Urban planning students engage with communities through the Freedom Summer Fellowship
“You can’t teach planning today without grappling with how policy actually unfolds within communities,” says Professor Phillip Thompson.
Climate change may produce “fast-food” phytoplankton
With warmer ocean temperatures, the composition of marine plankton could shift from protein-rich to carb-heavy, a new study suggests.
Augmenting citizen science with computer vision for fish monitoring
MIT Sea Grant works with the Woodwell Climate Research Center and other collaborators to demonstrate a deep learning-based system for fish monitoring.
A complicated future for a methane-cleansing molecule
A new model shows how levels of the “atmosphere’s detergent” may rise and fall in response to climate change.
Investigating Antarctic ice shelf melting with global navigation satellite systems
Observations suggest a major melting event at the Ross Ice Shelf was connected to atmospheric turbulence.
3 Questions: Communicating about climate, in audio and beyond
Madison Goldberg, the new host of the Ask MIT Climate podcast, talks about her career as a science communicator as well as ideas she thinks it’s important for climate communicators to convey.
Ocean bacteria team up to break down biodegradable plastic
MIT researchers uncovered the roles of bacterial species from the environment as they consume biodegradable plastic.
How Joseph Paradiso’s sensing innovations bridge the arts, medicine, and ecology
From early motion-sensing platforms to environmental monitoring, the professor and head of the Program in Media Arts and Sciences has turned decades of cross-disciplinary research into real-world impact.
Understanding how “marine snow” acts as a carbon sink
A new study finds hitchhiking bacteria dissolve essential ballast in ubiquitous “snow” particles, which could counteract the ocean’s ability to sequester carbon.
X-raying rocks reveals their carbon-storing capacity
New research by MIT geophysicists could assist efforts to remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it underground.
Nitrous oxide, a product of fertilizer use, may harm some soil bacteria
While some N2O is produced naturally at the plant root, agricultural practices can increase its levels, to the detriment of some microbes that support plant growth.
Designing a more resilient future for plants, from the cell up
Foray Bioscience, founded by Ashley Beckwith SM ’18, PhD ’22, is engineering single plant cells to create new materials and meet growing demand.
Study reveals climatic fingerprints of wildfires and volcanic eruptions
In research that could help elucidate humans’ role in global warming, scientists showed how three major natural events impacted global atmospheric temperatures.
Bridging science and society in the emerging bioeconomy
In STS.059 (The Bioeconomy and Society), students explore the social and political factors at work in the biology, biotech, and biological engineering sectors.
Exploring the promise of regenerative aquaculture at an Arkansas fish farm
Through research with MIT D-Lab, MIT engineering student Kiyoko “Kik” Hayano worked with Keo Fish Farms to build a model for regenerative water systems.