16th Annual Innovation Forum

Innovation Forum is an annual competition and networking event, hosted by the Keller Center, showcasing Princeton research with the potential to be commercialized and/or have social and cultural impact. Participants present their research in a three-minute presentation to the audience and a panel of judges, followed by a two-minute question and answer period.

The event consists of two distinct tracks: a track for science and engineering innovations and a track for social sciences and humanities innovations.

1:00 pm – Opening remarks by Dean Andrea Goldsmith

1:10 pm – Welcome by Naveen Verma, Director of the Keller Center, and Cornelia Huellstrunk, Executive Director of the Keller Center

1:20 pm – Science, Technology, Engineering and Math pitches

1:22 pm – Alex Place: Tantalum Superconducting Qubits – an invention with the potential to revolutionize fields ranging from drug discovery to artificial intelligence by speeding fabrication and extending coherence times.
1:32 pm – Xiaohui Xu: Solar Absorber Gel – a technology that purifies polluted water using only natural sunlight.
1:42 pm – Nathaniel Banks: Project Plastic – a floating bio-filter platform treatment that removes micro-plastics from rivers and active water systems.
1:52 pm – Micah Nelp: Soliome – a genetically encoded, engineer-able sunscreen that is ecologically safe and made from components already present in the human body.
2:02 pm – Yue Ma: Reconfigurable Antenna for IoT/5G Wireless Systems – a reconfigurable antenna system, based on large-area electronics.

2:12 pm – Short break

2:15 pm – Remarks by Esther Schor, Professor of English and Chair of the Humanities Council

2:20 pm – Humanities and Social Sciences pitches

2:20 pm – Jacob Shapiro: A Multi-Stakeholder Research Development Center for a Digital Age – proposes to build a Center that enables cross-sector research collaboration.
2:30 pm – Sarah Rivett: Native American and Indigenous Studies Initiative at Princeton – seeks to promote the history and culture of Indigenous communities, especially those impacted by Princeton’s institutional history, and build mutually beneficial collaborations that will serve their needs while enhancing the ethic and integrity of Princeton scholarship.
2:40 pm – Natalia Ermolaev and Andrew Janco: New Languages for Natural Language Processing – a tool that addresses the lack of linguistic diversity in digital technology.
2:50 pm – Elena Araoz: Innovations in Socially Distant Performance – takes lessons learned from modifications made to performance art during the pandemic to modernize and reimagine theatre and performance beyond traditional models.
3:00 pm – Xiaoxiao Shen: ReChat – an interactive platform to promote deliberative democracy that allows researchers to administer, monitor, and analyze live conversations in online survey experiments.
3:10 pm – Gissoo Doroudian and Rebecca Koeser: Startwords – an experimental, conversational play-space for humanities scholarship.

3:20 pm – Remarks by Rod Priestley, Vice Dean for Innovation

3:30 pm – Poster and networking session

4:00 pm – Keynote by Manish Bhardwaj, CEO and Co-Founder of Innovators In Health, James Wei Visiting Professor in Entrepreneurship 2021–2022

4:20 pm – Closing ceremony

Co-sponsored by the Office of Technology Licensing and the Humanities Council.

Open to the public. Registration is required by Thursday, October 7 at 9:00 am.