MIT startup Alsym Energy, cofounded by Prof. Kripa Varanasi, has developed an alternative to lithium-ion batteries using sodium ions, writes Morgan Clendaniel for Fast Company. “The battery is nonflammable and nontoxic, allowing it to be placed in more sensitive areas and saving money on cooling systems that often have to be co-installed with large lithium batteries,” explains Clendaniel.
Joe Romm ‘82, PhD ‘87, “a physicist by training who became one of the most influential voices in the debate over climate change and how to stop it, using his blog to provide deep-dive insights and sharp-elbowed critiques,” died on Sept. 14, reports Clay Risen for The New York Times. “There’s nobody else like Joe Romm,” says Michael Mann, Romm’s colleague at the Penn Center. “There’s nobody else who brought all of these interlocking talents and proclivities together in the way that he did. That gave him such a unique voice, and it’s a voice that we sorely could use today.”
Research Scientist Judah Cohen speaks to USA Today’s Doyle Rice, Dinah Voyles Pulver and Janet Loehrke about the intensity of the polar vortex this year, and his predictions on what sort of weather the upcoming winter season will bring across the country. “The polar vortex is no longer record strong (signaling a milder winter) and it is actually a bit weaker than normal as it is undergoing a polar vortex stretch,” says Cohen. "It looks like that over the next two weeks the PV will be near normal or slightly weaker than normal.”
During Climate Week NYC, Evelyn Wang, MIT’s Vice President for Energy and Climate, emphasized the importance of utilizing AI to help tackle climate change, write Seth Borenstein and Jennifer McDermott for The Associated Press. Data centers adding to climate and water problems ‘is not forever,’ according to Wang, who told The Associated Press that data centers are about five years away from being water neutral and about a decade away from no longer adding to planet-warming emissions.
A study by MIT researchers has found evidence that the first signs of ozone depletion appeared in 1957 in the upper tropical stratosphere, driven by carbon tetrachloride, an industrial chemical introduced in the 1930s and widely used as a dry-cleaning and degreasing agent, writes Gizmodo reporter Ellyn Lapointe. “This finding underscores the importance of long-term atmospheric monitoring so that we can fully understand how it responds to chemical pollution,” Lapointe notes.
Senior Research Scientist C. Adam Schlosser, deputy director of the MIT Center for Sustainability Science and Strategy, speaks with Joshua Miller of The Boston Globe’s Camberville & Beyond newsletter about weather, climate and how warming temperatures could impact the Northeastern US. Schlosser explains that: “warmer air can carry more moisture, more vapor. So, imagine again a future for the Northeast where everything is risen by a few degrees. It's not just the daytime temperatures, but the nighttime temperatures. The amount of vapor in the air has a big impact on nighttime temperatures, and on hot, humid nights, your body's ability to cool is diminished.”
Prof. Raymond Pierrehumbert and his colleagues have discovered an exoplanet orbiting a star 34 light-years from Earth that is "covered with a perpetual ocean of magma and enveloped by a noxious and fiercely hot sulfur-rich atmosphere," reports Will Dunham for Reuters. "The era of exoplanet discovery keeps showing us new kinds of worlds, indeed 'strange new worlds,' generally stranger than anything in 'Star Trek,'" says Pierrehumbert. “This offers all sorts of exciting opportunities to put together fundamental physics in very novel ways."
Prof. Christopher Knittel speaks with New York Times reporter Emmett Lindner about how the conflict with Iran has influenced gas prices in the United States. “When there’s a supply disruption in the Middle East, that raises prices for every barrel of oil in the world,” explains Knittel. “Those price increases then trickle down to products that use oil, gasoline being the most relevant one.”
Prof. Christopher Knittel speaks with Bloomberg reporter Stacey Vanek Smith about increased gas prices. “Gas is something we tend to buy on a weekly basis,” says Knittel. “But also, we see the price hundreds of times a day. Even if you’re not buying it, you see the price, so the salience of gas prices is like no other.”
Research Scientist Judah Cohen speaks with USA Today reporter Doyle Rice about how changes in the polar vortex will impact March weather across the United States. “I would expect a milder period in the eastern US until close to the spring equinox," says Cohen. "Then I think eventually colder weather arrives to the eastern U.S. related to the polar vortex split in late March or early April that could hang around for a while."
Research scientist Judah Cohen served as a panelist for the Boston Globe’s “The Reshaping of New England’s Seasons: What’s Happening to Our Weather?” event, reports Ken Mahan for The Boston Globe. Cohen and his fellow panelists discussed New England weather, sharing insights and answering questions from community members.
USA Today reporter Dinah Voyles Pulver spotlights Research Scientist Judah Cohen’s research studying how weather systems and climate patterns are related to the increase in Arctic blasts and deep freezes this winter.
Research Scientist Judah Cohen speaks with New York Times reporter Eric Niiler about his research studying “how global warming might also be causing colder winters in the eastern United States.” Cohen says “It’s weird what’s going on now in the stratosphere. These stretching events happen every winter, but just how the pattern is stuck is really remarkable.”
Research Scientist Judah Cohen speaks with Boston Globe reporter Ken Mahan about how a disrupted polar vortex (PV) could impact weather in the United States in the coming weeks. “The PV has been doing its best Mr. Fantastic impression, stretching and compressing continuously,” allowing frigid air to escape southward, Cohen explains. “If we (New England) do receive colder weather, but not quite the cold we experienced in late January, again from this larger PV disruption, it will be either late February and early March.”
Research Scientist Judah Cohen speaks with USA Today reporter Doyle Rice about how the polar vortex and cold Siberian air could impact weather across the U.S. in February. Cohen noted that some of the cold weather being felt on the East Coast of the U.S. is "coming from Siberia and that is contributing to the extremity of the cold since Siberia is the source of the coldest air of the Northern Hemisphere in winter.”