School of Science

“My training at MIT gave me an empathy for microbes,” says Emily Greenhagen. “It’s an approach that a lot of chemical engineers don’t necessarily think about and has been key to my success.”

A rose by any other name would smell as yeast

Emily Havens Greenhagen ’05 leads a team of scientists brewing perfume from yeast.

July 14, 2017

Researchers have developed a metal-free contrast agent for MRI scans, which could be safer for certain patients.

Metal-free MRI contrast agent could be safer for some patients

New agent could be used for certain high-risk groups and may enable longer-term tumor imaging.

July 12, 2017

“In the Southwest, water availability for irrigation is already a concern,” says Elodie Blanc, a research scientist at MIT’s Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change. “If we mitigate, this could prevent added stress associated with climate change and a severe decrease in runoff in the western United States. But it will be even worse in the future if we don’t do anything a...

Climate change to deplete some US water basins, reduce irrigated crop yields

By 2050, the Southwest will produce significantly less cotton and forage, researchers report.

July 11, 2017

Nested cubes are assembled on a lab shelf in Buliding 18, nestled among snorkel fume hoods. The display was part of a thesis project by Angel Chen MS '17.

The art of construction: Chemistry lab takes center stage in an artist’s exhibition

In search of a space under construction in which to stage an art installation, grad student Angel Chen was drawn to Building 18’s fourth floor lab renovation.

July 10, 2017

Robert Griffin awarded Richard R. Ernst Prize in Magnetic Resonance

Griffin honored for pioneering contributions to high-resolution solid state nuclear magnetic resonance and its applications to biological systems.

July 7, 2017

The Marble Center for Cancer Nanomedicine’s faculty is made up of Koch Institute members who are committed to fighting cancer with nanomedicine through research, education, and collaboration. Top row (l-r) Sangeeta Bhatia, director; Daniel Anderson; and Angela Belcher. Bottom row: Paula Hammond; Darrell Irvine; and Robert Langer.

Converging on cancer at the nanoscale

Marking its first anniversary, the Koch Institute’s Marble Center for Cancer Nanomedicine goes full steam ahead.

July 7, 2017

Graduate student Lucas Mason-Brown is chief technology officer for and co-founder of Data for Black Lives (D4BL), an organization helping scientists use data to fight racial bias in real estate, finance, criminal justice, and other areas.

Lucas Mason-Brown named 2017 Echoing Green Fellow

MIT graduate student in mathematics honored for using equations to boost racial equality.

July 6, 2017

$MIT climate scientists have found that the ocean’s export efficiency, or the fraction of total plankton growth that is sinking to its depths, is decreasing, due mainly to rising global temperatures.$

Rising temperatures are curbing ocean’s capacity to store carbon

Study finds large amounts of carbon dioxide, equivalent to yearly U.K. emissions, remain in surface waters.

July 6, 2017

Researchers have created in simulations the first system in which can be manipulated by a beam of ordinary light rather than the expensive specialized light sources required by other systems.

Tiny “motors” are driven by light

Researchers demonstrate nanoscale particles that ordinary light sources can set spinning.

June 30, 2017

Rainer Weiss wins Princess of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research

Prestigious Spanish award shared with Caltech's Kip Thorne and Barry Barish and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration for work in detecting gravitational waves.

June 29, 2017