National Institutes of Health (NIH)

After studying more than 100 languages, Prof. Edward Gibson has “discovered a pattern in the way different cultures discern and label colors,” writes Ben Thompson for the Boston Globe. 

A new study from Prof. Edward Gibson examines the way different languages describe colors. “If you were to take the spectrum of colors that are perceptibly different to humans and chop it in half, every language would have more words for describing the warm half than the cool half,” writes Rachel Gutman for The Atlantic. 

A new study by MIT researchers examines how people who speak different languages describe colors, reports Zach Zorich for Science. The researchers found that, “the ability to describe colors isn’t as rooted in our biology as many scientists thought. And that means that language development may be far more rooted in our culture than in how we literally see the world.”

Boston Herald reporter Lindsay Kalter writes that MIT researchers have developed a hydrogel-based capsule that can slowly release medications over several days and could help patients follow complex treatment regimens.  “A lot of people do not take their medication as prescribed,” explains postdoc Jinyao Liu. “With this, you just need a single dose.”

MIT researchers have developed a new way to grow liver tissue, writes Jamie Ducharme for Boston Magazine. “These minuscule structures expanded to 50 times their starting size,” Ducharme explains, “and performed normal liver functions like metabolism regulation, bile production, and detoxification.”

MIT researchers have engineered an expandable liver from human liver cells that can grow up to 50 times its original size, reports Lindsay Kalter for the Boston Herald. In the future, the researchers would like to make the expandable livers smarter, “by embedding sensors in them to tell us how they are doing,” explains Prof. Sangeeta Bhatia.

MIT researchers have developed a new way to engineer liver tissue that involves implanting tiny “seeds” of liver tissue, which expand to perform normal liver functions, reports Robert Preidt for U.S. News & World Report. The technique could one day “help reduce long wait lists for liver transplants.”

A study by MIT researchers finds that children from lower-income families benefited more from summer reading programs, reports Andrew Grant for The Boston Globe. Of the children who participated in the study about half, “improved their test scores and most of those that did came from lower-income families.”

The Economist writes about new research from Prof. Chris Voigt, in which “he and his colleagues demonstrate how to control customised cells with coloured light.”

Timandra Harkness of BBC Radio 4’s FutureProofing series spoke with research affiliate Gio Traverso and postdoc Phillip Nadeau about their ingestible electronic device that uses stomach acid to power tiny sensors. “Once you have the capacity to have a smart system sitting in your stomach that one can communicate with, it opens up the door to homing in on the individual patient,” said Traverso.

STAT reporter Eric Boodman writes that MIT researchers have engineered living materials that glow when they detect certain chemicals. Boodman notes that the researchers hope the living sensors “could at some point be used to pick up dangerous toxins or the chemical signs of disease.”

Reporting for the PBS NewsHour, Nsikan Akpan highlights a new study co-authored by MIT researchers that examines how many NIH grants lead to new patents and medications. Prof. Pierre Azoulay explains that the study, “provides evidence that the research done in the public sector is useful — it’s relevant for the research done by private-sector firms.”

Newsweek reporter Jessica Wapner writes about a new study by MIT researchers that provides evidence that NIH funding contributes to a large number of patents in the field of biomedicine. The findings indicate that NIH-funded research “is not being done in an ivory tower,” explains Prof. Pierre Azoulay. “Companies use it as input in their own discovery efforts.”   

Nature reporter Elie Dolgin writes about Prof. Pierre Azoulay’s new research that shows NIH funding has a significant impact on innovation in the field of biomedicine. Azoulay explains that from an economic standpoint the U.S. is “under-investing overall” in biomedical research.

Los Angeles Times reporter Melissa Healy writes that a new study by Prof. Pierre Azoulay examining the impact of NIH-funded research shows that NIH funding, “fuels the kinds of innovations that drive the U.S. economy.” Azoulay explains, “NIH public funding expenditures have large effects on the patenting output of the private sector.”