The robotics team at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition recently took one of their exoskeletons for a test drive in the outside world. A video of the first out-of-lab test of IHMC’s Eva exoskeleton is now available. Eva is designed to help those who work in hazardous environments and need to carry heavy personal protective equipment. This collaboration with Sandia National Laboratories, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, explores how wearable robotic systems can be incorporated into nuclear remediation projects. The collaboration is aimed at addressing the healthspan issues of a specialized, aging workforce, but there potentially… Read More

Hans Van Dongen knew when he majored in astrophysics, it would not likely be his career. It was the diversity and rigor of scientific disciplines he would study in pursuit of that degree at Leiden University in the Netherlands that appealed to him. “When you signed up for astrophysics they tell you, ‘you are not going to be an astrophysicist, but you will be able to do pretty much anything else that you put your mind to because you have learned all of these different skills.’ And that is exactly what happened. I learned a ton of all these different… Read More

After more than 34 years under the leadership of founder Dr. Ken Ford, the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition will see a new senior leadership team take the reins. Ford will step into an emeritus role as of January 2025. Under Ford’s leadership, IHMC was built from a small office inside the University of West Florida into an independent research entity with an international reputation for excellence and innovation. The Institute focuses on a broad range of topics related to amplifying and extending human capabilities through three primary research focus areas: artificial intelligence and human cognition, robotics and… Read More

The Ocala community has long supported IHMC. But to many, the research that goes on there is a bit of a mystery. Ocala’s campus is home to computer scientists, engineers, and linguists engaged in research spanning machine learning, natural language understanding, natural language understanding for social cybersecurity, and speech analysis for physiological state determination. The inaugural Ocala Research Showcase was an open house-style event highlighting IHMC scientists and sharing the impact their research can have in artificial intelligence and machine learning, robotics and exoskeletons, and healthspan, resilience, and performance. Research Scientist Dr. Ian Perera led the coordination of the event… Read More

IHMC’s podcast STEM-Talk has earned another accolade, winning the bronze award in the third Annual Signal Awards for best General Health and Wellness podcast. Dr. Ken Ford, IHMC’s co-founder and CEO, co-hosts the podcast with colleagues from IHMC, including Drs. Dawn Kernagis, Marcas Bamman, and Tommy Wood. The episode featured by the Signal Award is Episode 162 with Dr. Marc Hamilton, an international expert in muscle physiology and professor at the University of Houston. He has published pioneering work on the soleus push-up, a potent physiological method which Marc discovered having the ability to elevate metabolism for hours, even while… Read More

Dr. Rudy Tanzi is best known for co-discovering all three familial early onset Alzheimer’s genes — discoveries that have expanded what we know about the disease, how we might counter its effects, and the speed with which drug therapies can be brought to market. He has co-written two books with Deepak Chopra, , “Super Brain” and “The Healing Self,” and is one of the top 50 most cited neuroscientists in the world. He also plays keyboards in the studio for Aerosmith and its guitar player Joe Perry. A well-rounded career to be certain. Tanzi is the director of the Genetics… Read More

Dr. Marcas Bamman has received a $7.7 million award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for a clinical trial to determine how people age 60 and older attain the health benefits of exercise. Bamman is a Senior Research Scientist at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) who leads the Institute’s Healthspan, Resilience, and Performance team. This new project is called “Multidimensional Predictive Modeling to Understand Mechanisms of Exercise Response Heterogeneity in Older Adults.”  It is a collaboration with the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation and the University of Florida. “This type of research is what the new Healthspan, Resilience,… Read More

Dr. Anurag Singh has spent his career using research to unlock a better treatment path for the chronic diseases that dominated his early medical practice. “I felt I was blindly treating the symptomology of these chronic diseases (cancer, diabetes), and it gave rise to the question, ‘What if we could intervene earlier?’” Singh says. The journey to answer that question led him to Nestle Health Science and ultimately to his role as chief medical officer at Timeline Nutrition, a Swiss life-science company focused on improving mitochondrial and cellular health. Singh, who has a medical degree in internal medicine and a… Read More

Few people know as much about inflammation and neuroscience as Dr. Kevin Tracey does. So how does he explain what inflammation — whose identification can be traced to the time of Galen — means to human health? “Every year, 60 million people die on Earth,” he says. “Two-thirds of them — 40 million people — die of a disease caused or made worse by inflammation.” That’s why he sees inflammation as “the single major threat to long healthspan because it contributes to the major killers and major unsolved diseases on the planet.” In the latest episode of STEM-Talk, available now wherever you… Read More

The Evening Lecture series for Fall 2024 at Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) features a heavy focus on human performance, workplace culture and related topics. The sessions begin in Pensacola on Sept. 19, 2024, with Sarah Robb O’Hagan, the chief executive officer of EXOS, a coaching company focused on human performance utilizing a team of fitness specialists, performance coaches, physical therapists, dietitians, and psychologists to maximize team performance. She led the reinvention and turnaround of Gatorade as its global president, the digital transformation of Equinox Fitness Clubs as its President and the transformation of Flywheel Sports to… Read More

Science Saturdays are back and ready to turn on new scientific minds this school year. These 90-minute educational enrichment sessions are a cornerstone piece of community outreach at Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC). Topics in 2024 will include 3D printing, bottle rockets, secret codes, and more. The sessions are free to the families who attend, thanks to the support of community partners. For more than 17 years now, Science Saturday has inspired students in grades 3-7 in both Pensacola and on the Institute’s Ocala campus. In the 2023-2024 school year, more than 300 students attended the series,… Read More

Is AI at its peak or is it just getting warmed up? That’s just one of the questions Dr. Ken Ford, IHMC’s CEO and Founder weighs in on in this “Ask Me Anything” episode of STEM-Talk available now wherever you listen to podcasts. In this episode, Ken, who is Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, shares his thoughts on AI given the recent developments in the field, particular in the realm of Generative AI, with programs like Chat GPT becoming a household name in the last year. “(Large Language Models) as they have been developed can… Read More

Students have long had a home at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition. This summer’s student collaborators included cadets from the U.S. Air Force Academy participating in the Cadet Summer Research Program. This program offers opportunities for cadets to get out of the classroom and experience real-world research and development that align with their majors, interests, and potentially their career fields. Senior Research Scientist Dr. Kevin Gluck, who worked with the students, says that although they won’t all pursue science or engineering in the Air Force, it is certain research and development will play a role in all… Read More

For Dr. Charles Serhan, music was one of the keys that unlocked his love of science. Serhan counts among his many talents, being an accomplished vibraphone player. “Many things I learned in music translated to science,” Serhan said. “If you really wanted to play well, you had to study and practice. It’s like learning a language. In science the same is true. You need to learn the language and study and practice every day.” Why does he love science? “The rigor and objectivity and the ability to test hypothesis an experiment,” he says. “Nothing is more fun than that.” Serhan… Read More

The battle against cyberattackers has often felt like an uphill slog. The Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) is part of a team looking to turn that tide. This spring, IHMC partnered with California-based nonprofit research institute SRI to take aim at the psychology of cyberattackers to better defend against their efforts. The project is funded by Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) — the research and development arm of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence — which launched it in February 2024. DNI refers to the project as Reimagining Security with Cyberpsychology-Informed Network Defenses (ReSCIND)… Read More

How did the son of two Bohemian graphic designers become a citizen science advocate who built his knowledge to turn his own health around? It’s a journey worth listening to, and in this episode of STEM-Talk, Dave Feldman shares that story. The episode is available now wherever you listen to podcasts. Feldman is the founder of the Citizen Science Foundation and is known for his research into the ketogenic diet. Dave is a software engineer by training who embraced a ketogenic diet to avoid his progression toward type 2 diabetes. After undertaking the high-fat/low-carbohydrate diet, Dave’ LDL cholesterol spiked. Dave’s… Read More

The new $40 million biomedically-based research complex constructed by the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) will be more than a striking addition to the Pensacola skyline. It will be an accelerant for the pace of discovery that will drive innovations in maximizing the healthspan for everyone from elite military operators and veterans to those with neurodegenerative diseases, musculoskeletal problems, and chronic metabolic conditions. The Healthspan, Resilience and Performance Research Complex is another step in the evolution of the vision that has been the bedrock of IHMC since its founding by Dr. Ken Ford, the Institute’s Chief Executive… Read More

An investment of $7.8 million from Triumph Gulf Coast will allow IHMC to bolster its research capabilities with a facility designed to handle sensitive federal research in support of Department of Defense and intelligence community customers. The grant to the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition was approved by Triumph’s board of directors in December 2023. Previous Triumph funding helped seed the $40 million Healthspan, Resilience, and Performance (HRP) research complex now under construction. The story is featured in the latest edition of IHMC’s newsletter, which is available now. The award includes funding to construct a highly flexible, multilevel… Read More

Dr. Robert Griffin has been named co-chairman of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society Technical Committee on Humanoid Robots, representing the Americas. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is the premier professional organization in the field. Griffin’s selection to co-chair the technical committee reflects the high regard for his work and for IHMC’s leadership in the field of humanoid robotics. “IHMC has been a pioneer in the field of humanoid robotics. Robert’s selection to the IEEE RAS Technical Committee is a much-deserved accolade for him and for the team at IHMC,” said Dr. Ken Ford, IHMC’s founder and… Read More

Dr. Alessio Fasano, who is considered the world’s leading expert in celiac disease and gluten-related disorders, returns for his second appearance on STEM-Talk. The interview is available now where you listen to podcasts. As he tells co-hosts Dr. Ken Ford and Dr. Marcas Bamman, he went to medical school with the idea of changing the world. And pediatrics, for him, was a love-at-first-sight way to accomplish this lofty goal. “I realized from the very beginning in medical school that dealing with kids was going to be more fun and interesting,” Fasano says. When it came time to choose a mentor,… Read More