About Us

The Makeability Lab is an advanced research lab in Human-AI directed by Professor Jon E. Froehlich in the Allen School of Computer Science at the University of Washington. We specialize in Human-Computer Interaction and applied machine learning for high-impact problems in accessibility, computational urban science, and augmented reality. To learn more, see our recent projects below and read our lab handbook.

Interested in working with us? If you are a current UW undergrad, UW MS student, or local Seattle high school student, please apply here. If you are a prospective PhD student, apply to the UW CSE PhD program and mention Professor Froehlich. Before applying, please read our lab handbook.

Recent Projects

This is the thumbnail image for the project Project Sidewalk

Project Sidewalk

2012 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project DepthScape

DepthScape

2024 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project NightLight

NightLight

2024 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project SPECTRA

SPECTRA

2022 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project Accessibility for Whom?

Accessibility for Whom?

2024 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project ArtInsight

ArtInsight

2023 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project Deep Learning for Sidewalk Assessment

Deep Learning for Sidewalk Assessment

2016 – Present

This is the thumbnail image for the project RAIS: Robotic Accessibility Indoor Scanner

RAIS: Robotic Accessibility Indoor Scanner

2023 – Present

See All Projects >

Recent Papers

SPECTRA: Personalizable Sound Recognition for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Users through Interactive Machine Learning

CHI 2025 To Appear

Steven Goodman, Emma McDonnell, Jon E. Froehlich, Leah Findlater

PDF | Citation | SPECTRA

NightLight: Passively Mapping Nighttime Sidewalk Light Data for Improved Pedestrian Routing

CHI 2025 To Appear

Joseph Breda, Daniel Campos Zamora, Shwetak Patel, Jon E. Froehlich

PDF | doi | Citation | NightLight

Accessibility for Whom? Perceptions of Mobility Barriers Across Disability Groups and Implications for Designing Personalized Maps

CHI 2025 To Appear

Chu Li, Rock Pang, Delphine Labbé, Yochai Eisenberg, Maryam Hosseini, Jon E. Froehlich

PDF | doi | Citation | Code | Project Sidewalk • Accessibility for Whom?

Authoring 2.5D Designs with Depth Estimation

CHI 2025 To Appear

Xia Su, Cuong Nguyen, Matheus A Gadelha, Yu Shen, Stefano Petrangeli, Jon E. Froehlich

PDF | Citation | DepthScape

Validating Pedestrian Infrastructure Data: How Well Do Street-View Imagery Audits Compare to Government Field Data?

Urban Sci 2025

Sajad Askari, Devon Snyder, Chu Li, Mikey Saugstad, Jon E. Froehlich, Yochai Eisenberg

PDF | doi | Citation | Project Sidewalk

Understanding Research Themes and Interactions at Scale within Blind and Low-vision Research in ACM and IEEE

TACCESS 2025

Maximiliano Jeanneret Medina, Yong-Joon Thoo, Jon E. Froehlich, Nicolas Ruffieux, Denis Lalanne

PDF | doi | Citation | Accessibility Literature Survey

See All Papers >

Recent Videos

SPECTRA: Personalizable Sound Recognition for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Users through Interactive Machine Learning

YouTube | Paper | SPECTRA

NightLight: Passively Mapping Nighttime Sidewalk Light Data for Improved Pedestrian Routing

YouTube | NightLight

Accessibility for Whom? Perceptions of Mobility Barriers Across Disability Groups and Implications for Designing Personalized Maps

YouTube | Paper | Accessibility for Whom?

Recent Talks

CookAR: Affordance Augmentations in Wearable AR to Support Kitchen Tool Interactions for People with Low Vision

Oct. 13, 2024 | UIST

Pittsburgh, PA

PDF | PPTX Paper | CookAR

AltGeoViz: Facilitating Accessible Geovisualization

Oct. 13, 2024 | IEEE VIS

St. Pete Beach, Florida

PDF | PPTX Paper | AltGeoViz

SonifyAR: Context-Aware Sound Generation in Augmented Reality

Oct. 13, 2024 | UIST

Pittsburgh, PA

PDF | PPTX Paper | SonifyAR: Context-Aware Sound Generation in Augmented Reality

MobiPrint: A Mobile 3D Printer for Environment-Scale Design and Fabrication

Oct. 13, 2024 | UIST

Pittsburgh, PA

Daniel Campos Zamora, Liang He, Jon E. Froehlich

PDF | PPTX Paper | MobiPrint

AI-Powered AR Accessibility

Aug. 8, 2024 | Apple's HCML Workshop

Cupertino, CA

Jon E. Froehlich

PDF | PPTX | CookAR • DIAM: Drone-based Indoor Accessibility Mapping • RASSAR • ARTennis • GazePointAR

RASSAR: Room Accessibility and Safety Scanning in Augmented Reality

May 15, 2024 | CHI 2024

Honolulu, Hawaiʻi

PDF | PPTX | RASSAR

GazePointAR: A Context-Aware Multimodal Voice Assistant for Pronoun Disambiguation in Wearable Augmented Reality

May 15, 2024 | CHI

Honolulu, Hawaiʻi

PDF | PPTX | GazePointAR

LabelAId: Just-in-time AI Interventions for Improving Human Labeling Quality and Domain Knowledge in Crowdsourcing Systems

May 14, 2024 | CHI 2024

Honolulu, Hawaiʻi

PDF | PPTX | LabelAId

Sponsors

Makeability Lab research is made possible by the generous support of our sponsors. Our research findings, opinions, and/or recommendations may not reflect their views.

We design, build, and evaluate new interactive tools and techniques to address pressing societal challenges. Makeability refers both to how our technological innovations make new abilities possible for humans as well as our educational mission to help students gain new abilities as they learn and grow through research, invention, and human-centered design.