In an article for Wired, Cara McGoogan writes about Prof. Hiroshi Ishii’s vision for the future of technology. We need to "envision what kind of future we want to create," explains Ishii. "To inspire people, to make them think differently. Art is so important as a driving force."
Liz Stinson reports for Wired on Kinetic Blocks, a shape-shifting display developed by MIT researchers that uses 900 computer-controlled pins to manipulate objects. “Hopefully in the future this can be a big versatile engine you can use to control whatever you like,” explains paper co-author Philipp Schoessler.
MIT researchers have been awarded a new NSF grant to develop robots that can serve as reading companions for children, reports Lindsey Kratochwill for Popular Science. The study, led by Prof.Cynthia Breazeal, aims to advance the fields of autonomous storytelling and human-robot interaction.
Researchers from MIT’s Camera Culture Group have devised a way for cameras to see through walls and bad weather, reports Vijee Venkatraman for BetaBoston. “It is not meant to be the next camera for consumers — the idea is to help with imaging in dangerous conditions, and to help with non-destructive testing,” writes Venkatraman.
Prof. Ramesh Raskar is leading the development of a new platform aimed at maintaining order and calm during the Kumbh Mela festival, the AP reports. "We want to see how we can take this amazing challenge in crowds and food and security and housing and transportation ... and see how we can make this a tech-savvy Kumbh Mela,” says Raskar.
Jon Christian reports for The Boston Globe on FitSocket, a device created by researchers in MIT’s Biomechatronics group that gathers data used to create personalized prosthetic sockets. “We’re treating the body as a mechanical thing, because it is,” explains graduate student Arthur Petron.
In an article for Wired, Liz Stinson writes about how the new technique MIT researchers developed for 3-D printing glass could be used in building design. Stinson writes that Prof. Neri Oxman believes, “3-D printed glass eventually will make building facades far more dynamic.”
Forbes contributor TJ McCue writes about how MIT researchers have developed a 3-D printer that can manufacture glass. McCue explains that the printer uses, “many of the same controllers and parts that existing Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) printers use.”
Principal Research Scientist Ethan Zuckerman writes for Fortune about whether the rise of ride-sharing services such as Uber and Lyft could portend a revival of hitchhiking. “Social serendipity is too important an activity to be left to the advertising slogans of sharing-economy startups in the hope that they will make it happen as a side benefit,” Zuckerman writes.
In this video, PBS explores a new technique MIT researchers developed to enlarge brain samples, making them easier to image at high resolutions. Prof. Ed Boyden explains that he hopes the technique could be used to “hunt down very rare things in a tissue.”
Dominic Basulto writes for The Washington Post about the implications of a new method for 3-D printing glass created by MIT’s Mediated Matter Group. Basulto writes that the technology could eventually give us “the ability to create objects and applications that do not exist today.”
Wired reporter James Temperton writes that researchers at MIT have developed a new method for 3-D printing glass. Temperton writes that the process is “better understood as additive manufacturing, with layers of molten glass being slowly drizzled into shape through a nozzle.”
Kate Darling of the MIT Media Lab speaks with Wired reporter Katie Collins about what the destruction of a hitchhiking robot says about how people relate to robots. "Can we change people's empathy with robots,” says Darling. This is "at the core of what I view as ethics. I don't think robot ethics is about robots, it is about humans."
According to The Economist, MIT researchers are using 3-D printing to modernize the coiling method of glass production. The researchers have “already used their device to print a range of objects, including optical prisms and decorative vessels.”
“MIT's Mediated Matter Group has figured out a way to put molten glass through a 3D printer, creating beautiful sculptures,” writes Mary Beth Griggs for Popular Science. The printer lays down individual layers of melted glass, bringing it up to a finished sculpture.