MIT Associate Professor Jacob Andreas of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science [EECS] and MIT Associate Professor Brett McGuire of the Department of Chemistry have been chosen because the winners of the 2026 Harold E. Edgerton Faculty Achievement Award. Established in 1982 as a everlasting tribute to Institute Professor Emeritus Harold E. Edgerton’s great and enduring support for younger faculty members, this award is given annually in recognition of outstanding distinction in teaching, research, and repair.
“The Department of Chemistry is incredibly delighted to see Brett recognized for science that has modified how we take into consideration carbon in space,” says Class of 1942 Professor of Chemistry and Department Head Matthew D. Shoulders. “Brett’s lab combines laboratory spectroscopy, radio astronomy, and complicated signal-analysis methods to tug definitive molecular fingerprints out of extraordinarily faint data. His discovery of polycyclic fragrant hydrocarbons within the cold interstellar medium has opened a strong recent window on astrochemistry. Furthermore, Brett is inventing the creative and unique tools that make discoveries like this possible.”
“Jacob Andreas represents the best possible of MIT EECS” says Asu Ozdaglar, EECS department head. “He’s an progressive researcher whose work combines computational and linguistically informed approaches to construct foundations of language learning. He’s a rare educator who has brought these forefront ideas into our core classes in natural language processing and machine learning. His ability to bridge foundational theory with real-world impact, while also advancing the social and ethical dimensions of computing, makes him truly deserving of the Edgerton Faculty Achievement Award.”
Andreas joined the MIT faculty in July 2019, and is affiliated with the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. His work is in natural language processing (NLP), and more broadly in AI. He goals to know the computational foundations of language learning, and to construct intelligent systems that may learn from human guidance. Amongst other honors, Andreas has received Samsung’s AI Researcher of the 12 months award, MIT’s Kolokotrones and Junior Bose teaching awards, a 2024 Sloan Research Fellow award, and paper awards on the National Accrediting Agency for Clinical Laboratory Sciences, the International Conference on Machine Learning, and the Association for Computational Linguistics.
Andreas received his BS from Columbia University, his MPhil from Cambridge University (where he studied as a Churchill scholar), and his PhD in natural language processing from the University of California at Berkeley. His work in natural language processing has taken on thorny problems in the potential gap between humans and computers. “The defining feature of human language use is our capability for compositional generalization,” explains Antonio Torralba, Delta Electronics Professor and college head of Artificial Intelligence and Decision-Making within the Department of EECS. “Lots of the core challenges in natural language processing is addressed by simply training larger and bigger neural models, but this sort of compositional generalization stays a persistent difficulty, and without the power to generalize compositionally, the deep learning toolkit won’t ever be robust enough for probably the most difficult real-world NLP tasks. Jacob’s work on compositional modeling draws recent connections between NLP and work in computer vision and physics aimed toward modeling systems governed by symmetries and other algebraic structures and, using them, they’ve been capable of construct NLP models exhibiting quite a few recent, human-like language acquisition behaviors, including one-shot word learning, learning via mutual exclusivity constraints, and learning of grammatical rules in extremely low-resource settings.”
Inside EECS, Andreas has developed multiple advanced courses in natural language processing, in addition to recent exercises designed to get students to grapple with necessary social and ethical considerations in machine learning deployment. “Jacob has taken a number one role in completely modernizing and lengthening our course offerings in natural language processing,” says award nominator Leslie Pack Kaelbling, Panasonic Professor within the Department of EECS. “He has led the event of a contemporary two-course sequence, which is a cornerstone of the brand new AI+D [artificial intelligence and decision-making] major, routinely enrolling several hundred students each semester. His command of the realm is broad and deep, and his classes integrate classical structural understanding of language with the most recent learning-based approaches. He has put MIT EECS on the worldwide map as a spot to review natural language at every level.”
Brett McGuire joined the MIT faculty in 2020 and was promoted to associate professor in 2025. His research operates on the intersection of physical chemistry, molecular spectroscopy, and observational astrophysics, where he seeks to uncover how the chemical constructing blocks of life evolve alongside and help shape the birth of stars and planets. A former Jansky Fellow after which Hubble Postdoctoral Fellow on the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, McGuire has a BS in chemistry from the University of Illinois and a PhD in physical chemistry from Caltech. His honors include a 2026 Sloan Fellowship, the Beckman Young Investigator Award, the Helen B. Warner Prize for Astronomy, and the MIT Award for Teaching with Digital Technology.
The college who nominated McGuire for this award praised his extraordinary public outreach, his immediate willingness to tackle teaching class 5.111 (Principles of Chemical Science), a General Institute Requirement (GIR) course comprised of 150–500 students, and his service to each the MIT and astrochemical communities.
“Brett is on the very top of astrochemical scientists in his age group resulting from his discovery of fused carbon ring compounds within the cold region of the ISM [interstellar medium], an statement that gives a route for carbon incorporation in planets,” says Sylvia Ceyer, the John C. Sheehan Professor of Chemistry in her nomination statement. “His extensive involvement in service-oriented activities throughout the astrochemical/physical community is extremely unusual for a junior scientist, and is testament to the worth that the astronomical community places in his wisdom and judgement. His phenomenal organizational skills have made his contributions to graduate admission protocols and seminar administration at MIT the envy of the department. And most significantly, Brett is an excellent teacher, who cares deeply about students’ understanding and success, not only in his course, but of their future endeavors.”
“As an assistant professor, Brett volunteered to show 5.111, a big GIR course with 150–500 students, and has received a few of the perfect teaching evaluations amongst all faculty who’ve led the topic,” says Mei Hong, the David A. Leighty Professor of Chemistry. “He has a natural talent in explaining abstract physical chemistry concepts in an attractive manner. His slides, which he prepared from scratch as a substitute of modifying from previous years’ material from other professors, are clear, and … the mixture of lucid explanation and humor has generated great enthusiasm and interest in chemistry amongst students.”
Subject evaluations from McGuire’s courses praised his humor, the clarity of his explanations, and his ability to rework a lecture right into a “science show.” “I have not felt this kind of desire for the depth of understanding in a subject beyond only a straight grade [in some time],” says one student. “Brett definitely stimulated that love of learning for me.”
“Brett is an impressive faculty member who is devoted to fostering student learning and success,” says Jennifer Weisman, assistant director of educational programs in chemistry. “He’s thoughtful, caring, and goes above and beyond to assist his colleagues, students, and staff.”
“I’m thrilled to be chosen for the Edgerton Award this 12 months,” says McGuire. “The award is nominally for teaching, research, and repair; MIT and the chemistry department particularly have been an incredible place to learn and grow in all these areas. I’m incredibly grateful for the mentorship, enthusiasm, and support I even have received from my colleagues, from my students each within the lab and within the classroom, and from the MIT community during my time here. I look ahead to many more years of exciting discovery along with this one-of-a-kind community.”