Isabella Pu
robotics researcher, artist, educator, engineer

Hi y’all! I’m Isabella Pu, a first year PhD student in the Personal Robots Group at the MIT Media Lab, studying with Professor Cynthia Breazeal. In 2023, I graduated from Princeton University with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and certificate in Robotics & Intelligent Systems, and in 2025 I received my Master’s degree in Media Arts and Sciences from the MIT Media Lab.
Broadly, my research investigates how we can use social robots and AI to create playful, engaging, and educational child-robot/AI interactions. As today’s children become more immersed in AI and other technologies, it becomes increasingly important to empower children’s usage of these technologies. In particular, I am interested designing and developing new AI and social robot interactions for early childhood and creative education. I pursue this line of work in several ways:
- I create child-robot and child-AI interactions to investigate how children can interact with robots and AI in positive, engaging, and educational ways.
- I design K-12 curricula and learning experiences to teach children about AI and robots, empowering them to use these technologies more confidently.
- I develop human-AI and human-robot co-creativity interactions to encourage creative learning and creative uses of technology.
Previously, I have worked at Blizzard Entertainment (for the Horde!) on the Player Interactions & Trust team, building systems to detect disruptive behavior in games and help promote pro-social behavior. If you’re interested in this, check out some of the PIT team’s amazing work.
Outside of work, I am an avid achievement hunter and play all sorts of video games. I also follow fashion, write & play music, and write & perform poetry.
news
Mar 27, 2025 | Our work “How can we learn and use AI at the same time?”: Participatory Design of GenAI with High School Students is accepted to ACM IDC 2025! |
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Dec 24, 2024 | Our work The Beatbots: A Musician-Informed Multi-Robot Percussion Quartet is accepted to IEEE/ACM HRI 2025! |
Aug 29, 2024 | A HeARTfelt Robot: Social Robot-Driven Deep Emotional Art Reflection with Children wins the RSJ Pioneering Research Award in Robot and Human Interactive Communication at IEEE RO-MAN 2024! |
May 26, 2024 | Our work A HeARTfelt Robot: Social Robot-Driven Deep Emotional Art Reflection with Children is accepted to IEEE RO-MAN 2024! |