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Thursday, October 29, 2026Oct 29

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Good For You: GPS grad named MIT innovator

photo Maithilee Kunda

Kunda named MIT innovator

Maithilee Kunda, a 2002 graduate of Girls Preparatory School, has been recognized as a visionary in the MIT Technology Review’s annual list of Innovators Under 35. She is the daughter of Drs. Sarma and Prabha Kunda of Chattanooga and is married to Jim Neidhoefer of Nashville.

Previous winners include Larry Page and Sergey Brin, co-founders of Google; Mark Zuckerberg, co-founder of Facebook; and Jonathan Ive, chief designer of Apple.

Kunda, who received her bachelor’s degree from MIT and doctorate from Georgia Tech, is a professor at Vanderbilt University, where she directs the laboratory for Artificial Intelligence and Visual Analogical Systems. As an assistant professor of computer science and computer engineering at Vanderbilt, she works on algorithms for artificial intelligence that emulate human visual thinking – thinking with images rather than symbols and words.

As one of this year’s honorees, Kunda will attend the EmTech MIT conference Oct. 18-20 in Cambridge, Mass.