Graduate student Shomik Verma writes for Newsweek that “we need systemic change to ensure our individual climate actions aren't going to waste. If you're serious about fighting climate change this year, instead of recycling more, consider shifting focus to policy support and investments.” Verma adds: “if we advocate for change at the federal and state level, we can build an effective bridge between our individual actions and the change we want to see in the world.”
Prof. Giovanni Traverso speaks with GBH’s “All Things Considered” host Arun Rath about his work developing new approaches to weight loss treatments that don’t involve surgery or pharmaceuticals. “Our team does a lot of work on ingestible systems, ingestible capsules that can do many things,” says Traverso. “You know, we recognize that we live now in a world where we have really incredible therapies that are very effective for the treatment of diabetes and obesity. But we also recognize that they’re not for everybody. There are people who have side effects, people who can’t take them, so these are certainly alternatives, or potentially synergistic interventions, that could work together either with those drugs or, as I was mentioning, for folks that have side effects from the drugs.”
Prof. Seth Lloyd speaks with NPR Morning Edition host Adam Bearne about recent advancements in quantum chips and the future of quantum computing. "Quantum computers, their ability to do multiple tasks at once, allows them to explore a much larger range of possibilities than is available to classical computers, which can really only do one thing at a time," says Lloyd.
Researchers at MIT have developed a new type of dynamic gastric balloon that inflates on demand and could be used to help patients feel more full before meals, reports Margherita Bassi for Gizmodo. The engineers have “designed a potential future alternative for patients who, for any number of reasons, cannot treat obesity through medications or invasive surgeries such as gastric bypass surgery or stapling,” writes Bassi.
MIT researchers have developed a gastric balloon that can inflate before eating and contract afterwards in an effort to ensure the body does not grow accustomed to the balloon, reports Nicola Davis for The Guardian. “What we try to do here is, in essence, simulate the mechanical effects of having a meal,” explains Prof. Giovanni Traverso. “What we want to avoid is getting used to that balloon."
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.”
Research Scientist Susan Amrose speaks with Knowable Magazine reporter Lele Nargi about the use of inland desalination for farming communities. Amrose, who studies inland desalination in the Middle East and North Africa, is “testing a system that uses electrodialysis instead of reverse osmosis,” explains Nargi. “This sends a steady surge of voltage across water to pull salt ions through an alternating stack of positively charged and negatively charged membranes.”
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. Giovanni Traverso and his colleagues have developed a new device, inspired by sea creatures, that can deliver drugs orally by using jets to “eject drugs into the tissue lining the digestive tract," reports Anil Oza for STAT. “We want to make it easier for patients to receive medication,” says Traverso. “The challenge with drugs like insulin and monoclonal antibodies is that they require an injection. That in and of itself can be a barrier for receiving that medication.”
Forbes contributor Michael T. Nietzel spotlights the newest cohort of Rhodes Scholars, which includes Yiming Chen '24, Wilhem Hector, Anushka Nair, and David Oluigbo from MIT. Nietzel notes that Oluigbo has “published numerous peer-reviewed articles and conducts research on applying artificial intelligence to complex medical problems and systemic healthcare challenges.”
Yiming Chen '24, Wilhem Hector, Anushka Nair, and David Oluigbo have been named 2025 Rhodes Scholars, report Brian P. D. Hannon and John Hanna for the Associated Press. Undergraduate student David Oluigbo, one of the four honorees, has “volunteered at a brain research institute and the National Institutes of Health, researching artificial intelligence in health care while also serving as an emergency medical technician,” write Hannon and Hanna.
MIT researchers have used a sonar imaging system to observe a “colossal congregation of cod consume over 10 million capelin,” reports Mark Kaufman for Mashable. This event “was the largest predation event ever documented in the ocean,” writes Kaufman.
Using a sonar-based technique called Ocean Acoustic Waveguide Remote Sensing (OAWRS), researchers at MIT and elsewhere have tracked a swarm of cod off the coast of Norway eating millions of migrating capelin fish, reports Ed Cara for Gizmodo. Cara notes that in the future this technique could potentially allow “researchers and others to more easily monitor the health of these important fish and other life in marine ecosystems.”
MIT researchers have developed a biosensor “the size of a stick of gum that can be implanted under the skin and deliver naloxone if vital signs indicate an overdose,” reports David Ovalle and Elana Gordon for The Washington Post.
Researchers at MIT and elsewhere have developed a 3D printing method that allows “precise control over color, shade, texture, all with just a single material,” reports Vanesa Listek for 3Dprint.com. This technique “promises a faster and more sustainable solution than traditional approaches relying on multiple materials and nozzle changes,” explains Listek.