In the Media

“An artsy new app under development at the MIT Media Lab has you and another person sharing daily activities like waking up, walking around and getting something to eat,” Devin Coldewey writes for MSNBC.

Professor David Autor speaks with NPR’s Tom Ashbrook about the achievement gap between boys and girls in the classroom and what this may mean for the future of the American workforce.

Laura Baverman writes about MaKey MaKey, a manufacturing kit for children developed by MIT researchers, in a piece for USA Today. The kit allows children to develop musical instruments and electronics.

In an article for CNN, Thom Patterson reports on how MIT startup Altaeros Energies has developed an airborne wind turbine that they hope can deliver power to the roughly 1 billion people in rural areas without electricity.

Slate reporter Lily Newman writes about the new phone application, called 20 Day Stranger, developed by Media Lab researchers. Newman writes that, “the app connects strangers and allows them to update each other about any and every detail of their lives for 20 days.”

Bloomberg Businessweek reporter Peter Coy writes about how researchers from MIT and other universities simulated 549 storm surges in New York City and analyzed the effectiveness of different defenses. The researchers found that the most cost-effective method is to allow storm waters to flood the city while protecting critical infrastructure.

Writing for The Boston Globe, Leon Nayfakh examines the day he spent attending a conference via the People’s Bot, a telepresence robot developed by a team of MIT researchers.

Martin LaMonica of The Boston Globe writes about two MIT startups that are aiming to solve long-standing problems with the production of nuclear power. Transatomic Power and UPower Technologies are looking for ways to make efficient use of radioactive waste and develop smaller, cheaper plants, respectively.

In an article for El Mundo (written in Spanish), Carlos Betriu writes about the annual robotics competition that is the culmination of course 2.007. The goal of the course is to challenge students to solve problems with robots and to think creatively, Betriu reports.

Austin Hess reports on MIT’s new environment initiative in an article for The Tech. “MIT undertakes initiatives to inspire genuinely new ideas and the initiative on the environment will be no exception,” Maria T. Zuber, MIT Vice President for Research, told The Tech.

NPR’s Sally Herships speaks with Prof. M. Taylor Fravel about the territorial dispute in the South China Sea. “Fravel notes that border disputes in the area have been going on for decades and this is China's way of trying to demonstrate its claim to the territory,” Herships reports.

In an article for The New York Times, John Markoff writes about a recent synthetic biology conference hosted by MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms. “Neil Gershenfeld, a physicist who is the director of the Center for Bits and Atoms, said that the improvement in the capacity to read and write biological genes has given rise to the possibility of ‘spectacular advances,’” Markoff writes.

“The goal of the simulation is to compare the actual cosmos — viewable via telescope — to the computer-created universe. The comparison will allow scientists to test if their theories on the creation of the universe work,” Salon reporter Sarah Gray writes of Illustris.

“Three scientific papers about the Y chromosome, which determines maleness in humans and most other mammals, should lay to rest the myth that it may disappear after a few more million years of evolution,” Financial Times reporter Clive Cookson writes of MIT research on the Y chromosome.

MIT alumnus James Lee’s company has invented an armrest with a double-decker design that allows it to be shared comfortably, WCVB reports.