TILOS is a National Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research Institute, funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), with additional support from Intel Corporation. Our mission is to make impossible optimizations possible, at scale and in practice.

A partnership of faculty from University of California, San Diego, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, National University, University of Pennsylvania, University of Texas at Austin, and Yale University, TILOS use-domain research pioneers learning-enabled optimizations that transform chip design, robotics, communication networks, and other use domains that are vital to our nation’s health, prosperity and welfare.

Our foundational research pursues five main pillars:

  • Bridging discrete and continuous optimization.
  • Distributed, parallel, and federated optimization.
  • Optimization on manifolds.
  • Dynamic decisions under uncertainty.
  • Nonconvex optimization in deep learning.
A diagram representing the interconnectedness of the various components of TILOS mission
FEATURED SEMINAR
When and Why Pretrained Language Models Hallucinate
Adam Kalai, OpenAI

Recordings of past TILOS Seminars and other presentations are available at tilos.ai/recorded_talks.
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Penn Engineering Faculty Appointed to Endowed Positions

TILOS Networks Team co-lead Alejandro Ribeiro, a professor in the departments of electrical & systems engineering and computer & information science at University of Pennsylvania, has been named the Solomon...

Exploring the Impact of Generative AI on Education, Research and More

TILOS Foundations team member Mikhail (Misha) Belkin is working toward a better understanding of how AI and generative AI models actually work. Belkin gave a talk at UC San Diego’s...

Robotics team member Xiaolong Wang receives 2025 Sloan Research Fellowship in Computer Science

Congratulations to the Sloan Research Fellows of 2025, who represent the most promising early-career scientists working today. Their achievements and potential place them among the next generation of scientific leaders...

Who to Vaccinate First? Penn Engineers Answer a Life-or-Death Question with Network Theory

Engineering and medical researchers at Penn have developed a groundbreaking framework that can determine the best and most computationally optimized distribution strategy for COVID-19 vaccinations in any given community. Published...

Construction robot researchers target dangerous and dirty jobs

Research to remotely pilot robots and improve how the machines model construction environments is well underway at UC San Diego. The team, led by electrical and computer engineering professors Truong...

STATEMENT OF VALUES

CROSS-DISCIPLINARY

We are a community of cross-disciplinary scholarship, creativity and curiosity, and value the pursuit of knowledge, the advancement of technology, and professional development.

INTEGRITY

We are a community of integrity and character that values what is honorable and honest in addressing real societal needs and grand challenges.

INCLUSIVITY

We are an inclusive and engaged community of diverse people and perspectives that values and seeks out different viewpoints and styles of thinking.