• Login
  • Register

Work for a Member organization and need a Member Portal account? Register here with your official email address.

Research
Digital Currency Initiative (DCI)

Decentralizing trust and disrupting power structures with cryptographic peer-to-peer exchange and distributed systems
Project Research

Coin selection by Random Draw according to the Boltzmann distribution

Coin selection refers to the problem of choosing a set of tokens to fund a transaction in token-based payment systems such as, e.g., crypto…
Publication Research

Coin selection by Random Draw according to the Boltzmann distribution

Bönsel, J. L., Maurer, M., Petriconi, S., Tundis, A., & Winstel, M. (2026). Coin selection by Random Draw according to the Boltzmann distribution. arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.17490.
Research
City Science

Looking beyond smart cities
Archived
Project Research

Evaluating the Practical Privacy of Whirlpool CoinJoins

Bitcoin is the leading public permissionless digital currency. Bitcoin uses a public ledger to achieve strong security properties and doubl…
Archived
Post Research

Neha Narula talks stablecoins on Bloomberg Crypto

Stablecoins Pose Risks Under Stress: MIT's Neha Narula
Archived
Project Research

Enhancing the Privacy of a Digital Pound

With the increase in electronic payments options, privacy considerations are becoming even more important and privacy concerns more prevale…
Archived
Project Research

CBDC as a Cryptographic Platform

As announced on March 17, 2022, the Bank of Canada collaborated on a two year CBDC research project with the MIT Digital Currency Initiativ…
Archived
Archived
Project Research

Beware the Weak Sentinel: Making OpenCBDC Auditable without Compromising Privacy

Abstract: We propose, implement, and evaluate two extensions to OpenCBDC, an open-source transaction processor designed for central ba…
Archived
Archived
Project Research

OpenCBDC

ResearchTechnical Paper | Executive Summary | GitHubAboutIntroductionOpenCBDC is an open source project to engage in co…
Archived
Archived
Project Research

Scaling Privacy Preserving Payments in a Centralized Digital Currency

This project is working on understanding and implementing privacy preserving payments in CBDC. After surveying privacy techniques from cryp…
Archived
Research
sAIpien

Scalable AI Program for the Intelligent Evolution of Networks (sAIpien)
Research
Fluid Interfaces

Designing Systems for Cognitive Augmentation
Archived
Project Research

Application of Programmability to Commercial Banking and Payments with Kinexys by JP Morgan

This paper provides an overview of blockchain technology and smart contracts and explains how they enable multiple parties to deploy and ex…
Archived
Archived
Research
Media Lab Research Theme: Life with AI

Life with AI | Designing the future of smart systems to improve the human experience
Archived
Research
Media Lab Research Theme: Future Worlds

Future Worlds | Design and action for the future we want to live in
Archived
Research
Media Lab Research Theme: Decentralized Society

Decentralized Society | Architecting the new internet for the good of the people
Archived
Research
Media Lab Research Theme: Cultivating Creativity

Cultivating Creativity | Catalyzing a global movement enabling everyone to unlock and unleash their individual and collective creativity
Publication Research

The GENIUS Act is Now Law. What’s Missing?

Samuel, Ashwanth, et al. "The GENIUS Act is Now Law. What’s Missing?," August 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/stablecoins-genius-act
Publication Research

Will Stablecoins Impact the US Treasury Market?

Samuel, Ashwanth, et al. "Will Stablecoins Impact the US Treasury Market?," August 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/stablecoins-treasuries
Publication Research

Stablecoins and the Limits of Existing Analogies

Samuel, Ashwanth, et al, "Stablecoins and the Limits of Existing Analogies." August 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/stablecoin-analogies
Publication Research

1:1 Redemptions for Some, Not All

Samuel, Ashwanth, et al. "1:1 Redemptions for Some, Not All." July 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/stablecoin-redemptions-for-some-not-all
Project Research

The Hidden Plumbing of Stablecoins: Financial and Technological Risks in the GENIUS Act Era

US dollar stablecoins are increasingly used as payment and settlement instruments beyond cryptocurrency markets. With the enactment of the …
Publication Research

The Hidden Plumbing of Stablecoins: Financial and Technological Risks in the GENIUS Act Era

Dan Aronoff and Neha Narula, et al. "The Hidden Plumbing of Stablecoins: Financial and Technological Risks in the GENIUS Act Era," Digital Currency Initiative, February 2026, https://dci.mit.edu/projects/hidden-plumbing-stablecoins
Publication Research

Designing Payment Tokens For Safety, Integrity, Interoperability, and Usability

Wee Kee Toh and Michael Maurer, et al. "Designing Payment Tokens For Safety, Integrity, Interoperability, and Usability," Digital Currency Initiative, May 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/projects/designing-payment-tokens-for-safety-integrity-interoperability-and-usability
Project Research

Designing Payment Tokens For Safety, Integrity, Interoperability, and Usability

Massachusetts Institute of Technology Digital Currency Initiative (MIT DCI) and Kinexys Digital Payments at J.P. Morgan collaborated on the…
Post Research

MIT DCI releases "Designing payment tokens for safety, integrity, interoperability and usability” with Kinexys by J.P. Morgan

 Executive SummaryMassachusetts Institute of Technology Digital Currency Initiative (MIT DCI) and Kinexys Digital Payments at J.P. Mor…
Post Research

TD Joins MIT Media Lab to Explore the Future of Responsible AI in Financial Services

TD joins MIT Media Lab's sAIpien program to advance responsible AI research and reimagine the future of banking and finance.
Project Research

DCI Global

We’re creating a new global research network to understand how cryptocurrencies and digital currencies help people financially flourish—and…
Project Research

Bitcoin Kernel API

Creating a library with a stable API/ABI for consensus-safe blockchain analysis and modification. Building on years of rearchitecting the B…
Publication Research

A new research network for Bitcoin and digital currency

Narula, Neha, "A new research network for Bitcoin and digital currency," August 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/new-research-network
Publication Research

Evaluating usage of the Whirlpool Bitcoin privacy protocol

Lin, Alicia, et al. "Evaluating usage of the Whirlpool Bitcoin privacy protocol." July 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/coinjoin-timing-questions
Publication Research

A Decade of Digital Currency at MIT

Narula, Neha. "A Decade of Digital Currency at MIT." May 2025, https://www.dci.mit.edu/posts/a-decade-of-digital-currency-at-mit
Research
Human Dynamics

Exploring how social networks can influence our lives in business, health, governance, and technology adoption and diffusion
Archived
Project Research

ADESS: A Proof of Work Blockchain Protocol Modification to Deter Double-Spend Attacks

A principal vulnerability of a proof-of-work ("PoW") blockchain is that an attacker can re-write the history of transactions by forking a p…
Archived
Publication Research

Enhancing the Privacy of a Digital Pound

Gabriela Torres Vives, et al. "Enhancing the Privacy of a Digital Pound." Bank of England and MIT Digital Currency Initiative, December 2024
Publication Research

Beware the Weak Sentinel: Making OpenCBDC Auditable without Compromising Privacy

Stuewe, Sam et al. "Beware the Weak Sentinel: Making OpenCBDC Auditable without Compromising Privacy." Digital Currency Initiative, 25 November 2024, https://dci.mit.edu/beware-the-weak-sentinel-making-opencbdc-auditable-with-out-compromising-privacy
Project Research

Privacy Preserving Designs for CBDCs with Deutsche Bundesbank

As the digitalization of the economy accelerates, protecting privacy is essential. In this regard, MIT Digital Currency Initiative has laun…
Post Research

Madars Virza wins Test of Time Award at 2024 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy

This award recognizes previously published papers with a lasting impact on research and practice in computer security and privacy.
Article Research

18-year-old Nigerian-American wins awards in finance, AI inventions

Bell was a high school intern with the Fluid Interfaces group, where he helped to develop assistive cognitive tools.
How software can act as an assistant rather than a tool, by learning from interaction and proactively anticipating the user's needs
Archived
Thesis Research

Scaling Privacy Preserving Payments

Ali, A. (2024) Scaling Privacy Preserving Payments. [Master's thesis, MIT]. https://www.mit.edu/publications/scaling-privacy-preserving-payments
Project Research

Privacy-Preserving Audits for OpenCBDC

Funded by a National Science Foundation EAGER GrantOpenCBDC raised the bar for CBDC performance and viability. In this subsequent work, we …
Project Research

Project Us

“Us” aims to help people develop their sense of empathy. It uses machine learning to analyze interlocutors’ signals (e.g., choice of words,…
Article Research

Social media is rewriting the banking playbook

In Scientific American, Dr. Alex Lipton and Media Lab Professor Alex ‘Sandy’ Pentland call for the creation of new banking regulations.
Archived
Project Research

Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC)

Since the Bank of England first raised the concept of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) in its 2015 research agenda, the subject has g…
Archived
Article Research

Let’s fight global tax dodgers with cutting-edge data science

Public interest tax analyst Don Griswold introduces Tech for Transparency, inspired by Media Lab Professor Alex Pentland's research.
Inventing the future of digitally augmented objects and environments.
Archived
Archived
Research
Collective Learning

Transforming data into knowledge
Article Research

Crypto Decoded

From Bitcoin to NFTs, crypto is making headlines. But what exactly is it, and how does it work?
Post Research

Global Fintech, edited by David L. Shrier and Prof. Alex 'Sandy' Pentland, wins Outstanding Academic Title Award from Choice, 2022

Choice is a publishing unit of the Association of College and Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association.
Center for Civic Media
Archived
Article Research

The MIT researcher who helps senators understand digital currencies

The MIT Digital Currency Initiative director serves as a crucial link between cryptocurrency developers and central banks around the world.
Article Research

MIT experts test technical research for a hypothetical central bank digital currency

Collaboration with Federal Reserve Bank of Boston yields progress in understanding how a digital currency might be developed in the future.
Article Research

Study: More people walked during the pandemic, but how much depended on their income level

Boston.com reports on research conducted by Human Dynamics head Sandy Pentland, visiting professor Esteban Moro, and collaborators.
Article Research

At delta v Demo Day, the MIT community celebrates student entrepreneurs

The 2021 event, held in Kresge Auditorium and streamed live, was an unmistakable sign that MIT’s campus is up and running.
Article Research

Digital Currency and Trade Systems Are Tearing up the Rules: We need a "digital Bretton Woods" to set standards

Sandy Pentland discusses national digital currencies and trade platforms, and how they could upend today's geopolitical hierarchies.
Article Research

Why central banks want to get into digital currencies

CNBC talks to Neha Narula and other experts about the growing interest in central bank digital currencies.
Archived
Research
New Media Medicine

How radical new collaborations will catalyze a revolution in health.
Digital Life
Archived
Archived
Research
CE 2.0

CE 2.0
Post Research

Perspectives on Libra

Essays and testimonies on Facebook's proposed cryptocurrency
Communications Futures Program
Archived
Future Storytelling
Archived
Consumer Electronics Laboratory
Archived
Article Research

Structural and temporal patterns of the first global trading market

We investigate the structure and dynamics of a network representative of the global trading market that emerged during the 16th century.
Post Research

Gary Gensler: Remarks at "Off" The Chain Summit

Blockchain technology and the crypto ecosystem it has birthed must come fully within public policy frameworks to reach its full potential.