This research project will create a theoretical and computational infrastructure to design new technology using creativity from crowds and individuals in combination with machine learning. A crowd could be a collection of experts within an organization, a classroom of students, or a large number of people online. Earlier research used machine learning working with individual engineers to help with simple design problems. This research will extend the earlier work to more complex configuration design problems, and will add crowd sourcing. Design representations will be graphs instead of vectors, and the design space will not be defined ahead of time. Machine learning may prove to be an important improvement over design evolution methods, and will provide insight into which design features are important. Machine learning also generates a model of subjective human judgment and preference, leading to more efficient and perhaps more innovative design synthesis.
If successful, this research will provide a platform for new models of innovation with input from multiple stakeholders: A machine supported by crowd-sourced knowledge and real-time interaction with humans will be able to produce unique and creative structures that were beyond the imagination of the humans involved. This research will also result in algorithmic advances in inference, learning, and related optimization techniques in representation learning for structured data and interactive human-machine collaboration. It will also provide a mathematical framework for innovation in massive system design problems involving thousands of designers such as the design of a jet fighter. The technology developed will be possible to implement in a variety of environments from complex engineering system design decisions to ideas for new products on commercial sites. In an educational context, this research, if successful, will allow students and teachers to experiment with design tools, individually, as part of a classroom experience, or as a national endeavor to both learn and possibly to generate new design ideas collectively.
