Faculty DirectorySam Kriegman
Assistant Professor of Computer Science
Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering
Contact
2233 Tech DriveEvanston, IL 60208-3109
Email Sam Kriegman
Website
Departments
Chemical and Biological Engineering
Affiliations
Biography
Sam Kriegman is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science, Mechanical Engineering, and Chemical and Biological Engineering at Northwestern University. His research seeks general theories of life, in which the details of carbon-based organisms would represent a special case. As we have yet to invent a time machine or the means of interstellar travel, Kriegman and his students design, build and breed robotic lifeforms to catch a glimpse of life as it may have arisen here on Earth or as it might exist elsewhere in the universe. The recipient of the NSF CAREER Award and the Cozzarelli Prize, his creation of the world's first AI-designed organisms (the “xenobots”) triggered considerable global media attention and a tidal wave of public discourse, still ongoing, among scientists in several fields, science communicators, and the public.
Selected Publications
Yu et al. “Agile legged locomotion in reconfigurable modular robots” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 123.10 (2026): e2519129123.
Matthews et al. “Efficient automatic design of robots.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120.41 (2023): e2305180120.
Kriegman et al. “Kinematic self-replication in reconfigurable organisms.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 118.49 (2021): e2112672118.
Kriegman et al. “A scalable pipeline for designing reconfigurable organisms.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117.4 (2020): 1853-1859.
Patents
Efficient automatic design of physical machines with moving parts. US20240281571A1
Engineered multicellular ciliated organisms and the kinematic self-replication thereof. US20220220437A1
Engineered multicellular organisms. US20230235296A1