Prof. Theodore Postol writes for The New York Times about the potential consequences of the United States of America withdrawing from the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty. “It is the unimaginable capabilities of these weapons that must take center stage when considering the giant and still unknown terrors and threats they pose to global stability and humanity’s future,” argues Postol.

Boston Globe reporter Hiawatha Bray writes that MIT startup Altaeros has developed a helium-filled airship called a SuperTower that can be used to carry cellular antennas and can be tethered 800 feet above ground. Bray explains that radio signals from the SuperTower “have a range of more than 35 miles over flat terrain, taking the place of 15 land-based cell towers.”

Prof. John Deutch proposes a demonstration project to show how renewable energy could provide 95 percent of electricity generation, reports Jeff McMahon for Forbes. Deutch suggests “setting up a competition between energy developers, allowing them to bid on a 20-year contract to provide a system that meets 95 percent of demand in an area using solar, wind and storage alone.”

Prof. Tim Berners-Lee speaks with Wired reporter K.G. Orphanides about his startup Inrupt, which is aimed at transforming how we share personal data on the web. Orphanides explains that Berners-Lee’s idea is that, “instead of a company storing all your personal data on their servers, you would keep it on your own personal data ‘pod.’”

Forbes contributor Gil Press writes about MIT cybersecurity startup Duality Technologies, which is working on guaranteeing privacy and utility. Press explains that the company is using a cybersecurity technique called Homomorphic Encryption, which “allows for processing and analysis of the encrypted data without having the secret key.”

New York Times reporter Dennis Overbye writes about the years of effort that go into ensuring that large-scale, Nobel-prize winning scientific endeavors like LIGO – which is jointly operated by MIT and Caltech – are funded and successful. Overbye writes that LIGO’s success “was a saga of persistence, ingenuity and just plain bravery in the face of nature and professional skepticism.”

Prof. Sara Seager speaks with National Geographic reporter Jamie Shreeve about her work searching for an Earth-like planet orbiting a sunlike star. “You never know what’s going to happen,” Seager says. “But I know that something great is around those stars.”