MIT scientists have discovered how propofol, a commonly used anesthetic, induces unconsciousness, reports Adam Kovac for Gizmodo. “The new research indicates that [propofol] works by interfering with a brain’s ‘dynamic stability’ – a state where neurons can respond to input, but the brain is able to keep them from getting too excited,” explains Kovac.
A research group led by postdoctoral associate Minde An analyzed China’s greenhouse gas emissions over the past decade, finding a substantial increase thought to be primarily driven by aluminum production, reports Ellen McNally for The Guardian. The researchers, writes McNally, say these levels could be reduced “with technological innovation and incorporation of the aluminum industry into the carbon market, or a national carbon trading scheme allowing emitters to buy or sell emission credits.”
Prof. David Rand speaks with New York Times reporters Tiffany Hsu and Stuart A. Thompson about the challenges of stopping the spread of misinformation. “It seems like an easy enough problem: there’s the true stuff and there’s the false stuff, and if the platforms cared about it, they would just get rid of the false stuff,” says Rand. “Then we started working on it and it was like, ‘Oh God.’ It’s actually way more complicated.”
Prof. Kerry Emanuel speaks with New York Times reporter Christopher Kuo about the expectations for the upcoming hurricane season. When discussing Hurricane Beryl, Emanuel says “usually the June and July storms are relatively benign. They don’t get up to full strength, so it’s very rare to have this.”
Prof. Larry Gurth and University of Oxford Prof. James Maynard have uncovered a new finding “about how certain polynomials are formed and how they reach out into the number line,” reports Caroline Delbert for Popular Mechanics. Gurth and Maynard “claim they’ve proven [Dirichlet] polynomials have a certain number of large values, or solutions, within a tighter ranger than before.”
Prof. Kerry Emanuel speaks with Scientific American reporter Chelsea Harvey about the future of hurricane forecasting and preparations. “I can’t predict the future, but I’m optimistic that things will get better,” says Emanuel. “And you’ll see people moving away from risky places, which is already beginning to happen. And those who elect to stay [will be] paying a lot of insurance or retrofitting houses to be built stronger.”
Prof. Emerita Mary-Lou Pardue, a cellular and molecular biologist whose work “formed the foundation for key advancements and discoveries in understanding the structure of chromosomes,” has died at age 90, reports Bryan Marquard for The Boston Globe. Pardue “was a role model of what women in science can be at a time when there weren’t a lot of those, and a trailblazer as a woman,” emphasizes Ky Lowenhaupt, manager of the Biophysical Instrumentation Facility at MIT, “but also a trailblazer as a scientist who didn’t do things along the path that other people took.”
MIT scientists studying parrots have discovered higher intelligence than previously thought, with some birds besting five-year-old children at logic games. With a tablet computer, parrots “have even figured out how to communicate using modern video conferencing technology,” writes Mack DeGeurin for Popular Science. When shown pictures of other parrots they had previously chatted with, “the parrots repeatedly requested to chat with their long-distance friends.”
Prof. Moungi Bawendi, a recipient of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, speaks with Nobel Prize Conversations host Adam Smith about the joys of visualizing quantum mechanics, the inspiration for his Nobel-prize winning work and his love of music. “Being in a place like MIT and being exposed to engineering and other scientific fields and medicine across the river and Harvard Medical School and a lot of startups around here, you really are exposed to so many things that are so interesting and I love that,” says Bawendi. “Those things give me ideas of how to go back to the lab and take different directions.”
MIT scientists have created a high-resolution brain map of the neurons that encode the meanings of various words, reports Sara Reardon for Nature. “The results hint that, across individuals, the brain uses the same standard categories to classify words,” Reardon explains, “helping us to turn sound into sense.”
Prof. Kerry Emanuel speaks with Associated Press reporter Seth Borenstein about this year’s Atlantic hurricane season. “This year, there’s also a significant difference between water temperature and upper air temperature throughout the tropics,” writes Borenstein. “The Atlantic relative to the rest of the tropics is as warm as I’ve seen,” says Emanuel.
Prof. Larry Guth and University of Oxford Prof. James Maynard have improved a previously discovered mathematical estimate contributing to the process of solving the Riemann hypothesis – an open question in number theory and mathematics, reports Manon Bischoff for Scientific American. Guth and Maynard have “provided new food for thought to tackle the 160-year-old puzzle,” writes Bischoff.
Sonia Vallabh and Eric Minikel, senior group leaders from the Broad Institute have created a gene-editing tool to combat prion diseases, reports Karen Weintraub for USA Today. The approach “should also work against diseases such as Huntington's, Parkinson's, ALS and even Alzheimer's, which result from the accumulation of toxic proteins,” Weintraub writes.
Writing for The Boston Globe, Cady Coleman ’83 reflects on her career as an astronaut and Air Force colonel. “I am an astronaut,” writes Coleman. “Even after 24 years at NASA, two space shuttle missions, and six months living aboard the International Space Station, it thrills me to say those words, and yet there is a part of me that’s still surprised by them.”
Prof. David Kaiser joins Grammy winning producer Jack Antonoff and host Matt White of Sing for Science to discuss the nature and perception of time. Kaiser helps illustrate, “the idea that we're experiencing things that can seem to take a long time or short time, and that has to do with our state in the world, and not only about what the clock is saying on the wall.”