DxE Network

Dream x Engineering
A collaborative initative with MIT Media Lab, and a growing research network

DxE Workshops

Workshop - 2019

The first international Dream x Engineering workshop was organized at MIT Media Laboratory in 2019, while Michelle was a visiting researcher with Dr. Pattie Maes, Adam Haar Horwitz, and Judith Amores. Over 50 scientists and engineers joined who study techniques and technologies to influence and record dreams. Topics included the science of lucid dreaming, sensory influences on dreaming, and memory reactivation in dreams. Technologies explored included flexible circuit boards, portable olfactometers, and wearable sensors. The workshop launched an interdisciplinary research network, and aims to develop dream engineering approaches to improve memory, creativity, and wellbeing, and translate sleep laboratory findings into real-world settings.

DxE Seminars

Seminars 2021 - 2023

The 2021 and 2023 online Dream x Engineering seminars followed several weekly sessions featuring four panelists who presented recent research findings, and an open discussion with ~60 attendees each week. [images by Bruno Olmeda]

2023 Seminar (recordings):

Using Dream Engineering to Treat Nightmares

Clinical Applications of Lucid Dream Engineering

Stimulation and Rhythms in Dream Engineering

Dream Content and Affect

Broader perspectives in dream engineering

2021 Seminar (recordings):

Deconstructing sleep via phenomenology

Sleep and dream stimulation 

Unexpected factors in the lab

Broader perspectives in dream engineering

Dreaming in the body

Ethics of dream engineering

Sleep recording & dream reporting

DxE Special issue

Special issue - 2020

After the workshop we compiled a Special Issue on Dream Engineering in the journal Consciousness and Cognition [image by Bruno Olmeda]:

Editorial: Towards Engineering Dreams. Carr, Horowitz, Amores & Maes.

Carr et al. (2020). Dream Engineering: Simulating worlds through sensory stimulation. 

Horowitz et al. (2020). Dormio: A targeted dream incubation device.

Picard-Deland et al. (2020). Flying dreams stimulated by an immersive virtual reality task.

Blanchette-Carriere et al. (2020). Attempted induction of signalled lucid dreaming by transcranial alternating current stimulation. 

Erlacher et al. (2020). Inducing lucid dreams by olfactory-cued reactivation of reality testing during early-morning sleep: A proof of concept.

Appel et al. (2020). Inducing signal-verified lucid dreams in 40% of untrained novice lucid dreamers within two nights in a sleep laboratory setting. 

Gott et al. (2020). Sleep fragmentation and lucid dreaming. 

Stocks et al. (2020). Dream lucidity is associated with positive waking mood. 

Mallett (2020). Partial memory reinstatement while (lucid) dreaming to change the dream environment.