Research Laboratory of Electronics

Three EECS professors join leadership team

Saman Amarasinghe and Joel Voldman are named associate department heads; Nancy Lynch is associate department head for strategic directions, a new post.

January 12, 2018

Vivienne Sze, who was part of a team that developed a new video-compression standard, holds an Engineering Emmy Award recognizing the group's work.

Vivienne Sze shares Engineering Emmy Award with colleagues

Associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science was part of a group that earned acclaim for work on a new video compression standard.

November 30, 2017

Physicists at MIT and Harvard University have demonstrated a new way to manipulate quantum bits of matter. The researchers report using a system of finely tuned lasers to first trap and then tweak the interactions of 51 individual atoms, or quantum bits.

Scientists demonstrate one of largest quantum simulators yet, with 51 atoms

New technique manipulates atoms into antiferromagnetic state.

November 29, 2017

MIT President L. Rafael Reif welcomes family, colleagues, friends, former students, and other associates of the late MIT Institute Professor Mildred “Millie” Dresselhaus to a symposium celebrating her life and career.

Celebrating Millie

Symposium commemorates the life and career of pioneering professor and beloved mentor Mildred Dresselhaus.

November 29, 2017

$MIT physicists have invented a new technique to cool atoms into condensates, which is faster than the conventional method and conserves a large fraction of the original atoms.$

A faster way to make Bose-Einstein condensates

Method of laser cooling may speed up investigations into magnetism and superconductivity.

November 23, 2017

At least 30 MIT faculty, research staff, and alumni are listed throughout Forbes’ seventh annual 30 Under 30 edition, featuring some of the world’s best young innovators.

MIT brainpower highlighted in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 lists for 2018

Forbes calls this year's 30 Under 30 lists an "encyclopedia of creative disruption."

November 21, 2017

Anita Hill, a Martin Luther King Jr. Visiting Professor at MIT, is moderating a series of discussions marking the 45th anniversary of Title IX.

Visiting Professor Anita Hill leads conversations about Title IX

Attorney, author, and civil-rights advocate moderates The Gender/Race Imperative, a series of talks at MIT about equality in education.

November 13, 2017

A scanning electron micrograph of a human T lymphocyte (also called a T-cell) from the immune system of a healthy donor. Researchers have designed a synthetic gene circuit that triggers the immune system to attack cancers when it detects signs of the disease.

Gene circuit switches on inside cancer cells, triggers immune attack

Advance may open new pathways for cancer immunotherapy.

October 19, 2017

A new system from MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory works by analyzing light at the edge of walls, which is impacted by the reflections of objects around the corner from the camera.

An algorithm for your blind spot

Using smartphone cameras, system for seeing around corners could help with self-driving cars and search-and-rescue.

October 9, 2017

A new technique boosts the power output of tiny, chip-mounted terahertz lasers by 88 percent.

Tiny terahertz laser could be used for imaging, chemical detection

New design boosts the power output of the best-performing chip-scale terahertz laser by 80 percent.

August 8, 2017

A new flexible graphene solar cell developed at MIT is seen in the transparent region at the center of this sample. Around its edges are metal contacts on which probes can be attached during tests of device performance.

Transparent, flexible solar cells

Researchers develop a novel technique using graphene to create solar cells they can mount on surfaces ranging from glass to plastic to paper and tape.

July 28, 2017

This vacuum chamber with apertures for several laser beams was used to cool molecules of sodium-potassium down to temperatures of a few hundred nanoKelvins, or billionths of a degree above absolute zero. Such molecules could be used as a new kind of qubit, a building block for eventual quantum computers.

Ultracold molecules hold promise for quantum computing

New approach yields long-lasting configurations that could provide long-sought “qubit” material.

July 27, 2017

MIT researchers have designed new methods for paring down neural networks so that they’ll run more efficiently on handheld devices.

Bringing neural networks to cellphones

Method for modeling neural networks’ power consumption could help make the systems portable.

July 18, 2017

MIT student Neerja Aggarwal directed "Einstein's Dreams" on stage in the spring of 2017.

Featured video: Bringing “Einstein’s Dreams” to life

An MIT student in engineering and theater arts melds her dual passions to bring physics to the stage.

June 20, 2017

“We engineer new functions into cells. We try to give them new abilities,” PhD student Fahim Farzadfard says. “Basically, we’re making molecular tools. We try to understand cells inner-workings and engineer them using these tools.”

Endowing cells with new abilities

PhD student Fahim Farzadfard engineers cells to record “memories” of past events.