interactive. media. research.
Our group, headed by Prof. Dr. Jan Borchers, works in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). Grounded in Computer Science, we develop and study new interaction theories, techniques, and systems in areas like personal digital fabrication and personal design, mobile, wearable, and shape-changing user interfaces, soft robotics, interactive textiles, handheld augmented reality, interaction with AI, and visual coding environments. Our goal is to make the Brave New World of interactive technologies useful by making it usable. Since starting in October 2003, we have become one of Germany's best-published research groups at CHI, the premier international academic conference in the field.
We're part of the Computer Science Department and the HCI Center at RWTH Aachen University, Germany's top-ranked University of Technology and one of Germany's Excellence Universities. Our group is an Endowed Chair of the German B-IT Foundation.
Our CHI'24 Contributions
We regularly present our work at ACM CHI, the world's premier conference on Human-Computer Interaction. Here's what we shared there this year:
Fighting Malicious Designs:
Towards Visual Countermeasures Against Dark Patterns
Short Paper by Schäfer et al., CHI '24
Mappings in the Home:
Selecting Home Appliances in 3D Space
Late-Breaking Work by Nowak et al., CHI '24
How’s Your Sewing?
Investigating Metrics to Automatically Assess Sewing Expertise
Late-Breaking Work by Lahaye et al., CHI '24
Mobilizing Research and Regulatory Action on Dark Patterns and Deceptive Design Practices
Workshop by Gray et al., CHI '24
News & Events
- At this year's Girls' Day, twelve children visited our Fab Lab Aachen (Apr 25, 2024)
- Our Late-Breaking Work Mappings in the Home: Selecting Home Appliances in 3D Space was accepted at ACM CHI'24—congratulations Oliver Nowak, Lennart Becker, and Sebastian Pettirsch! (Feb 29, 2024)
- Our Late-Breaking Work How’s Your Sewing? Investigating Metrics to Automatically Assess Sewing Expertise was accepted at ACM CHI'24—congratulations Marcel Lahaye, Ricarda Rahm, Judith Ernstberger, and Andreas Dymek! (Feb 29, 2024)
- Our paper about countermeasures against Dark Patterns in UI design was accepted at ACM CHI'24—congratulations René Schäfer, Paul Preuschoff, René Röpke, and Sarah Sahabi! (Jan 19, 2024)
- We are co-organizing a workshop on Dark Patterns at ACM CHI'24! (Dec 19, 2023)
- Our publication "Attentive Notifications: Minimizing Distractions of Mobile Notifications Through Gaze Tracking" earns a Best Late-Breaking Work Award at ACM MobileHCI'23. Congratulations Sebastian and Eunae! (Sep 29, 2023).
- Prof. Borchers gives an invited talk at the Aachen Chamber of Commerce on "The Golden Rules of Usable Technology" (Aug 10, 2023).
- Our full paper "Investigating Visual Countermeasures Against Dark Patterns in User Interfaces" was accepted at MuC'23. (Jul 18, 2023)
- At this year's "Helle Köpfe" event, 15 children from the region visited our lab and built rockets using press-fit kits made with our laser cutter. (May 08, 2023)
- At this year's Girls' Day, ten children visited our Fab Lab Aachen. (Apr 27, 2023)
- Our workshop proposal together with researchers from other institutions on "Soft Robotics and Actuated Materials for Human-Computer Interaction" was accepted at ACM DIS'23. More information and how to participate here. The submission deadline is June 15. (Apr 03, 2023).
- Our position paper Eight Challenges of Future Electronics Toolkits (
Draft PDF) was accepted to the Workshop Beyond Prototyping Boards: Future Paradigms for Electronics Toolkits at ACM CHI'23. (Mar 06, 2023) - Three of our Late-Breaking Works have been accepted for presentation at ACM CHI'23. (Feb 27, 2023)
- Prof. Jan Borchers' book Arduino in a Nutshell has been downloaded over 200,000 times! (Feb 17, 2023).
- For CHI'23, the world's premier HCI conference, Prof. Jan Borchers is an Associate Chair for the Building Devices Subcommittee, a member of the Student Research Competition Jury, and a member of the Interactivity Jury. (Jan 24, 2023)
- The first in-person Aachen Maker Meetup (#143!) after the pandemic took place with lots of participants, projects, and pizza. (Jan 18, 2023)
- Our full paper "What’s That Shape? Investigating Eyes-Free Recognition of Textile Icons" was accepted at ACM CHI'23. (Jan 16, 2023)
- Earlier news & events...
Usability for Everybody in 18 Minutes
Teaching Summer 2024
Designing Interactive Systems 2
Current Topics in Media Computing and HCI
FLApp
FLApp, our mobile Future Lab Aachen App for iOS and Android, is the city's official science-focused walking tour through Aachen's inner city. But instead of historical facts, you'll learn about the latest discoveries and inventions made by engineers and scientists at each location, with some locations using Augmented Reality.
Interested in HCI?
- Jan's Top Ten list of HCI books
- What makes a good PhD student? (Jan, Jan 25, 2006)
- HCI Journals and their Impact Factors (Jan, Jan 30, 2006)
- Other HCI- and Media Computing-related groups at RWTH Aachen University
- Join our low-traffic HCI Announcements list to be informed about HCI-related events at our chair, at RWTH Aachen University and in the area.
Media Computing Group / Lehrstuhl Medieninformatik und Mensch–Computer–Interaktion (Informatik 10) • Prof. Dr. Jan Borchers • RWTH Aachen University • Im Süsterfeld 9 • 2nd floor • Room 2.86 • 52072 Aachen • Germany • +49 (0)241 80-21051 • Contact & Directions • Imprint