Mary Lou Jepsen has led Facebook’s virtual reality efforts, advised Google’s Sergey Brin, and invented $100 laptops. Now she is turning her consumer electronics experience to the task of curing disease.
After decades of working in display divisions at some of Silicon Valley’s biggest companies, her goal is to shrink today’s massive MRI machines into wearable devices that continuously scan the body. Jepsen’s new company, Openwater, is developing technology that uses the way the body scatters infrared light to develop high-resolution images equal to those produced by an MRI. This is enabled by novel LCDs with pixels small enough to create holographic images, coupled with the use of body-temperature detectors and complex software. These LCDs are small and light enough that they could line a beanie or a bandage. The implications of a wearable body imaging system are significant for detecting and treating cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and even mental illnesses.
Join us as Mary Lou Jepsen discusses her Silicon Valley history, her company on the cutting edge of tech and medicine, and her vision for the future of body imaging and healthcare. Until mid-2016 she led advanced consumer electronics and virtual reality at Facebook and Oculus. Previously, she had a similar role at Google and Google X, where she was also a close advisor to Sergey Brin. She co-founded One Laptop per Child (OLPC) with Nicholas Negroponte, and was the lead inventor and architect of the $100 laptop. She holds a PhD in optical physics and an ScB in electrical engineering both from Brown University as well as an ScM in computational holography from the MIT Media Lab. She is an inventor on over 100 published or issued patents.
This event will be streamed live on our Facebook page: facebook.com/computerhistory.
Computer History Museum
1401 N. Shoreline Boulevard
Mountain View,
CA,
94043
