Julie Shah

Julie Shah is the H.N. Slater Professor at the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics and leads the Interactive Robotics Group at MIT’s Schwarzman College of Computing. She focuses on creating robots that work effectively alongside humans in dynamic environments, combining expertise in artificial intelligence, human factors, and systems engineering.

• BS, SM: Aeronautics and Astronautics (MIT)
• PhD: Autonomous Systems (MIT)

Her research explores human-robot collaboration, emergent communication, and trust calibration in automated systems, with applications in manufacturing, surgery, and space exploration. Recent publications highlight advancements in language-guided abstraction, human-in-the-loop policy adaptation, and ethics-aware AI.

Julie Shah has received prestigious accolades including the NSF CAREER award and recognition in the MIT Technology Review TR35. Her lab’s work on industrial human-robot collaboration was named one of the 10 Breakthrough Technologies of 2013 by Tech Review.

She previously worked at Boeing Research and Technology, where she developed innovative methods for human-robot teamwork in safety-critical domains. Her lab at MIT continues to push boundaries in robot locomotion, situational awareness, and sociotechnical systems.