Ryo Suzuki | University of Colorado Boulder Assistant Professor

Ryo Suzuki
University of Colorado Boulder, Assistant Professor of ATLAS and Computer Science

I am an Assistant Professor at the University of Colorado Boulder in the ATLAS Institute and Department of Computer Science.

My research lies at the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), AR/VR, tangible interfaces, and AI. I direct the Programmable Reality Lab at CU Boulder, where we build computational media that blend digital and physical worlds.

Previously, I was an Assistant Professor at the University of Calgary. Before that I was a PhD student at the CU Boulder, advised by Daniel Leithinger and Mark D. Gross in THING Lab and Human-Computer Interaction Group

From Tools for Thought to Space for Thought

Mission

Augment Human Thought and Creativity
with the Power of AR and AI

by Transforming the Everyday Environment into a Dynamic Space for Thought


Computers are dynamic media. Much like writing systems, the printing press, and painting canvases, they empower and amplify human thought and creativity. This medium, however, is currently confined within the boundaries of flat rectangular screens, restricting our minds and creative potential to what can be done in this small space. Our goal is to redesign this medium to unlock the full potential of human capabilities, by transforming our world itself into a computational medium with the power of AR and AI.

Principles

Blended

Should Work with Real, Tangible Objects in the Real World, not Virtual Objects on Screens or in VR
Humans have developed tangible and spatial abilities. Media should leverage these innate human capabilities, instead of requiring humans to adapt to media’s capabilities.

Dynamic

Should Leverage Dynamic and Explorable Representations, not Static and Passive Ones
Human thought and creative process is fluid. Media should harness this dynamic and explorable potential, beyond merely watching and consuming static text or passive content.

Pervasive

Should Work with Every Single Space, Object, and Environment, On-the-Fly and On-Demand
Tangible user interfaces exist over decades, but only in research labs. It is time to make them accessible, adaptable, and deployable to everywhere for everyone with the power of AI.

Umbrella Themes

Augmented Languages

Reinvent Languages for Spatial Computing Era
We redesign "languages", including written, spoken, and visual languages, to empower human-to-human communication

― Dynamic Media for ―
reading
presenting
writing
communicating

Explorable Environments

Science Museums for Every Home
We transform our everyday space into explorable environments where people can learn through tangible exploration just like science museums.
― Dynamic Media for ―
learning
understanding
exploring
discovering

Generative AR

Make the World a Dynamic Canvas for Generative AI
We unleash the creative potential of Generative AI beyond screens, as if the entire world becomes a dynamic and living canvas.
― Dynamic Media for ―
sketching
expressing
authoring
creating

Responsive Physical World

Respond Both Visually and Physically
Both visual and physical representations are equally important. We make environments responsive both visually and physically with AR and robotics
― Dynamic Media for ―
touching
crafting
feeling
manipulating

Adaptive Reality

Ambient and Context-Aware Intelligence
We make dynamic media pervasive and ubiquitous with the power of AR and AI, weaving them into the fabric of everyday life.

― Dynamic Media for ―
adapting
reminding
visualizing
assisting

Projects

UIST 2026
Generative AR for Movie Augmentation
UIST 2025
Editable Map Animations with LLM Agents
UIST 2025
Visually-Enriched AR Task Guidance
SUI 2025
On-Demand Mixed Reality Summarization
IUI 2025
Generating Mixed Reality Instructions from Video
UIST 2023
AI-Enabled Augmented Textbook
UIST 2023
Dynamic Sketch in AR
UIST 2023
Tangible Holoportation
CHI 2023
AI-Enabled Tangible AR Prototype
CHI 2023
Human Teleoperation
UIST 2022
Augmented Presentation
UIST 2022
AR Sketch for Robots
CHI 2022
A Survey and Taxonomy
UIST 2021
On-Demand Haptics
UIST 2020
Visualize Everyday Motion
CHI 2020
Reconfigurable Rooms
UIST 2019
Swarm Robots as Dynamic Media
CHI 2018
Sketch to Program Swarm Robots
UIST 2018
3D Printer as Dynamic Media

Full Papers

cinemaworld project video preview

CinemaWorldUIST 2026

Generative Augmented Reality for Movie Augmentation

Keiichi Ihara, DaeHo Lee, Manato Abe, Hye-Young Jo, Ryo Suzuki   Conditionally accepted to UIST 2026

map2video project video preview

Map2VideoUIST 2026

Guiding real-world-grounded AI video generation

Hye-Young Jo, Mose Sakashita, Aditi Mishra, Ryo Suzuki, Koichiro Niinuma, Aakar Gupta   Conditionally accepted to UIST 2026

CARVidUIST 2026

Content-aware retargeting of videos with on-screen graphics

Aditya Gunturu, Mackenzie Leake, Ryo Suzuki, Stephen DiVerdi   Conditionally accepted to UIST 2026

editing-reality project video preview

Editing RealityDIS 2026

In-situ co-creation with generative AI in mixed reality

Suibi Che-Chuan Weng, Shih-Yu Ma, Sawyer Reinig, Pritalee Kadam, Ada Yi Zhao, Amy Banić, Ryo Suzuki, Ellen Yi-Luen Do  

Visualization Collaboration ChallengesCHI 2026

Challenges in synchronous and remote collaboration around visualization

Matthew Brehmer, Maxime Cordeil, Christophe Hurter, Takayuki Itoh, Wolfgang Büschel, Mahmood Jasim, Arnaud Prouzeau, David Saffo, Lyn Bartram, Sheelagh Carpendale, Chen Zhu-Tian, Andrew Cunningham, Tim Dwyer, Samuel Huron, Masahiko Itoh, Alark Joshi, Kiyoshi Kiyokawa, Hideaki Kuzuoka, Bongshin Lee, Gabriela Molina León, Harald Reiterer, Bektur Ryskeldiev, Jonathan Schwabish, Brian A. Smith, Yasuyuki Sumi, Ryo Suzuki, Anthony Tang, Yalong Yang, Jian Zhao  

mapstory project video preview

MapStoryUIST 2025

Prototyping Editable Map Animations with LLM Agents

Aditya Gunturu, Ben Pearman, Keiichi Ihara, Morteza Faraji, Bryan Wang, Rubaiat Habib Kazi, Ryo Suzuki  

realitysummary project video preview

RealitySummarySUI 2025

On-Demand Mixed Reality Text Summarization and Question Answering

Aditya Gunturu, Shivesh Singh Jadon, Nandi Zhang, Morteza Faraji, Jarin Thundathil, Wesley Willett, Ryo Suzuki  

video2mr project video preview

Video2MRIUI 2025

Generating Mixed Reality 3D Instructions from 2D Videos

Keiichi Ihara, Kyzyl Monteiro, Mehrad Faridan, Rubaiat Habib Kazi, Ryo Suzuki  

robovisar project video preview

RoboVisARHRI 2024

Immersive Authoring of Condition-based AR Robot Visualisations

Rasmus Skovhus Lunding, Mille Skovhus Lunding, Tiare Feuchtner, Marianne Graves Petersen, Kaj Gronbaek, Ryo Suzuki  

sketched-reality project video preview

Sketched RealityUIST 2022

Sketching Bi-Directional Interactions Between Virtual and Physical Worlds with AR and Actuated Tangible UI

Hiroki Kaimoto, Kyzyl Monteiro, Mehrad Faridan, Jiatong Li, Samin Farajian, Yasuaki Kakehi, Ken Nakagaki, Ryo Suzuki  

mixels project video preview

MixelsUIST 2022

Fabricating Interfaces using Programmable Magnetic Pixels

Martin Nisser, Yashaswini Makaram, Lucian Covarrubias, Amadou Yaye Bah, Faraz Faruqi, Ryo Suzuki, Stefanie Mueller  

roomshift project video preview

RoomShiftCHI 2020

Room-scale Dynamic Haptics for VR with Furniture-moving Swarm Robots

Ryo Suzuki, Hooman Hedayati, Clement Zheng, James Bohn, Daniel Szafir, Ellen Yi-Luen Do, Mark D Gross, Daniel Leithinger  

shapebots project video preview

ShapeBotsUIST 2019

Shape-changing Swarm Robots

Ryo Suzuki, Clement Zheng, Yasuaki Kakehi, Tom Yeh, Ellen Yi-Luen Do, Mark D. Gross, Daniel Leithinger  

morphio project video preview

MorphIODIS 2019Best Paper Award

Entirely Soft Sensing and Actuation Modules for Programming Shape Changes through Tangible Interaction

Ryosuke Nakayama*, Ryo Suzuki*, Satoshi Nakamaru, Ryuma Niiyama, Yoshihiro Kawahara, Yasuaki Kakehi   (the first two authors equally contributed)

dynablock project video preview

DynablockUIST 2018

Dynamic 3D Printing for Instant and Reconstructable Shape Formation

Ryo Suzuki, Junichi Yamaoka, Daniel Leithinger, Tom Yeh, Mark D. Gross, Yoshihiro Kawahara, Yasuaki Kakehi  

trace-diff project video preview

TraceDiffVL/HCC 2017

Debugging Unexpected Code Behavior Using Trace Divergences

Ryo Suzuki, Gustavo Soares, Andrew Head, Elena Glassman, Ruan Reis, Melina Mongiovi, Loris D’Antoni, Bjöern Hartmann  

Mixed-Initiative Code FeedbackL@S 2017

Writing Reusable Code Feedback at Scale with Mixed-Initiative Program Synthesis

Andrew Head, Elena Glassman, Gustavo Soares, Ryo Suzuki, Lucas Figueredo, Loris D’Antoni, Björn Hartmann   (the first three authors equally contributed)

RefazerICSE 2017

Learning Syntactic Program Transformations from Examples

Reudismam Rolim, Gustavo Soares, Loris D'Antoni, Oleksandr Polozov, Sumit Gulwani, Rohit Gheyi, Ryo Suzuki, Björn Hartmann  

AtelierCHI 2016

Repurposing Expert Crowdsourcing Tasks as Micro-internships

Ryo Suzuki, Niloufar Salehi, Michelle S. Lam, Juan C. Marroquin, Michael S. Bernstein  

PhD Dissertation

Selected Posters and Demos

HoloTouchCHI '23 LBW

VR Haptics at HomeCHI '23 LBW

UltraBotsUIST '22 SIC

HapticLeverUIST '22 Poster

RealitySketchSIGGRAPH Asia '21 RTL

RealitySketch: Augmented Reality Sketching for Real-time Embedded and Responsive Visualizations
Ryo Suzuki, Rubaiat Habib, Li-Yi Wei, Stephen Diverdi, Wilmot Li, Daniel Leithinger.
[PDF][DOI][Video]

Swarm FabricationUIST '21 SIC

Programmable PolaritiesUIST '21 Demo

Programmable Polarities: Actuating Interactive Prototypes with Programmable Electromagnets
Martin Nisser, Leon Cheng, Yashaswini Makaram, Ryo Suzuki, Stefanie Mueller.
[PDF][DOI][Video]

Collective Shape-Changing UIUIST '19 DC

LiftTilesUIST '19 Poster

LiftTiles: Modular and Reconfigurable Room-scale Shape Displays through Retractable Inflatable Actuators
Ryo Suzuki, Ryosuke Nakayama, Dan Liu, Yasuaki Kakehi, Mark D. Gross, and Daniel Leithinger,.
[PDF][Poster][DOI][Video]

Synthesized HintsCHI '17 LBW

Exploring the Design Space of Automatically Synthesized Hints for Introductory Programming Assignments
Ryo Suzuki, Gustavo Soares, Elena Glassman, Andrew Head, Loris D'Antoni, and Bjoern Hartmann,.
[PDF][Poster][DOI][Video]

DaemoUIST '15 Poster

CumikiICSE '15 Poster

Press Coverage

Professional Activities

Program Committee: CHI 2022-2025, UIST 2022-2024, ISMAR 2021-2023, VRST 2021-2022, TEI 2021-2023, DIS 2024, GI 2020

Journal Editorial Board: ACM Transactions of Human-Robot Interaction, Frontiers in Virtual Reality Haptics

Organizer: UIST 2022 (Student Innovation Contest Chair), UIST 2021 (Student Innovation Contest Chair), CHI 2021 (Social Media Chair), CHI 2021 (Student Research Competition Jury), UIST 2016 (Web and Social Media Chair),

Review: CHI 2016--2022, UIST 2017--2022, IMSUT 2020--2021, ISS 2021, ISMAR 2020--2022, VRST 2020--2022, CSCW 2021, TOCHI 2020--2021, PACM 2021, DIS 2021, C&C 2021, IEEE VR 2020, VL/HCC 2020, SCF 2019, SIGGRAPH ETech 2019--2021, GI 2020

Student Volunteer: UIST 2016, CHI 2017

Current Affiliation

CU Boulder

Assistant Professor

August, 2024 --- Current

Previous Affiliation

University of Calgary

Assistant Professor

January, 2021 --- August, 2024
Tohoku University

Visiting Professor

October, 2023 --- Current
Google

Visiting Researcher

July, 2023 --- May, 2024
CU Boulder
August, 2015 --- August, 2020
Microsoft Research
May, 2020 --- August, 2020
May, 2019 --- August, 2019
University of Tokyo
December, 2017 --- October, 2018
UC Berkeley

Research Intern

May, 2016 --- August, 2016
Stanford University

Research Intern

May, 2015 --- August, 2015
University of Tokyo

Research Assistant

October, 2014 --- May, 2015

Research Intern

December, 2014 --- March, 2015

Recent Updates

2026-08-07

Three papers—CinemaWorld, Map2Video, and CARVid—were conditionally accepted to UIST 2026.

2026-06-01

Editing Reality was published at DIS 2026.

2026-05-01
2025-10-24

Hye-Young Jo received a 2025 Google PhD Fellowship.

2025-09-02

Two papers—MapStory and Guided Reality—were accepted to UIST 2025.

2024-08-01

Joined the ATLAS Institute at CU Boulder as an Assistant Professor.

2023-07-25

Three full papers were accepted to UIST 2023 (25%).

2023-06-22

UIST 2023 PC Meeting Subcommittee Chair

2023-05-25

One full paper was accepted to DIS 2023.

2023-05-10

Visited Rome, Barcelona, and London for guest talks.

2023-04-23

Attended CHI 2023 in Hamburg to present two full papers and two late-breaking works.

2023-02-26

Two CHI 2023 LBW papers were accepted (34%)

2023-01-13

Two full papers were accepted to CHI 2023 (28%).

2023-01-11

CHI 2023 PC Meeting (Blending Interaction Subcommittee).

2022-12-13

Three papers were submitted to R&R for CHI 2023

2022-12-01

Visited the ATLAS Institute at CU Boulder.

2022-11-02

Mehrad Faridan and Marcus Friedel won an Honorable Mention Award in the UIST 2022 Student Innovation Contest.

2022-10-30

Attended UIST 2022 in Bend.

2022-10-25

Attended IROS 2022 in Kyoto.

2022-10-23
2022-10-15

Visited Tohoku University (Yoshifumi Kitamura Lab).

2022-10-15

Traveling to Japan.

2022-07-31

Final day for the Mitacs Globalink summer interns.

2022-07-29

Co-chaired the UIST 2022 Student Innovation Contest with Thijs Roumen (Ultrasound Levitation Kit).

2022-07-10

Visited Seoul National University (to see Inrak Choi).

2022-07-08

Attended SIGCHI Korea Summer Event at the University of Seoul.

2022-07-05

Invited Talk at KAIST (hosted by Andrea Bianchi and Juho Kim).

2022-07-04

Visited the KAIST HCI Group in Korea.

2022-06-30

One full paper was accepted to IROS 2022 (48%).

2022-06-25

Three full papers were accepted to UIST 2022 (26%).

2022-06-16

Visited the SFU HC Group in Vancouver.

2022-05-16

Invited Talk at Calgary Public Library.

2022-05-01

Presented AR and Robotics Taxonomy paper at CHI 2022 in New Orleans.

2022-04-28

Invited Talk at Microsoft Research EPIC Group in Redmond (hosted by Ken Hinckley).

2022-03-11

Invited Talk at CU Boulder ATLAS (hosted by Ellen Yi-Luen Do and Mark Gross).

2022-02-11

One full paper was accepted to CHI 2022 (26%).

2022-01-21

One full paper was accepted to ICRA 2022.

2021-12-17

Presented RealitySketch at SIGGRAPH Asia 2021 Real-Time Live! in front of thousands of attendees.

2021-11-11

CHI 2022 PC Meeting (Blending Interaction).

2021-09-01
2021-08-28

Our full paper was accepted to UIST 2021 (25%).

2021-06-16
2021-04-16

Received NSERC Discovery Grant funding.

2020-08-28

Our UIST paper won 🏆 Honorable Mention Award.

2020-08-07

Joined the University of Calgary as an Assistant Professor in CS and a member of the HCI Group, starting in Winter 2021.

2020-07-28

Submitted my PhD dissertation and officially graduated! :)

2020-07-01

One IROS 2020 full paper was accepted (47%).

2020-06-24

One full paper was accepted to UIST 2020 (21%).

2020-05-18

Started an internship at Microsoft Research (mentor: Mar Gonzalez Franco).

2020-05-13

PhD Defense ... and Passed! :) (committee: D Leithinger, M Gross, T Yeh, H Ishii, T Igarashi)

2020-02-14---05-13

Traveling for on-site job interviews (UW, UCSB, Boston, Virginia Tech, Calgary)

2019-12-12

One full paper was accepted to CHI 2020 (24%).

2019-11-25

Traveling to Boston to visit MIT CSAIL and Media Lab

2019-10-19

Traveling to New Orleans for UIST 2019

2019-10-10

Became a PhD candidate (committee: D Leithinger, M Gross, T Yeh, H Ishii, T Igarashi, E Do)

2019-10-08

One full paper was accepted to TEI 2020 (28%).

2019-08-02

One poster and one doctoral consortium paper were accepted to UIST 2019.

2019-07-01

One full paper was accepted to UIST 2019 (24%).

2019-06-27

Won Best Paper Award for DIS 2019 (Top 1%).

2019-05-20

Started an internship at Adobe Research (mentor: Rubaiat Habib).

2019-03-26

One full paper was accepted to DIS 2019 (25%).

2018-08-15

Received JST ACT-I funding (mentor: Takeo Igarashi).

2018-08-06

One full paper was accepted to UIST 2018 (21%).

2018-08-03

One Pacific Graphics 2018 short paper was accepted (26%).

2017-12-14

Started an internship at The University of Tokyo (mentor: Yasuaki Kakehi).

2017-12-11

Two full papers were accepted to CHI 2018 (25%).

2017-06-27

One full paper was accepted to VL/HCC 2017 (29%).

2017-06-21

One full paper was accepted to ASSETS 2017 (26%).

2017-02-11

One late-breaking work paper was accepted to CHI 2017 (38%).

2016-12-16

One full paper was accepted to L@S 2017 (22%).

2016-12-12

One full paper was accepted to ICSE 2017 (19%).

2016-05-23

Started an internship at UC Berkeley (mentor: Bjoern Hartmann).

2016-01-15

One full paper was accepted to CHI 2016 (23%).

2015-10-01

I will serve as a web and social media chair for UIST 2016

2015-05-18

Started an internship at Stanford (mentor: Michael Bernstein).

2014-10-15

The very first day of starting my HCI research (mentor: Koji Yatani)