Pollution

Siqi Zheng is an associate professor in MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning whose work examines the dynamic connections between what she calls urban “vibrancy” — economic and job growth, for instance — and urban “amenities,” such as transit, clean air, schools, housing, and restaurants.

The city is her lab

Siqi Zheng studies the economics of China’s urban explosion.

July 3, 2018

Repellency of different liquids on polyester fabric coated with H1F7Ma-co-DVB: soy sauce (black drop), coffee (brown drop), HCl acid (top left transparent drop), NaOH (bottom right transparent drop) and water (remaining transparent drops).

Let it rain! New coatings make natural fabrics waterproof

MIT-developed process could offer nontoxic alternative to environmentally harmful chemicals.

June 29, 2018

“People usually think MIT is exclusively focused on STEM research," says PhD student Elena Sobrino. "I saw this program, HASTS, as a way to be in conversation with physical or biological scientists, as a social scientist myself.”

Discovering hidden stories in the Flint water crisis

Graduate student Elena Sobrino looks beyond the headlines to study interactions between the city’s people and institutions.

June 24, 2018

The Center for Social Innovation in Toronto is making financial support available for winners of the contest, which is being held on MIT’s Climate CoLab platform.

Contest is crowdsourcing strategies to reduce pollution from small businesses

Toronto's Center for Social Innovation seeks solutions with a contest on MIT's Climate CoLab platform, providing up to $432,000 to fund pilot projects.

June 20, 2018

Roughly 60 percent of the global population lives in Asia, often with limited access to water.

Study: Climate action can limit Asia’s growing water shortages

Following the Paris accord could reduce risk of severe water-access problems, researchers find.

June 19, 2018

Clouds of pollution float into the sky from two smoke stacks

Checking China’s pollution, by satellite

Study finds reduction in sulfur emissions from power plants.

June 18, 2018

Several years ago, Daniel Cohn (left) and Leslie Bromberg took on the challenge of designing a low-emissions, fuel-efficient replacement for the polluting diesel engines traditionally viewed as the only viable option for powering heavy-duty trucks. Using sophisticated computer models developed by Bromberg, they’ve now produced a conceptual design for an engine that should be up to the task.

Getting the world off dirty diesels

Gasoline-alcohol engines for heavy-duty trucks could produce a meaningful improvement in global air quality.

June 13, 2018

Ravi Raju, a Picower Clinical Research Fellow, explains how gene expression differs as mice respond to circumstances modeling poverty.

Fighting toxic stress in children is tough but possible

Taking time to understand underlying causes of stress can help children escape debilitating health effects, symposium speakers argue.

May 31, 2018

MIT Joint Program Senior Research Scientist Chien Wang's work seeks to advance knowledge about the critical, yet still poorly understood, issue of how aerosol-cloud interactions impact the climate.

Chien Wang selected to join French climate research initiative

MIT senior research scientist is one of six U.S. scientists to join French President Emmanuel Macron's "Make Our Planet Great Again" program.

May 29, 2018

Seven new projects focusing on solutions to water and food systems challenges, led by 11 faculty principal investigators across five MIT departments, will be funded by the Abdul Latif Jameel World Water and Food Security Lab (J-WAFS) with two-year grants of up to $200,000.

J-WAFS awards over $1.3 million in fourth round of seed grant funding

Eleven principal investigators from six MIT departments will receive grants totaling over $1.3 million, overhead free, for research on food and water challenges.

May 25, 2018

Southeast Asia is seen shrouded by smoke in this NASA satellite photo.

Clearing the air over Southeast Asia

Study finds reducing biomass burning is not enough to significantly improve air quality in Southeast Asia.

May 7, 2018

“In China, as you go to tighter and tighter climate policies, you continue to reduce pollutant emissions from coal, whereas the U.S. has already reduced a lot of its air pollution from coal through end-of-pipe technologies,” Karplus says.

Study: Health benefits will offset cost of China’s climate policy

A 4 percent reduction per year in carbon dioxide emissions should net $339 billion in health savings in 2030, researchers estimate.

April 23, 2018

Juliana Mitkiewicz (fourth from right) was a 2017 MIT D-Lab visiting graduate student. She is pictured in Estelí, Nicaragua with a group of MIT D-Lab: Gender and Development students and colleagues from Universidad Centroamericana de Nicaragua in January. From left to right: Janel Mendoza, Gabriela Orozco, Thea Louis, Olivia Waring, Mitkiewicz, Nelson Salazar, Migdalia Herrera, and Laureano Arcia...

3Q: Juliana Mitkiewicz on sustainable development and empowering women in developing countries

Former MIT D-Lab visiting graduate student is helping local communities address environmental challenges, improve regional economies, and promote gender equality.

April 6, 2018

In addition to fieldwork, TREX students explored local landmarks, including the Kilauea Iki Crater.

In fieldwork program, students take the lead

TREX program from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering takes students to Hawaii to conduct environmental research.

February 12, 2018

$Hydraulic fracturing is an industrial process in which a mixture of water, sand, and chemicals is injected into a well at rates of up to 4,000 gallons per minute, at pressures up to 10,000 pounds per square inch.$

Charting gas and oil's future in a decarbonizing world

New analytical method addressing the dynamic nature of the petroleum industry could enable more accurate energy scenarios.

January 12, 2018

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