Faculty Directory
Sam Kriegman

Assistant Professor of Computer Science

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering

Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering

Contact

2233 Tech Drive
Evanston, IL 60208-3109

Email Sam Kriegman

Website

Sam's website

Lab website


Departments

Computer Science

Mechanical Engineering

Chemical and Biological Engineering

Affiliations

PhD Program in Applied Physics

Biography

Sam Kriegman is an assistant professor of computer science, chemical and biological engineering, and mechanical 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, Sam 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. An AI2050 Fellow and Cozzarelli Prize recipient, 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

Kriegman, Sam, et al. "A scalable pipeline for designing reconfigurable organisms." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117.4 (2020): 1853-1859.

Kriegman, Sam, et al. "Kinematic self-replication in reconfigurable organisms." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 118.49 (2021): e2112672118.

Kriegman, Sam. "Why virtual creatures matter." Nature Machine Intelligence 1.10 (2019): 492-492.

Patents

Engineered multicellular organisms. US PCT/US2021/013105; WO 2022/005527.

Engineered multicellular ciliated organisms and the kinematic self-replication thereof. US2022/0220437.