Kim Donohue will run the 2023 Boston Marathon to honor her husband, who was injured in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, and raise awareness for the Sean Collier Memorial Fund, reports Karen Anderson for WCVB. Donohue is “drawing inspiration from her husband and their friend, Sean Collier, an MIT police officer shot and killed just days after the marathon attacks,” writes Anderson.
Open Style Lab, a nonprofit initially started as a summer project at MIT in 2014 that is aimed at making fashion more accessible for people who are disabled, designed clothes for “Double Take,” a fashion event dedicated to raising awareness about the lives and needs of people with spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), reports Matthew Herper for STAT.
Prof. Jack Wisdom and his colleagues have found that “Saturn’s rings are a result of a moon that was torn apart by the planet’s tidal forces about 160 million years ago,” reports Jamie Carter for Forbes. “Wisdom and his co-researchers have dubbed the moon Chrysalis after the process of Chrysalis transforming into a butterfly,” writes Carter.
Fast Company reporter Sam Becker writes that a study co-authored by MIT researchers finds that weaker social connections on LinkedIn have a greater impact on job mobility than stronger relationships. The findings demonstrate that “the best thing many job seekers can do, as counterintuitive as it sounds, is to mine their lesser-known or secondary connections for opportunities,” writes Becker.
Researchers at MIT have found that “Salet” is the best starting word for Wordle, reports Erik Kain for Forbes. “The algorithm that MIT used solved—on average—Wordle’s puzzles with just 3.421 guesses, which they determined was better than audio or crane,” writes Kain. “And salet performed 1% better than Wordle Bot’s recent best word, slate, despite having the same letters.”
Research by Prof. Sinan Aral and his colleagues has found that having “moderately weak ties” can positively facilitate job shifts, reports Nicola Davis for The Guardian. Aral said that as well as examining the importance of weak ties, the study highlighted the degree to which social media algorithms “are turning the knobs on our economies and fundamental indicators like employment."
Research led by Prof. Michael Howland has found that adjusting the orientation of wind turbines on a farm can reduce the wake effect and boost the total output, reports Maria Perez Ortiz for Wired. “Howland and his team’s algorithm first uses atmospheric physics and operational farm data—such as temperature and wind conditions—to estimate the wakes that turbines are creating and how these are impacting other turbines,” writes Ortiz.
Prof. Jack Wisdom is the lead author of a new study that proposes “Saturn and Neptune’s gravity may have once been in sync, but Saturn has since escaped Neptune’s pull due to a missing moon,” reports Laura Baisas for Popular Science.
Prof. Jack Wisdom and his colleagues have found that Saturn may have acquired its tilt and rings from a lost moon that was destroyed, reports Leah Crane for New Scientist. “Simulations using data from the Cassini spacecraft shows that an additional moon between Titan and Iapetus, destroyed between 100 million and 200 million years ago, could explain both of these long-standing mysteries,” explains Crane.
A new study co-authored by MIT scientists proposes that Saturn’s rings could have been created when a lost moon of Saturn’s became unstable and crashed into the planet, reports Katie Hunt for CNN. “While the gas giant likely swallowed 99% of the moon, the remainder became suspended in orbit, breaking into small icy chunks that ultimately formed the planet’s rings,” writes Hunt.
Reuters reporter Will Dunham writes that scientists from MIT and other institutions have found that the destruction of a large moon, called Chrysalis, that “strayed too close to Saturn would account both for the birth of the gas giant planet's magnificent rings and its unusual orbital tilt of about 27 degrees.” Prof. Jack Wisdom explained that "as a butterfly emerges from a chrysalis, the rings of Saturn emerged from the primordial satellite Chrysalis.”
Lindsay Androski ’98, a full-term member of the MIT Corporation, writes an opinion piece for The Los Angeles Times about the how the lack of diversity in healthcare negatively impacts women and people of color. “The people in charge of funding healthcare research and development ultimately shape which conditions will be treated and cured,” writes Androski. “Every day the status quo continues means more suffering, mainly for people who aren’t white men.”
Boston Globe correspondent Necee Regis spotlights this year’s Cambridge Science Festival, which is being produced by the MIT Museum and hosted at the Kendall/MIT Open Space. “Programming falls into four categories: Science + Climate, Science + Food, Science + Fashion, and The Science Carnival, the latter of which includes a midway, main stage, sideshows and more,” Regis writes.
MIT researchers have found that “Salet” is statistically the best starting word for Wordle, reports Nicolas Vega for CNBC. “If you play Salet and you play intelligently you can assuredly win the game within five guesses,” says graduate student Alexander Paskov. “You don’t even need that last guess.”
“Cosmic Cowboy,” a new sci-fi opera composed by lecturer Elena Ruehr, explores “the mysteries of space, time and love,” reports Llyod Schwartz for WBUR. Additionally, Schwartz spotlights how Collage New Music, a contemporary music series directed by David Hoose, will be held on October 16, 2022 at Killian Hall.