In the Media

MIT tops the Niche “Best Colleges in America” list, reports Matt Yurus for CBS Boston. The rankings consider a “number of factors including academics, student earnings and debt, professor quality and diversity,” Yurus notes.

MIT Media Lab fellow and “bionic artist” Viktoria Modesta writes for a special CNN feature about how technology is changing what it means to be human. Modesta, who voluntarily amputated her leg due to constant pain, writes that “fusing my body with technology feels like a philosophical exploration of humanity. It is art.”

MIT placed fifth on this year’s Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education ranking of the Top Schools for Student Outcomes, reports Douglas Belkin for The Wall Street Journal. “Outcomes scores are derived from graduation rates, income after graduation, debt repayment and academic reputation,” Belkin explains.

MIT has been named the number two school in the country in this year’s Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education College Rankings. MIT Vice Chancellor Ian Waitz explains that MIT offers students a “candy store” of learning opportunities, including opportunities for undergraduates to participate in research projects. “We invest a great deal in the students here,” he says.

Boston Globe reporter Jeremy Eichler spotlights Prof. Tod Machover’s new opera, “Schoenberg in Hollywood,” which looks at the life and work of the composer Arnold Schoenberg. Eichler writes that the opera is “at once an earnestly admiring tribute and an unconventional biographic fantasia.”

MIT alumnus You Wu has spent six years perfecting robots that can travel through pipes to identify water leaks, writes Anne Quito for Quartz. “Over 240,000 water pipes burst in the US each year, with each incident costing an average of $200,000 in infrastructure damage,” notes Quito.

MIT researchers have identified how blood cells clump together in patients with sickle-cell disease, writes Shi Yinglun for the Xinhua News Agency. Yinglun explains that the findings represent "a step toward being able to predict when these events known as vaso-occlusive pain crises might occur.”

MIT researchers have developed a new system that can detect depression by examining a patient’s speech and writing, reports John Biggs for TechCrunch. Biggs writes that the system could “help real therapists find and isolate issues automatically versus the long process of analysis. It’s a fascinating step forward in mental health.”

Axios reporter Ben Geman writes that a MIT Energy Initiative study shows that while nuclear power is critical to cutting carbon emissions, expanding the industry will be difficult without supportive policies and project cost reductions. The report’s authors explain that the increasing cost of nuclear power undermines its "potential contribution and increases the cost of achieving deep decarbonization."

In an article for The New York Times about how scientists are developing new ways to treat disease using bacteria, Carl Zimmer highlights how MIT startup Synlogic is developing what could be the first FDA-approved synthetic biology-based medical treatment for a disease called phenylketonuria.

A new MIT Energy Initiative study details how nuclear power could help fight climate change, reports Jonathan Tirone for Bloomberg News. The study’s authors explain that U.S. policy makers could support the nuclear industry by putting a “price on emissions, either through direct taxation or carbon-trading markets. That would give atomic operators more room to compete against cheap gas, wind and solar.”

BuzzFeed highlights the work of Prof. Sangeeta Bhatia in a list of trailblazing women working in the STEM fields. BuzzFeed notes that Bhatia is an “incredible role model for women in STEM, not only for to her scientific contributions, but for the elegant way in which she balances her professional and personal roles.”

MIT scientists have developed a new coating that uses solar-power to melt and prevent ice buildup, reports the Xinhua News Agency. The coating, which does not use harmful chemicals, “collects solar radiation, converts it to heat, and spreads that heat around so that the melting is not just confined to the areas exposed directly to the sunlight.”

Quanta Magazine reporter Natalie Wolchover spotlights how the work of Profs. William Freeman, Antonio Torralba and Ramesh Raskar is shedding light on how visual signals can be used to uncover information on hidden objects. Freeman explains that he is thrilled by the idea that “the world is rich with lots of things yet to be discovered.”

Writing for The Boston Globe, Cate McQuaid highlights Delia Gonzalez’s new exhibit at the MIT List Visual Arts Center. McQuaid notes that Gonzalez turns to “ancient civilization in search of meaning — specifically the eruption of Mount Vesuvius and the destruction of Pompeii, in the year 79.”