4/23/2026
Two research teams from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign were recognized with Honorable Mention for their contributions as part of the prestigious Moonshots // One research competition from Laude Institute. The teams' proposals were selected among the top 25 from a field of 125 proposals submitted by 600+ researchers across 47 leading institutions in the U.S. and Canada.
Two research teams from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign were recognized with Honorable Mention for their contributions as part of the prestigious Moonshots // One research competition from Laude Institute. The teams' proposals were selected among the top 25 from a field of 125 proposals submitted by 600+ researchers across 47 leading institutions in the U.S. and Canada.
“The quality of submissions was so strong that the selection committee chose to recognize and fund teams beyond the original eight,” the Institute said. In addition to a seed grant, both Illinois teams will showcase their projects to philanthropic funders later this year.
Lead PI Jim Rehg, CS professor at Siebel School of Computing and Data Science, submitted the project, “Immersive Intelligence for Anywhere Anytime Healthcare,” with his team: Sarita Adve, CS professor, Brighten Godfrey, CS professor, Shenlong Wang, CS assistant professor, Minjia Zhang, CS assistant professor, and Mark Cohen, dean of Carle Illinois College of Medicine.
The project will develop I2Care, a novel AI-powered eXtended Reality (XR) system that will greatly expand the treatments that front-line healthcare workers are authorized to provide, by creating a care team composed of on-site and virtual providers that interact seamlessly to improve patient outcomes. I2Care will ameliorate barriers to healthcare access by enabling front-line providers to administer more complex and effective treatment, without compromising patient safety.
The project is a collaboration among two Grainger College of Engineering centers—the Health Care Engineering Systems Center, which develops computational solutions for challenging healthcare problems, and the IMMERSE Center for Immersive Computing, which brings together expertise in immersive technologies, applications, and human experiences—and Carle Illinois College of Medicine, the world's first engineering-based medical school, leveraging engineering and advanced technology, allowing doctors to provide more humanistic care for patients.
“We are delighted to participate in the Laude Moonshots program and leverage UIUC’s expertise in immersive computing, AI-based health analytics, and engineering-based healthcare to develop novel solutions that promise to remove barriers to healthcare access across the state of Illinois and the nation,” Rehg said.
The second Illinois project, “ATLAS: Adaptive Technologies for Learning and Reskilling,” was led by CS professor, ChengXiang Zhai, co-led by CS assistant professor Jiaxuan You, and included fellow Siebel School colleagues Nancy M. Amato, CS professor and director of the Siebel School; Dilek Hakkani-Tür, CS Professor; and Jiawei Han, CS professor.
The project addresses the problem of traditional education not keeping pace with new technologies that change jobs. ATLAS vision aims to leverage new artificial intelligence (AI) technology to transform workforce upskilling by establishing a novel “Upskill-as-You-Go” (U-GO) reskilling paradigm. With U-GO, instead of requiring workers to step away from their careers to retrain, a trusted AI-powered assistant (AI-pilot) would deliver bite-sized, job-relevant learning directly within everyday work tasks. The AI-pilot would analyze the worker’s current task and provide personalized “just-in-time” instruction. At the heart of the innovation is an Open Reskill Graph (ORG), a continuously evolving, human-verified knowledge graph that maps real-world skills and ensures that the AI’s guidance is accurate, transparent and trustworthy. By combining real-time learning with a rigorously grounded knowledge structure, the project seeks to turn the workplace itself into a reliable, always-updating classroom, allowing a worker to master new skills while remaining productive.
“We are honored to be recognized by the Laude Institute in their Moonshots research competition and are grateful to them for funding us to explore our proposed ATLAS vision,” Zhai said. “This is a result of the combined expertise of our team with every member contributing from a different perspective, and especially Assistant Professor Jiaxuan You, who did all the heavy lifting throughout the process from the conceptualization through proposal writing. I am grateful to our team and look forward to our collaboration in carrying out the proposed project in the coming months.”
Zhai added that the Moonshots program challenged the teams to think big but with practically feasible initial steps. He is excited to share their research as well as amplify the achievements of the Siebel School, The Grainger College of Engineering, and the university.
“As the first land-grant institution to participate in Coursera online learning, Illinois is a pioneer in innovative learning with numerous successful online degree programs and special interdisciplinary programs such as CS+X and iCAN,” Zhai said. “We hope to continue this tradition of innovation and further innovate in the space of workforce upskilling."
Grainger College affiliations:
Jim Rehg is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
Sarita Adve is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science and electrical and computing engineering in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
Mark Cohen is an Illinois founder Grainger professor of bioengineering in the Department of Bioengineering and a professor in the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology.
Brighten Godfrey is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
Shenlong Wang is an Illinois Grainger assistant professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
Minjia Zhang is an Illinois Grainger assistant professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
ChengXiang Zhai is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
Nancy M. Amato is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science and the Abel Bliss Professor of Engineering at Siebel School of Computing and Data Science as well as director of the Siebel School.
Dilek Hakkani-Tür is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
Jiawei Han is an Illinois Grainger professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.
Jizxuan You is an Illinois Grainger assistant professor of computer science in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science.