hands-on projects related to paper and provides an opportunity for the largely technology-focused participants to take a break from their routine, relax, and explore their creative side and enhance their well-being. 

Doll also has been an active educator at Georgia Tech Science and Engineering Day, which is part of the Atlanta Science Festival. This year, more than 3,000 K-12 students and parents visited Georgia Tech’s campus to engage in hands-on STEAM activities. Representing the museum, Doll worked with families to make prints on a clamshell printing press featuring a custom-designed Buzz image (designed by Doll) on a postcard for the kids to take home. The activity showcased the rich history of the printing press and modern technology with a photopolymer printing plate.

Through these diverse projects and initiatives at the museum, Doll continues to make a difference in the world of papermaking. Looking ahead, she hopes to expand the museum’s educational initiatives as well as the education team and its resources, and she envisions broadening the museum’s reach and impact by offering free programs to schools through grants. She is also working with Georgia Tech faculty and researchers on museum research into the art of nano cellulose and plans to establish a paper and natural dye garden for teaching.

On Aug. 29 in the Exhibition Hall from 5 to 7p.m, CREATE-X will celebrate its 10th year of supporting entrepreneurship at Georgia Tech by introducing its next cohort of startup founders at Demo Day. This free event, attracting more than 1,500 people annually, allows the public to explore products from over 100 newly minted startups, ranging from consumer apps to deep tech. It also provides a chance to engage with more than 250 founders thanks to its no-pitch format.

Since its inception in 2014, CREATE-X has worked to infuse a spirit of entrepreneurship at Georgia Tech. From supporting eight teams in its inaugural cohort, the program has grown to support the launch of over 100 startups this summer, bringing the total to 560 startup teams boasting a total portfolio valuation of over $2 billion. In the last year, the program has expanded internationally and looks to continue building opportunities for its students. 

“Our mission is to instill entrepreneurial confidence. We believe that entrepreneurship is a life skill,” says Rahul Saxena, CREATE-X director. “Georgia Tech students are capable of creating startups. We’re just giving them the tools and resources to do it. We want every Tech student to have this advantage when starting their business.”

At the kickoff for Startup Launch, the program’s summer startup accelerator, CREATE-X co-founder Chris Klaus spoke on the landscape of startups. “The secret sauce for unicorns is colleges. The number of unicorns is increasing, and I expect that trend to continue. This is the perfect place to build a startup,” he said. 

Startup Launch has concluded for the summer, and the founders are preparing to showcase their solutions at Demo Day.

Register Now

“We invite you to become part of shaping what comes next. Support these founders as they creatively solve real-world issues. See future industry leaders be born. Join us for the culmination of these founders’ hard work, passion, and ingenuity at Demo Day,” Rahul said. 

Demo Day 2024 registration is open. Tickets are free but limited. Don’t miss this chance to witness the future of innovation and entrepreneurship. For more information, visit the CREATE-X website.

When it comes to manufacturing innovation, the “valley of death” — the gap between the lab and the industry floor where even the best discoveries often get lost — looms large.

“An individual faculty’s lab focuses on showing the innovation or the new science that they discovered,” said Aaron Stebner, professor and Eugene C. Gwaltney Jr. Chair in Manufacturing in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. “At that point, the business case hasn't been made for the technology yet — there's no testing on an industrial system to know if it breaks or if it scales up. A lot of innovation and scientific discovery dies there.”

The Georgia Tech Manufacturing Institute (GTMI) launched the Advanced Manufacturing Pilot Facility (AMPF) in 2017 to help bridge that gap. 

Now, GTMI is breaking ground on an extensive expansion to bring new capabilities in automation, artificial intelligence, and data management to the facility. 

“This will be the first facility of this size that's being intentionally designed to enable AI to perform research and development in materials and manufacturing at the same time,” said Stebner, “setting up GTMI as not just a leader in Georgia, but a leader in automation and AI in manufacturing across the country.”

AMPF: A Catalyst for Collaboration

Located just north of Georgia Tech’s main campus, APMF is a 20,000-square-foot facility serving as a teaching laboratory, technology test bed, and workforce development space for manufacturing innovations.

“The pilot facility,” says Stebner, “is meant to be a place where stakeholders in academic research, government, industry, and workforce development can come together and develop both the workforce that is needed for future technologies, as well as mature, de-risk, and develop business cases for new technologies — proving them out to the point where it makes sense for industry to pick them up.”

In addition to serving as the flagship facility for GTMI research and the state’s Georgia AIM (Artificial Intelligence in Manufacturing) project, the AMPF is a user facility accessible to Georgia Tech’s industry partners as well as the Institute’s faculty, staff, and students.

“We have all kinds of great capabilities and technologies, plus staff that can train students, postdocs, and faculty on how to use them,” said Stebner, who also serves as co-director of the GTMI-affiliated Georgia AIM project. “It creates a unique asset for Georgia Tech faculty, staff, and students.”

Bringing AI and Automation to the Forefront

The renovation of APMF is a key component of the $65 million grant, awarded to Georgia Tech by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Economic Development Administration in 2022, which gave rise to the Georgia AIM project. With over $23 million in support from Georgia AIM, the improved facility will feature new workforce training programs, personnel, and equipment. 

Set to complete in Spring 2026, the Institute’s investment of $16 million supports construction that will roughly triple the size of the facility — and work to address a major roadblock for incorporating AI and automation into manufacturing practices: data.

“There’s a lot of work going on across the world in using machine learning in engineering problems, including manufacturing, but it's limited in scale-up and commercial adoption,” explained Stebner. 

Machine learning algorithms have the potential to make manufacturing more efficient, but they need a lot of reliable, repeatable data about the processes and materials involved to be effective. Collecting that data manually is monotonous, costly, and time-consuming.

“The idea is to automate those functions that we need to enable AI and machine learning” in manufacturing, says Stebner. “Let it be a facility where you can imagine new things and push new boundaries and not just be stuck in demonstrating concepts over and over again.”

To make that possible, the expanded facility will couple AI and data management with robotic automation.

“We're going to be able to demonstrate automation from the very beginning of our process all the way through the entire ecosystem of manufacturing,” said Steven Sheffield, GTMI’s senior assistant director of research operations.

“This expansion — no one else has done anything like it,” added Steven Ferguson, principal research scientist with GTMI and managing director of Georgia AIM. “We will have the leading facility for demonstrating what a hyperconnected and AI-driven manufacturing enterprise looks like. We’re setting the stage for Georgia Tech to continue to lead in the manufacturing space for the next decade and beyond.”