Program Leadership

Speakers & Organizers

Leading researchers across cognitive neuroscience, foundation models, and psychiatry convening at AIAS+ 2026.

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Distinguished Keynote

Keynote Presentation

Dr. Antonio Damasio ★ Distinguished Keynote
Distinguished Keynote Speaker USC

Dr. Antonio Damasio

Director, Brain and Creativity Institute

David Dornsife Chair in Neuroscience, Professor of Psychology, Philosophy, and Neurology · University of Southern California (USC)

World-renowned neuroscientist and author whose seminal research uncovered the neural substrates of emotion, feelings, decision-making, and consciousness. Pioneer of the somatic marker hypothesis and foundational works on homeostasis in cognitive architecture.

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Workshop Leadership

Organizers & Speakers

Akila Kadambi Google DeepMind

Akila Kadambi

Organizer & Speaker

Google DeepMind / UCLA / USC

Neuroscientist focusing on humanistic and embodied neuroscience, continuous state modeling, and artificial intelligence architectures.

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Dr. Marco Iacoboni UCLA

Dr. Marco Iacoboni

Organizer & Speaker

UCLA Brain Research Institute & Semel Institute

Globally recognized pioneer of the mirror neuron system, action processing, empathy, and social cognition.

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Dr. Lisa Aziz-Zadeh USC BCI

Dr. Lisa Aziz-Zadeh

Organizer & Speaker

USC Brain and Creativity Institute

Leading expert in the cognitive neuroscience of embodiment, action observation, and language processing in the human brain.

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Dr. Srini Narayanan Google DeepMind

Dr. Srini Narayanan

Organizer & Speaker

Google DeepMind, Zurich, Switzerland

Distinguished research scientist pioneering neural theories of language, embodied meaning, and next-generation AI architectures.

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Invited Researchers

Invited Speakers & Panelists

Dr. Radu Soricut Google DeepMind

Dr. Radu Soricut

Distinguished Research Scientist

Google DeepMind

Pioneering research leader in multimodal foundation models, situated AI, vision-language integration, and embodied machine intelligence.

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Dr. Leonardo Christov-Moore IACS

Dr. Leonardo Christov-Moore

Senior Research Scientist & Neuroscientist

Institute for Advanced Consciousness Studies (IACS)

Leading investigator examining the neural basis of empathy, altruism, interoceptive awareness, and relational AI alignment.

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Dr. Sahib Khalsa UCLA

Dr. Sahib Khalsa

Associate Professor & Psychiatrist

UCLA

Leading neuroscientist and clinician pioneering human interoception, body-brain communication, and visceral neural pathways.

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Dr. Vittorio Gallese Univ. of Parma

Dr. Vittorio Gallese

Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience

University of Parma, Italy

World-renowned cognitive neuroscientist, co-discoverer of mirror neurons, and pioneer in embodied simulation theory across language and action.

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AIAS⁺ 2026 Main Conference

Featured Conference Speakers

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AIAS⁺ 2026 Main Conference Showcase: The distinguished scholars below are keynote and plenary speakers for the broader AIAS⁺ 2026 Main Conference (November 5–7, 2026). For speakers and organizers specific to our Embodiment in Multimodal LLMs Workshop (Saturday, Nov 7), please see the Workshop Keynotes & Speakers and Organizers sections above.

AIAS⁺ 2026 Conference Plenary & Keynote Speakers

Join Us at AIAS+ 2026

Register to attend this landmark workshop on Saturday, November 7, 2026 at The Ritz-Carlton, San Francisco.

Register for Workshop → Register at aiasplus.org →