Derek Lyons

Biography

Photo of Derek Lyons

Derek Lyons is an Assistant Project Scientist in the Department of Informatics at the University of California, Irvine. His research blends game design and child development themes, examining the ways in which novel interactive technologies can help support children's learning and creativity. His current project, KarunaTree, is an NSF-funded game world designed to help children understand and respond to the serious environmental challenges that face our planet. Derek is a Rhodes Scholar, and earned his PhD in cognitive developmental psychology from Yale University. He also holds an M.Sc. in Computer Science from the University of Oxford, an S.M. in Media Arts and Sciences from the MIT Media Lab, and a B.A. in Chemistry from Reed College. Derek has contributed to interactive installations shown at ACM SIGGRAPH and Ars Electronica, and his research has been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Current Opinion in Neurobiology, and Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society (forthcoming). In the popular press Derek's work has been featured by outlets including the New York Times, NPR, and NOVA.

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