Materials Science and Engineering

Angela Belcher (pictured), MIT professor of biological engineering and materials science and engineering; Paula Hammond, professor and head of the MIT Department of Chemical Engineering; Po-Yen Chen PhD ’15 (now at Brown University); and others have shown that a novel, high-efficiency, low-cost solar cell can be made using lead recovered from an abundant, old-technology source: lead-acid car bat...

Solar energy from discarded car batteries

An MIT development could benefit both the environment and human health.

December 22, 2015

(Clockwise from top left)
Angela M. Belcher; Sangeeta N. Bhatia; H. Robert Horvitz; and Emery N. Brown.

Four MIT faculty named 2015 fellows of the National Academy of Inventors

Belcher, Bhatia, Brown, and Horvitz recognized for demonstrating a prolific spirit of innovation and invention resulting in a tangible impact on society.

December 18, 2015

Rediscovering fundamental innovation

Eugene Fitzgerald explores the innovation dynamics that produce new technological and economic paradigms.

December 3, 2015

Representatives from the Americas, Europe, and Africa gathered at MIT for the first International Workshop on Alternative Potash, Nov. 10-12.

Potash: A silent crisis brews

Farmers in Africa and other tropical areas in the Southern Hemisphere are stripping potassium from soils without replacing it.

November 24, 2015

Powering science

The MIT High Performance Research Computing Facility powers MIT research behind the scenes.

November 20, 2015

Close-up image of part of the shell of a chiton (Acanthopleura granulata) shows the two kinds of sensory organs that cover the shell surface. The eyes are the dark bumps with shiny centers. The exact function of other sensory organs called aesthetes (small bumps with black centers) is not yet known.

Armor plating with built-in transparent ceramic eyes

Tiny sea creatures feature transparent optical systems as tough as their shells.

November 19, 2015

Why MIT.nano?

Doug Spreng ’65 believes nanotechnology could hold the biggest payoffs — for everyone.

November 13, 2015

MIT Libraries explore 17th-century postal archive in "Signed, Sealed, and Undelivered"

2,600 recently rediscovered early modern letters to be analyzed in groundbreaking international digital humanities project.

November 10, 2015

MIT postdoc Davide Ciceri holds a microfluidic device he designed to study leaching of potassium from the silicate mineral potassium feldspar.

Leaching study boosts potash alternative

Microfluidic experiments show feldspar releases potassium at a higher rate than expected, suggesting new possibilities for using ground rocks in agriculture.

November 10, 2015