Faculty

Writing for The New York Times, Prof. Anant Agarwal shares AI’s potential to “revolutionize education by enhancing paths to individual students in ways we never thought possible.” Agarwal emphasizes: “A.I. will never replace the human touch that is so vital to education. No algorithm can replicate the empathy, creativity and passion a teacher brings to the classroom. But A.I. can certainly amplify those qualities. It can be our co-pilot, our chief of staff helping us extend our reach and improve our effectiveness.”

Wall Street Journal reporter John Anderson spotlights NOVA’s “Building Stuff: Change It!” – a program that follows engineers, including Prof. Maria Yang, as they “seek to help humanity adapt to a changing world, drawing on the ideas and traditions of the past to create new technologies.” When discussing efforts to adapt to climate change, Yang explains: “All design is redesign.”

Prof. Kripa Varanasi speaks with BBC News reporter Chris Baraniuk about his work developing a “range of coatings that make surfaces slippery and therefore resistant to the formation of biofilms.” Baraniuk notes that: “Tests of one such coating in an experiment carried out on board the International Space Station found that it worked as intended.”

Prof. Alan Lightman speaks with Boston Globe correspondent Kate Tuttle about his new book, “The Miraculous from the Material: Understanding the Wonders of Nature,” in which Lightman “celebrates the phenomena that inspire awe.” Lightman explains: “I think the humanities are even more important now in a period of exponentially advancing technology. We really have to think hard about what makes us human. Like having compassion for other people. The ability to fall in love, the ability to appreciate beauty.”

Prof. Vipin Narang speaks with New York Times reporter David E. Sanger about the “use of nuclear weapons as the ultimate bargaining chip.” Narang explains: “A nuclear threshold is not determined by words, but by the deterrence balance and stakes, and changes to declaratory doctrine do not at all change the deterrence balance between the U.S., NATO and Russia.”

Prof. Emeritus David Thorburn speaks with Washington Post reporter Laura Bradley about the rise of a new type of female detective archetype in TV crime shows. “Though the women who populate the crime dramas of today are notably contemporary, they share a key characteristic with their literary forebears — a nebulous relationship with law enforcement,” Bradley writes.  “There’s a long tradition of a certain kind of detective being at odds with the cops,” says Thorburn. “It goes back to Sherlock Holmes, who always mocked the London police and kept exposing them.” 

Prof. Daron Acemoglu and Prof. Simon Johnson, recipients of the 2024 Nobel Prize in economics, join Boston Public Radio to discuss their research examining the role of institutions in creating shared prosperity. “For the longer-term health of the U.S. economy,” says Acemoglu, “there’s probably nothing more important than its institutions. If any president, any politician, any party damages those institutions, that’s the first thing we should focus on.” Johnson adds: “Democracy has to deliver on shared prosperity. Otherwise people get very annoyed and they question the system.”

Craft in America visits Prof. Erik Demaine and Martin Demaine of CSAIL to learn more about their work with computational origami. “Computational origami is quite useful for the mathematical problems we are trying to solve,” Prof. Erik Demaine explains. “We try to integrate the math and the art together.”

Prof. Simon Johnson, one of the recipients of the 2024 Nobel Prize in economics, speaks with Times Higher Education reporter Jack Grove about his journey from a childhood in Sheffield as the son of a screw manufacturer to studying for his PhD at MIT and serving as chief economist at the International Monetary Fund. Speaking about how to help ensure AI is used to benefit society and workers, Johnson explains: “Big tech doesn’t like us, but we need a plan for this, and the role of economists like us is to get ideas like this out there so they can be hammered out in the policy world.”

Prof. Daron Acemoglu, a recipient of the 2024 Nobel Prize in economic sciences, speaks with CNBC about the challenges facing the American economy. Acemoglu notes that in his view the coming economic storm is really “both a challenge and an opportunity,” explains Acemoglu. “I talk about AI, I talk about aging, I talk about the remaking of globalization. All of these things are threats because they are big changes, but they’re also opportunities that we could use in order to make ourselves more productive, workers more productive, workers earn more. In fact, even reduce inequality, but the problem is that we’re not prepared for it.” 

Writing for Forbes, Senior Lecturer Guadalupe Hayes-Mota SB '08, MS '16, MBA '16, shares five lessons for aspiring entrepreneurs. “Starting a business is not just about having a brilliant idea; it's about finding purpose, solving real problems and building the right team,” explains Hayes-Mota. 

Prof. Simon Johnson, who shared the 2024 Nobel Prize in economic sciences with Prof. Daron Acemoglu, speaks with CNBC “Squawk Box” about his reaction to hearing the news that he was a Nobel laureate and his research on the role of strong institutions in shaping economies. “I think going forward we need to strengthen the resilience of our democracy in the United States,” says Johnson. He adds that having a “resilient democracy, a legitimate democracy, a democracy that everyone believes in and adheres to the results of elections, is absolutely fundamental to everything that we’ve been able to build.” 

Prof. Evelina Fedorenko speaks with Scientific American reporter Gary Stix about her research demonstrating that “language and thought are, in fact, distinct entities that the brain processes separately.” Speaking about how large language models could be used to help scientists better understand the neuroscience of how language works, Fedorenko explains that "there are many, many questions that we can now ask that had been totally out of reach: for example, questions about [language] development.”

Writing for The New York Times, Institute Prof. Daron Acemoglu explores the “three epochal changes poised to reshape the U.S. economy in coming years: an aging population, the rise of artificial intelligence and the rewiring of the global economy.” Acemoglu makes the case that “if handled correctly, these challenges could remake work and deliver much higher productivity, wages and opportunities — something the computer revolution promised and never fulfilled.” He adds: “If we mismanage the moment, they could make good, well-paying jobs scarcer and the economy less dynamic. Our decisions over the next five to 10 years will determine which path we take.”

In a letter to the Financial Times, Prof. Daron Acemoglu and his colleagues highlight the importance of providing access to affordable financing for the world’s poorest countries. “IDA, the World Bank’s concessional financing facility for these countries, has a proven track record for providing this support and its upcoming replenishment is a moment for the international community to match their stated concern with a stepped-up financial contribution,” they write. “We urge finance ministers of the G20 countries to lead this effort and increase contributions to the 21st replenishment of the International Development Association (IDA21).”