Funding

Anantha Chandrakasan, MIT’s chief innovation and strategy officer and dean of MIT’s School of Engineering, speaks with Boston Globe reporter Jon Chesto about the new MIT-GE Vernova Energy and Climate Alliance. “A great amount of innovation happens in academia. We have a longer view into the future,” says Chandrakasan. He adds that while companies like GE Vernova have “the ability to get products out quickly to scale up, to manufacture, we have the ability to think past the short-term. ... It’s super smart of them to surround themselves with this incredible talent in academia. That will allow us to make the kind of breakthroughs that will keep U.S. competitiveness at its peak.”

E&E News reporter Christa Marshall writes that the new MIT-GE Vernova Energy and Climate Alliance will “scale sustainable energy systems across the globe” and advance breakthrough low-carbon technologies.

Prof. Sarah Millholland, Prof. Christian Wolf, Prof. Emil Verner, Prof. Darcy McRose, Prof. Marzyeh Ghassemi, Prof. Mohsen Ghaffari and Prof. Ariel Furst have received the 2025 Sloan Research Fellowship for “being among the most promising scientific researchers currently working in their fields,” reports Michael T. Nietzel for Forbes. “Sloan Research Fellows are chosen in seven scientific and technical fields—chemistry, computer science, Earth system science, economics, mathematics, neuroscience, and physics,” explains Nietzel. 

Writing for The Boston Globe, President Emeritus L. Rafael Reif highlights the fundamental contributions made by universities across the United States in the advancement of scientific and technological innovations, and the role of government funding in these sectors. “Since World War II, the ideas born in university research laboratories have helped to make America great,” writes Reif. “Universities’ contributions should be recognized, and the systems that allow them to contribute should not be recklessly derailed.” 

Writing for The Boston Globe, President Emeritus L. Rafael Reif makes the case that “without strong research universities and the scientific and technological advances they discover and invent, the United States could not possibly keep up with China.” He emphasizes that “punishing universities financially for their failings — real and imagined — would be counterproductive. If anything, the China challenge demands that universities do more than they are already doing — and that they have the resources to do so.”

A more than $40 million investment to add advanced nano-fabrication equipment and capabilities to MIT.nano will significantly expand the center’s nanofabrication capabilities, reports Jon Chesto for The Boston Globe. The new equipment, which will also be available to scientists outside MIT, will allow “startups and students access to wafer-making equipment used by larger companies. These tools will allow its researchers to make prototypes of an array of microelectronic devices.”

Writing for The Atlantic, Prof. Deb Roy makes the case that “new kinds of social networks can be designed for constructive communication—for listening, dialogue, deliberation, and mediation—and they can actually work.” Roy adds: “We can and should create social networks designed for public discourse that prioritize inclusion, where underheard voices and perspectives can flourish, and where people take and offer disagreement in good faith.”

The Center for UltraCold Atoms, located at MIT, is one of four university physics programs that will share $76 million in funding from the National Science Foundation as part of the organization’s Physics Frontiers Centers program, which aims to “foster major breakthroughs at the intellectual frontiers of physics,” writes Michael T. Nietzel for Forbes. “[T]he Center for UltraCold Atoms is a joint effort with Harvard University that will explore how to achieve greater control and programmability of complex quantum systems,” he explains.

Prof. Daniela Rus, director of CSAIL, emphasizes the central role universities play in fostering innovation and the importance of ensuring universities have the computing resources necessary to help tackle major global challenges. Rus writes, “academia needs a large-scale research cloud that allows researchers to efficiently share resources” to address hot-button issues like generative AI. “It would provide an integrated platform for large-scale data management, encourage collaborative studies across research organizations, and offer access to cutting-edge technologies, while ensuring cost efficiency,” Rus explains.

A new report co-authored by MIT researchers finds that the “US lead in advanced computing has declined significantly over the past five years—especially when measured against China,” writes Will Knight for Wired. The report’s authors emphasize that the US “needs to make sure that the CHIPS Act spending reflects the importance of developing novel ideas in advanced computing, as opposed to just propping up existing technologies,” Knight notes.

Boston Globe columnist Shirley Leung spotlights Elise Strobach PhD ’20 - co-founder and CEO of AeroShield Materials, a company developing super-insulating windows. Strobach is a recipient of funding from the MassVentures fund for deep-tech startups with a focus on underserved founders or those based in underserved regions. “We want to do cool things that have big impact,” said Strobach. “The minute I first visited Massachusetts, I just really felt that, ‘Wow, this is a place where that can happen.' "

The Economist highlights a paper by researchers from MIT and Stanford that finds new ideas are becoming harder to find in areas ranging from crop yields to microchip density. The Economist also spotlights how Prof. Danielle Li and Prof. Pierre Azoulay examined the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) model of funding and found that it “does best when its program directors have a clear understanding of the sort of breakthroughs that are needed.”

Boston Globe reporter Scott Kirsner spotlights the work of Katie Rae, CEO of The Engine, on his roundup of some of the key figures in Boston’s tech network. The Engine is “for startups focused on ‘tough tech,’ technology that can often take years to perfect and build a business around,” writes Kirsner.

Writing for The Hill, President L. Rafael Reif and Stephen A. Schwarzman, chairman, CEO & co-founder of Blackstone, praise the new “CHIPS and Science Act” and highlight the need for further action on the ‘Science’ part of the law. “We urge Congress to capitalize on this bipartisan momentum and appropriate the funds that the bill authorizes,” they write. The nation's "future competitiveness, prosperity and security all rely on technological leadership. To sustain its strength in the long term, the U.S. needs to invent and manufacture the next new technologies.”

Science reporter Jocelyn Kaiser spotlights Prof. Kristala Prather’s work as a scout for a new funding program that will provide her the opportunity to identify “colleagues with an intriguing research idea so embryonic it has no chance of surviving traditional peer review—and, on her own, decide to provide some funding.” Says Prather: “I’m looking forward to giving it a try. I’m a people person, and I like learning new things.”