Writing for Axios, research scientist Apurba Sakti examines Norway’s transition to electric vehicles. “EVs become the preferred choice of most consumers once they try them; range anxiety can be addressed; the electricity grid was able to absorb the additional demand for electricity in the short run; and perhaps most important, temporary subsidies and incentives can kickstart the adoption of new green technology,” Sakti writes.
MIT researchers have developed a robot that can learn how to successfully play Jenga, reports Brian Heater for TechCrunch. “The robot has to learn in the real world, by interacting with the real Jenga tower,” explains Prof. Alberto Rodriguez. “The key challenge is to learn from a relatively small number of experiments by exploiting common sense about objects and physics.”
Researchers at MIT have developed an expandable pill that can stay in the stomach for a month and could potentially track issues like ulcers and cancers. “The pill is made from two types of hydrogels -- mixtures of polymers and water -- making it softer and longer-lasting than current ingestible sensors,” reports Robert Preidt for HealthDay.
Gizmodo reporter Andrew Liszewski writes that MIT researchers have developed a robot that can play Jenga using visual and physical cues. The ability to feel “facilitated the robot’s ability to learn how to play all on its own, both in terms of finding a block that was loose enough to remove, and repositioning it on the top of the tower without upsetting the delicate balance.”
Joseph Coughlin, director of the AgeLab, writes for Forbes about how people planning for retirement must factor in the cost of transportation as they age. “Transportation is often taken for granted but it is critical to living well at any age,” Coughlin notes.
MIT researchers have developed a robot that can play Jenga by combining interactive perception and manipulations, reports Mattha Busby for The Guardian. “In what marks significant progress for robotic manipulation of real-world objects, a Jenga-playing machine can learn the complex physics involved in withdrawing wooden blocks from a tower through physical trial and error,” Busby explains.
Principal Research Scientist Andrew McAfee speaks with NBC's Stephanie Ruhle about the ways robots are changing work. “The hollowing out of the middle class has not yet been replaced by middle class 2.0,” says McAfee. “That should be our real homework going forward, not trying to demonize the automation or the technology.”
A new robot developed by MIT researchers uses AI and sensors to play the game of Jenga, reports Rob Verger for Popular Science. “It decides on its own which block to push, [and] which blocks to probe; it decides on its own how to extract them; and it decides on its own when it’s a good idea to keep extracting them, or to move to another one,” says Prof. Alberto Rodriguez.
Washington Post reporter Peter Holley writes that MIT researchers have developed a new ingestible, expanding pill that can remain in the stomach for up to a month and could be used to help with weight loss or to monitor conditions inside the human body. “The pills could also be used to place tiny cameras inside the body that could monitor tumors and ulcers over time,” Holley explains.
Xinhua reports that MIT researchers have “discovered that lung tumors could hijack bacteria within the lung to promote their own survival.” As Tyler Jacks, director of the Koch Institute and the paper’s senior author explains, this research "opens up multiple potential avenues toward lung cancer interception and treatment.”
Wired reporter Matt Simon writes that MIT researchers have engineered a robot that can teach itself to play the game of Jenga. As Simon explains, the development is a “big step in the daunting quest to get robots to manipulate objects in the real world.”
MIT researchers have developed a new ingestible pill that expands once it reaches the stomach and could be used to monitor a patient’s health, reports the BBC News. “The dream is to have a smart pill, that once swallowed stays in the stomach and monitors the patient's health for a long time, such as a month,” explains Prof. Xuanhe Zhao.
Quartz reporter Jenny Anderson highlights Prof. Mitchel Resnick’s ideas for how to apply the kindergarten approach to learning to our entire educational system, in an effort to inspire lifelong learning. Anderson explains that Mitchel believes, “Kids should actively work on projects, which intersect with something they are passionate about, while working with peers in a playful environment.”
President Reif speaks with Gerry Baker of WSJ at Large about the impact of AI on the future of education and work. “Part of the goal of the [MIT Schwarzman] college is, as we educate people to use these [AI] tools, to educate them in a way that empowers human beings, not replaces human beings,” says Reif.
NBC News reporters Courtney McGee and Brenda Breslauer speak with MIT alumna Sherri Davidoff, a “white hat” hacker, who hacks into computer systems to help companies test their security. McGee and Breslauer write that Davidoff, “was one of the first female white-hat hackers in an industry still dominated by men.”