Awards, honors and fellowships

Profs. Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson PhD '89 have been awarded the 2024 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel for their work explaining the gaps in prosperity between nations and advancing our understanding of inequality, reports Jeanna Smialek for The New York Times. “Reducing the huge differences in income between countries is one of our times’ greatest challenges,” said Jakob Svensson, chairman of the economics prize committee. Thanks to the economists’ “groundbreaking research,” he said, “we have a much deeper understanding of the root causes of why countries fail or succeed.” Acemoglu reacted to winning the prize, noting that: “You dream of having a good career, but this is over and on top of that.” 

The 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to Victor Ambros '75, PhD '79 and Gary Ruvkun for the discovery of microRNA, “a tiny class of RNA molecules that play a crucial role in determining how organisms mature and function – and how they sometimes malfunction,” reports Teddy Rosenbluth and Derrick Bryson Taylor for The New York Times. Ambros and Ruvkun “had been postdoctoral fellows at the same time at Massachusetts Institute of Technology,” they explain . “As they studied C. elegans, they at first felt a smidgen of friendly competition as they each started their own labs in the Boston area, Dr. Ambros said.”

Victor Ambros '75, PhD '79 and Gary Ruvkun have won the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of microRNAs, report Mark Johnson and Lizette Ortega for The Washington Post. “Ambros and Ruvkunhad worked together as postdoctoral researchers in the lab of Nobel laureate and MIT Professor Robert Horvitz. “What the microRNAs really end up revealing for us is a way that parts of our genome can communicate with other parts of the genome,” says Ambros. “The significance of this discovery of microRNAs is that it allowed us to be aware of a very complex and nuanced layer of regulation whereby genes in our cells talk to each other.”

Victor Ambros ‘75, PhD ‘79 and Gary Ruvkun have won the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for “their groundbreaking work on how genes behave,” reports Patrick Smith for NBC News. Ambros and Ruvkun, who worked as postdocs in the lab of Professor H. Robert Horvitz in the late 1980s, discovered how microRNA molecules play a key role in gene regulation. "The pair sought to explore how nerve cells and muscle cells, for example, have very different characteristics despite having the same genetic information," writes Smith.

Prof. Yossi Sheffi, director of the MIT Center for Transportation and Logistics, has been named to the top spot in the Supply Chain Digital list of the top 10 supply chain influencers. Sheffi’s “expertise in systems optimization, risk analysis and supply chain management is covered in his extensive body of work,” writes Libby Hargreaves for Supply Chain Digital. “His consultancy with top enterprises cements him as the leading voice in shaping modern supply chain strategies and addressing emerging industry challenges.” 

Hashim Sarkis, dean of the MIT School of Architecture and Planning, has been selected as a juror for the Pritzker Architecture Prize, an award that is “essential in heightening society’s awareness of the impact of architecture on the human experience,” reports United States Architecture News. "At our doorsteps are new problems, be they related to climate, equity or new ways of life," says Sarkis. "But architects are rising to the occasion, expanding the field with inspiring new work.” 

Prof. Regina Barzilay has received the WebMD Health Heros award for her work developing a new system that uses AI to detect breast cancer up to 5 years earlier, reports WHDH. “We do have a right to know our risk and then we, together with our healthcare providers, need to manage them,” says Barzilay. 

Prof. Nancy Kanwisher has been named a recipient of the 2024 Champalimaud Foundation’s Vision Award, reports the Associated Press. The award highlights the collective work of four researchers who have “driven significant progress in the field of visual neuroscience." 

Prof. Moungi Bawendi, a recipient of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, speaks with Nobel Prize Conversations host Adam Smith about the joys of visualizing quantum mechanics, the inspiration for his Nobel-prize winning work and his love of music. “Being in a place like MIT and being exposed to engineering and other scientific fields and medicine across the river and Harvard Medical School and a lot of startups around here, you really are exposed to so many things that are so interesting and I love that,” says Bawendi. “Those things give me ideas of how to go back to the lab and take different directions.” 

Prof. Sara Seager, Prof. Robert Langer and Prof. Nancy Kanwisher have been awarded the 2024 Kavli Prize for their work in the three award categories: astrophysics, nanoscience, and neuroscience, respectively, reports Michael T. Nietzel for Forbes. According to the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, this award honors scientists with outstanding research “that has broadened our understanding of the big, the small and the complex,” writes Nietzel. 

The California Institute of Technology has announced the eight distinguished scientists who will be this year’s Brown Investigators, each receiving up to $2 million over five years to support research on fundamental challenges in the physical sciences, writes Michael T. Nietzel for Forbes. Recipient Prof. Nuh Gedik will, “develop a new kind of microscopy that images electrons photo-emitted from a surface while also measuring their energy and momentum.”

Forbes selects innovators for the list’s Healthcare & Science category, written by senior contributor Yue Wang. On the list is MIT PhD candidate Yuzhe Yang, who studies AI and machine learning technologies capability to monitor and diagnose illnesses such as Parkinson's disease.

An analysis by The Atlantic’s Ronald Brownstein notes despite Republican resistance to electric vehicles, many new production facilities are located in GOP-represented states. MIT Innovation Fellow Brian Deese explains EV companies are simply seeking space and nearby manufacturing and construction capacity, but said “it’s pretty hard to think of a technology where there was a cheaper, better technology to solve a consumer need and consumers prioritized a cultural or political patina over lower costs and higher quality.”

Prof. Linda Griffith and Stuart Orkin '67 were named to this year’s Time 100 Health list, which recognizes innovators leading the way to new health solutions. Griffith, who was honored for her work engineering a uterine organoid to study endometriosis, explains that in the future engineered organoids could be used to find the most effective treatments for patients. “We have all the genetic information and all the information from the patient’s exposure to infections, environmental chemicals, and stress that would cause the tissues to become deranged in some way, all captured in that organoid,” Griffith explains. 

ShareAmerica reporter Lauren Monsen spotlights Prof. Dina Katabi for her work in advancing medicine with artificial intelligence. “Katabi develops AI tools to monitor patients’ breathing patterns, hear rate, sleep quality, and movements,” writes Monsen. “This data informs treatment for patients with diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Crohn’s, and ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), as well as Rett syndrome, a rare neurological disorder.”