In this video, Reuters reporter Matthew Stock explores how researchers at the MIT Senseable City Lab are using big data to help make crowded cities better places to live. Stock explains that researchers hope to use anonymous data to improve public infrastructure and living spaces to “make the metropolis fit for future generations.”
Vox reporter Zack Beauchamp highlights a study co-authored by Prof. Ezra Zuckerman Sivan that finds voters often support a politician they recognize is lying when the politician is viewed as upholding a specific group’s best interests. Zuckerman Sivan explains that the lies are seen as “as a tool for expressing a larger truth.”
Forbes contributor Jeff McMahon writes that a new study by MIT researchers finds that nuclear reactors “cost so much in the West because of poor construction management practices.” The study’s authors suggest several ways to reduce the cost of constructing a nuclear plant, including standardizing multi-unit sites, seismic isolation, and modular construction.
Prof. Tim Berners-Lee has created a new technology aimed at allowing people more control over their online data, reports the BBC News. Berners-Lee felt that the “current model of handing over lots of data to many different online services did not serve people well,” the BBC explains.
In an article for Forbes, Charles Towers-Clark spotlights how MIT researchers developed a surgical technique that allows amputees to receive feedback from prosthetic limbs. The technique, Towers-Clark writes, “uses a muscle graft from another part of the body to complete the muscle pair, avoiding rejection which currently occurs in around 20% of cases, and allowing the patient to communicate naturally with the new limb.”
Wired reporter Megan Molteni highlights Prof. Aviv Regev’s work leading the Human Cell Atlas, an effort to catalog the cells in the human body that could eventually serve as a roadmap for understanding and treating disease. “From the beginning we have designed this as a public good and an open resource to enable science around the world,” Regev explains.
A study by MIT and Yale researchers finds that the number of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. may be two times greater than current estimates, reports Andres Picon for The Boston Globe. “Our goal was not to do anything political or policy-oriented; it was just to provide a better number, so that policy makers can debate over policies using it,” explains Senior Lecturer Mohammad Fazel-Zarandi.
Forbes reporter Maribel Lopez writes about how researchers at the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab are tackling a variety of AI challenges with real-world applications. Lopez notes that it’s great to see organizations like MIT and IBM coming together to “bridge the gap between science and practical AI solutions that can be used for both commercial and social good.”
Bloomberg reporter Faye Flam writes about a study by Prof. Pierre Azoulay that examines how the death of a superstar scientist impacts intellectual progress. Azoulay and his colleagues found that, “a star's death is followed by an influx of new people into the field, coming from related fields, with different ideas,” Flam explains.
Akshat Rathi of Quartz reports that Breakthrough Energy Ventures will invest in Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a startup collaborating with MIT to make fusion energy a viable source of renewable energy. The closely-watched fund’s investment “signals to others that a breakthrough in fusion may be closer than most think,” writes Rathi.
CSAIL researchers have developed a technique that makes it possible to create 3-D motion sculptures from 2-D video, reports Jennifer Kite-Powell for Forbes. The new technique could “open up the possibility to study social disorders, interpersonal interactions and team dynamics,” Kite-Powell explains.
Writing for STAT, Eric Boodman highlights how Prof. Jing-Ke Weng’s lab at the Whitehead Institute has mapped the genome of a firefly in an effort to understand how fireflies acquired the ability to glow. The researchers hope their findings will eventually be used to develop “better laboratory tools for studying disease and developing treatments.”
Bloomberg News reporter Mihir Sharma writes that a new study co-authored by MIT researchers finds that “intergenerational mobility has remained stagnant for Indians since the economy was liberalized in 1991.” For Indian Muslims, the researchers found that opportunities for upward mobility are declining.
BBC Click reports on a system developed by CSAIL researchers that creates 3-D motion sculptures based off of 2-D video. The technique, say the researchers, “could help dancers and athletes learn more about how they move.”
Quartz reporter Maria Thomas writes that MIT researchers found there is a lack of upward mobility available to Indian men born to fathers in the bottom of the socioeconomic distribution. The researchers found that the imbalance is the result of a “substantial rise in upward mobility for the historically-marginalised scheduled castes (SCs) and scheduled tribes (STs)… and a substantial decline for Muslims.”