Department of Energy (DoE)

Tony Lee of Mashable spotlights the technique developed by MIT researchers that allows plants to glow when inserted with nanoparticles containing luciferase,  an enzyme known to make fireflies glow. 

Prof. Michael Strano spoke with CNN’s Nicola Davison about his recent work making plants glow. "We're thinking about how we can engineer plants to replace functions of the devices that we encounter every day. The things that we make out of plastic and circuit boards -- can we replace those with a living plant?" said Strano.

Boston Globe reporter Alex Kingsbury highlights how MIT researchers have developed a new technique that allows plants to glow in the dark. Kingsbury writes that, “In subsequent tests with watercress, arugula, kale, and spinach, the plants glowed for 3.5 hours. Researchers also figured out a way to turn off the glow during daylight hours.”

Boston 25 News reports that MIT researchers have developed a new technique that allows plants to glow in the dark and could potentially be used in the future to transform them into sources of electricity. The researchers demonstrated the technique on several different types of plants, including kale, arugula, spinach, and watercress.  

Prof. Michael Strano speaks with BBC News reporter Alan Kasujja about the technique his team developed to embed nanoparticles into a plant’s leaves so that it can glow in the dark. Strano explains that his team figured out, “how to control where these particles go inside the plant…We can put them right near the biochemical processes where photosynthesis occurs.”

In this video, Reuters spotlights how MIT researchers have developed a new sensor that can be applied to plant leaves and can identify when a plant is experiencing a water shortage.  Prof. Michael Strano explains that the sensor allows users to, “detect the onset of water stress long before the tissue starts to be harmed.” 

Newsweek reporter Sydney Pereira writes that MIT researchers have engineered a plant that can glow in the dark by embedding nanoparticles into the plant’s leaves. “Further optimization could one day lead to plants that could illuminate entire work spaces or sprays that can be coated onto trees to transform them into streetlights,” Pereira explains. 

Prof. Michael Strano has developed “a sensor that can be “printed” onto a plant’s leaf and transmit data from the plant itself about if it’s experiencing water stress,” writes Kristin Toussaint for metro.

MIT researchers have developed a new sensor that can be applied to the leaf of a plant and could be used to help predict droughts, reports Alyssa Meyers for The Boston Globe. Prof. Michael Strano explains that in the future, “One of the most useful ways of using this sensor is to design more stress-tolerant crops.”

HuffPost reporter Thomas Tamblyn writes that MIT researchers have developed a new “air-breathing” battery that can store electricity for months. The new battery could harvest, “the vast wind energy waiting to be captured in the North Atlantic, store it for months on end and then release it into the grid for a fraction of the cost that we’re currently paying.”

MIT researchers have found that by 2050 climate change could deplete water basins and reduce crop yields, reports The Boston Globe’s Alyssa Meyers. If no action is taken to combat climate change, “numerous basins used to irrigate crops across the country will either start to experience shortages or see existing shortages ‘severely accentuated.’”

Prof. Ernest Moniz, the former Secretary of Energy, appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher to discuss the Iran nuclear deal. Moniz explains that the deal helps to ensure nuclear security as it “puts in place verification measures that are completely unique and apply to this deal forever.” 

After serving as the U.S. Energy Secretary for nearly four years, Prof. Ernest Moniz has returned to MIT as a part time physics professor and special adviser to President L. Rafael Reif, reports the Associated Press.

Louis Columbus of Forbes writes about MIT Technology Review’s 2017 list of technological breakthroughs, which features several innovations from MIT researchers. Featured MIT research includes a new solar cell design that could double the efficiency of conventional solar cells, and the Cell Atlas, an initiative to catalog every cell type in the human body. 

In an article for Salon about extreme weather, Paul Rosenberg highlights a new study by MIT researchers that shows climate change could cause California to “experience three more extreme precipitation events per year by 2100, although the number could be reduced by half that if aggressive policy measures are pursued.”