ISIS research on advanced technologies for teaching and learning involves several projects led by Prof. Gautam Biswas and Sr. Research Scientist Larry Howard.

One set of research themes concerns creating technology-based learning environments that are responsive to learners as individuals. Whether used by students in preparation for classroom instruction, in exercising knowledge and skills following classroom instruction, or in pursuing complete learning experiences, adaptive learning environments use knowledge about individual students and their situations within learning activities to better assist them in achieving targeted learning objectives.

CAPE and eLMS are technologies for adaptive online learning developed by the Adaptive Learning Technologies Group.  CAPE is an authoring technology based on the Model Integrated Computing (MIC) paradigm that supports a domain-specific visual design language augmented by data modeling and procedural programming facilities.  CAPE enables online learning designs to incrementally incorporate adaptations that dynamically respond to individual learners by altering flow or content as learning experiences unfold.

eLMS is an online learning platform that enacts designs authored with CAPE. Extensive instrumentation and data mining facilities in eLMS enable authors to understand the effectiveness of existing design adaptations and opportunities for additional adaptations.  eLMS supports interoperation with many campus learning platforms, such as Blackboard, WebCT, and Moodle, in addition to direct delivery to learners via limited-use URLs called QuotaLinks.

ISIS developed CAPE and eLMS for the NSF Engineering Research Center for Bioengineering Educational Technologies (VaNTH) where they have been used to create online learning resources as adjuncts to classroom-based instruction. The technologies have further been used to create individualized online learning experiences for the NSF Team for Research in Ubiquitous Secure Technologies (TRUST) Science and Technology Center and a professional training product line for the Adaptive Cybersecurity Training (ACT) Online Program of the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency and Department of Homeland Security.  Current work focuses on synergistically combining online and face-to-face training to create adaptive blended learning environments.