UMD is Shaping the Future of Artificial Intelligence

Where AI Gets Its Heart

The Artificial Intelligence Interdisciplinary Institute at Maryland (AIM) is building a future where artificial intelligence (AI) serves humanity and society through broadly interdisciplinary research, education, and engagement.

Our Vision

Uniting disciplines to build a world where AI uplifts people and society.

Our Mission

AIM works across all twelve colleges at the University of Maryland as a collaborative hub for AI, supporting research, offering innovative learning opportunities, and building community around responsible and ethical AI technology to advance the public good. We recognize that successful AI development requires expertise from computer science, engineering, the humanities, social sciences, and other disciplines where AI is advancing the cutting edge. By bringing together technologists, social scientists, and domain experts, we ensure that AI technology is developed in ways that support humanity.

Community and Collaboration

Community is central to AIM's mission. We aspire toward the University of Maryland's core values and strive to create an environment where faculty, students, and staff from all backgrounds can contribute their expertise and perspectives to building a positive AI future. We value interdisciplinary collaboration and believe that the most impactful AI research and education emerges from bringing together diverse expertise and viewpoints.

AIM is housed in the university's College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences.

AIM’s Four Pillars

AIM advances AI research and education through four interconnected pillars. Our work spans both foundational computational areas - including language technologies, computer vision, robotics, and high-performance computing - together with humanistic approaches and those grounded in the social sciences, philosophy, ethics, and other disciplines that examine how AI technology intersects with human values, society, and culture.

Accessibility

We investigate how AI can help make the world more accessible, including AI work related to disability, aging, neurodiversity, and mental health. Work in this pillar advances AI through the lens of making technology and the world more accessible and to enhance the independence of all populations.

Learning

We study how AI can be used to further education, to understand human cognition, and to advance the creation, acquisition, and dissemination of knowledge across individuals, teams, and organizations. This research includes building bridges between AI and educational technologies, cognitive science, neuroscience, and journalism.

Sustainability

We study how AI can address critical environmental and resource challenges across climate, food security, agriculture, aquaculture, as well as the civic, public health, and business implications of these challenges. This pillar focuses on how AI can contribute to sustainable solutions for pressing global challenges, as well as how AI can itself be made more sustainable.

Social Justice

We research the relationship between AI and important societal issues, including digital inequality, policy, and the social and historical contexts that shape technology development and deployment. This pillar examines how AI technologies interact with and impact various aspects of society and explores approaches to ensure AI development serves the broader public good.

From the start, interdisciplinary collaboration across fields will drive our AI institute’s success. We’re fortunate to have AI leaders in fields ranging from computer science and engineering to journalism, education, social sciences, business and the arts—a unique breadth of expertise that Maryland brings to the table. By uniting our efforts under one institute, we will not only become a magnet for ethical AI development and research but a global leader in preparing students and the workforce for an AI-infused world.

Jennifer King Rice

University of Maryland Senior Vice President and Provost