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“This place is remarkable,” Alfredo Alexander-Katz, the Walter Henry Gale Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, says of MIT. “You can throw any crazy idea out there” and then pursue it.

Seeing nature through a molecular engineer’s eye

Alfredo Alexander-Katz probes systems in action, from clotting blood to walking molecules.

August 22, 2016

“My lab’s goal is to really provide molecular insight, using NMR spectroscopy to answer a lot of structural, dynamic, and mechanistic questions” about membrane proteins, says Mei Hong, an MIT professor of chemistry.

Analyzing dynamic proteins

Chemistry professor Mei Hong studies the structures of proteins embedded in cell membranes.

August 8, 2016

John Fernández is a professor of building technology in the MIT Department of Architecture and director of the MIT Environmental Solutions Initiative.

John Fernández: Growing grassroots for sustainability on campus and abroad

Environmental Solutions Initiative’s new director discusses sustainable development, student engagement, and making Baker House his home.

August 2, 2016

“You have to consider that art is a very real part of our lives and societies, we have art institutions, we have funding for the arts, everyone has an idea of what it is,” says Rebecca Millsop, a PhD student in philosophy.

Seeking big answers

PhD student Rebecca Millsop uses philosophy to take on contentious questions about how we define art.

July 20, 2016

Jamal Abdul Nasser Traffic Circle in Amman, Jordan

Improving pavement management in Jordan

Concrete Sustainability Hub researcher Omar Swei is working to help Jordanian planners optimize maintenance on state-owned highways.

July 11, 2016

“The idea is one simple technology can have this huge impact on someone's well-being. But today there are a lot of technologies out there such as solar lanterns or water filters, and there's no way to systematically evaluate what works and what doesn't work on the ground,” says Cauam Cardoso, a PhD student in international economic development at MIT.

Seeking simple solutions with huge impacts

PhD student Cauam Cardoso assesses technologies that aim to help the world’s poor.

July 8, 2016

Mapping molecular neighborhoods

Associate Professor Ernest Fraenkel uses biological network modeling to identify new targets for disease.

July 5, 2016

“When I started in graduate school I knew already that I wanted to work on turbulence in tokamaks,” says Anne White, the Cecil and Ida Green Associate Professor in Nuclear Engineering in MIT’s Plasma Fusion and Science Center.

Anne White: A passion for plasma

Physicist has a fascination for the complexities of turbulence, and how to reduce it in fusion reactors.

June 29, 2016

“A big strand in my work has been to think about the important ways in which social identity, especially racial and ethnic identities, become really important in thinking about policies and justice in distributive issues,” MIT political scientist Evan Lieberman says.

Democracy now

Political scientist Evan Lieberman studies ethnic identity and African politics.

June 14, 2016

At MIT, a culture of innovation "never gets old"

With support she received at the Institute, Leila Pirhaji wants to bring computational systems biology to the marketplace.

June 2, 2016

Cara Lai, MIT Class of 2016, is double-majoring in literature and mechanical engineering.

Powered by literature on her way toward an MD

Senior Cara Lai cites MIT Literature studies as key to her preparation for medical practice.

June 1, 2016

Cody Dennett, PhD candidate in the Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering

Scrutinizing radiation’s impact

Nuclear science and engineering PhD student Cody Dennett simulates conditions inside reactors to measure microscopic defects in irradiated materials.

May 31, 2016

MIT mechanical engineering student Marie Elimbi Moudio

Finding wonderland

Senior Marie Elimbi Moudio enters a “weird place” and discovers a world of possibility.

May 27, 2016

From a near-death experience to an Executive MBA

After losing his sight in an auto accident, Joe Bellantoni is giving back to his community while enhancing his career, with the help of his wife and MIT Sloan.

May 26, 2016

Posters of religious leaders in Najaf, Iraq

From Babylon to Baudelaire and back

In exploring the role of clerics in the Shi’a world, political science PhD student Marsin Alshamary heeds the call of family history.