Ira Winder

Principal Researcher

ira.mit.edu

Ira is a researcher, educator, and practitioner who specializes in end-to-end design, development, and implementation of interactive simulations for solving complex problems in industry, academia, and public agencies. Ira's range of expertise includes Computer Science, Mathematical Modeling, City Planning, and Architectural Design. He is currently a Principal Researcher at CIT Henkaku Center. He maintains affiliations with MIT Engineering Systems Laboratory (ESL) and The University of Tokyo Graduate School of Frontier Sciences (GSFS). He holds a Master in City Planning (MIT, 2013) and Bachelor of Science in Art and Design (MIT, 2010).

As a Technical Instructor at MIT, Ira has taught Computational Urban Science at the undergraduate and graduate levels. As a Research Scientist at MIT Media Lab, Ira invented the tangible interactive matrix (TIM), an integrated hardware and software platform that merges parametric, voxelized simulations with user-friendly tangible interfaces. His work is now a platform for interdisciplinary research, most notably the CityScope Project at the MIT Media Lab's City Science Group. Ira has spoken and exhibited at venues including Autodesk University, TEDx Boston, US Chamber of Commerce, APA Planning Conference, Singapore World Cities Summit, Big Data Analytics Tokyo, Edinburgh Culture Summit, Guiyang Big Data Expo, and The G7 Conference for ICT. By special request, he presented a custom interactive simulation to Bill Gates at a summit for affordable housing in Seattle. Ira made an appearance in "A Lego Brickumentary," and his work has been featured on CBS, Financial Times Magazine, The Atlantic's CityLab, and a White House report to the President on "Technology and the Future of Cities."