In the Media

Prof. Thomas Malone speaks with Poets & Quants for Executives reporter Alison Damast about the executive education course he teaches with Prof. Daniela Rus that aims to provide senior-level managers with a better sense of how AI works. “We are certainly not trying to teach people to understand the details of how to write AI programs, though some of those in the course may know that already,” Malone says. “What we are trying to do is give them a sense of when it is easy and when it is hard to use AI technology at various times for different kinds of business applications.”

Researchers from MIT and elsewhere are investigating the “pathways, risk factors, and molecules” involved in the development of colorectal cancer, reports Rick Sobey for The Boston Herald. “The research team has uncovered contributing causes to this rise in early-onset cases, including: overweight/obesity, physical inactivity, poor diet, and alterations in the gut microbiome,” writes Sobey.

Research Scientist Eva Ponce speaks with Fast Company to explain how AI will impact supply chains. “One of the most common reasons I have seen companies fail when implementing disruptive technologies like AI is when they are rushing, with a lack of clear vision,” says Ponce.

In an article for The Guardian, Angela Saini, an instructor in the MIT Graduate Program in Science Writing, details her research studying the origins of the patriarchy. “Anthropologists have documented at least 160 matrilineal societies still in existence today, in which people trace their lineage through the women in their family rather than the men,” explains Saini. “There is an entire ‘matrilineal belt’ that stretches across Africa, and others dotted across Asia and North and South America.”

Mashable reporter Adele Walton spotlights Joy Buolamwini PhD '22 and her work in uncovering racial bias in digital technology. “Buolamwini created what she called the Aspire Mirror, which used face-tracking software to register the movements of the user and overlay them onto an aspirational figure,” explains Walton. “When she realised the facial recognition wouldn’t detect her until she was holding a white mask over her face, she was confronted face on with what she termed the ‘coded gaze.’ She soon founded the Algorithmic Justice League, which exists to prevent AI harms and increase accountability.”

MIT scientists have found that a potential treatment for Alzheimer’s disease involving flickering lights and low-pitched sound could also help prevent cognitive problems after cancer treatment, reports Clare Wilson for New Scientist. The treatment is aimed at stimulating 40 Hz brainwaves, which are linked to memory processing. The results suggest targeting such “brainwaves may result in broader benefits for the brain, including increasing the activity of immune cells and, most recently, boosting its drainage system, which could help clear a toxic protein called beta-amyloid.”
 

Gabriel Klein MBA '18 – senior director at EY-Parthenon, and a “beloved husband, son, brother, friend and colleague” – has died at the age of 35, reports Jeremy C. Fox for The Boston Globe. “He taught me what it meant to be a good person, to be a mensch,” says Gabriel’s brother, Noah Klein. “He taught me that you have to always be a loyal friend, and you always have to be a good son, and that means putting other people in front of yourself.”

Writing for Fast Company, Senior Lecturer Guadalupe Hayes-Mota '08, SM '16, MBA '16 shares methods to address the influence of AI in healthcare. “Despite these advances [of AI in healthcare], the full spectrum of AI’s potential remains largely untapped,” explains Hayes-Mota. “Systemic hurdles such as data privacy concerns, the absence of standardized data protocols, regulatory complexities, and ethical dilemmas are compounded by an inherent resistance to change within the healthcare profession. These barriers underscore the urgent need for transformative action from all stakeholders to fully harness AI’s capabilities.”

A new study conducted by researchers at MIT and elsewhere has found large language models (LLMs) can be used to predict the future as well as humans can, reports Chris Stokel-Walker for Fast Company. “Accurate forecasting of future events is very important to many aspects of human economic activity, especially within white collar occupations, such as those of law, business and policy,” says postdoctoral fellow Peter S. Park.

Using the James Webb Space Telescope, postdoc Rohan Naidu will be studying “some of the particularly large and red galaxies, [called little red dots,] that appear much brighter and more massive than theorists have expected galaxies at this epoch to be,” reports Jonathan O’Callaghan for Scientific American. Naidu’s “program will seek to settle the debat about little red dots once and for all,” writes O’Callaghan.

New York Times reporter Stephen Wallis spotlights Prof. Carlo Ratti’s proposal for the world’s first “farmscraper” in Shenzhen, China, a 51-story building that would be wrapped in a vertical hydroponic farm and could produce enough food annually to feed 40,000 people. “At this critical moment, what we architects do matters more than ever,” Ratti emphasizes. “Every kilowatt-hour of solar power, every unit of zero-carbon housing and every calorie of sustainably sourced vegetables will be multiplied across history.”

Cognito Therapeutics, an MIT startup co-founded by Prof. Li-Huei Tsai and Prof. Ed Boyden, has developed a headset that uses light and sound to slow the cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s patients, reports Emily Mullin for Wired. “Cognito’s headset, dubbed Spectris, delivers flashing lights and sounds through a pair of connected glasses and headphones to stimulate gamma waves in the brain” writes Mullin. “Different types of brain waves have different paces, or frequencies. Gamma waves are fast-frequency brain waves associated with thinking skills and memory, and people with Alzheimer’s are known to have fewer of these fast brain waves.”

Researchers from MIT and elsewhere are studying how T-cell receptors recognize antigens, reports Michael T. Nietzel for Forbes. The team “hopes to develop antigen-specific immunotherapies which could also have treatment implications for infectious diseases and allergies,” writes Nietzel.

Times Higher Education spotlights MIT President Sally Kornbluth in a roundup of top universities led by women. “Kornbluth’s academic background is in cell biology. She obtained a degree in political science from the University of Cambridge, and then pursued a PhD in molecular oncology at Rockefeller University.”

Bingxu Liu PhD '23 speaks with Science reporter Christie Wilcox about his work  studying STING, an immune protein that plays a key role in defending the human body against viruses, bacteria, and tumors. “STING is actually one of the most promising cancer immunotherapy targets,” explains Wilcox. “If you activate the STING pathway, it triggers a very strong immune response. But when it’s too strong, it can actually kill your T cells. Initial evidence suggest that T cells die because of some ion impact. Which begs the question: Can we just use STING to activate some parts of the immune response, like interferon, but also block the ion flow [that’s harming T cells]?”