Back in the first half of the 20th century, when MIT’s famed Harold “Doc” Edgerton was perfecting his system for capturing fast-moving events on film, the ability to observe changes unfolding at a scale of microseconds — millionths of a second — was considered a remarkable achievement. This led to now-famous images such as one […]

Founded in 1962, MIT’s Man Vehicle Laboratory (MVL) is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. The laboratory — housed within the MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research (MKI) — has had since its inception the goal of better defining the physiological and cognitive limitations of pilots and passengers of aircraft and spacecraft, and […]

Disorders such as schizophrenia can originate in certain regions of the brain and then spread out to affect connected areas. Identifying these regions of the brain, and how they affect the other areas they communicate with, would allow drug companies to develop better treatments and could ultimately help doctors make a diagnosis. But interpreting the […]

Films made of semiconductor nanocrystals — tiny crystals measuring just a few billionths of a meter across — are seen as a promising new material for a wide range of applications. Nanocrystals could be used in electronic or photonic circuits, detectors for biomolecules, or the glowing pixels on high-resolution display screens. They also hold promise […]

By sequencing cancer-cell genomes, scientists have discovered vast numbers of genes that are mutated, deleted or copied in cancer cells. This treasure trove is a boon for researchers seeking new drug targets, but it is nearly impossible to test them all in a timely fashion. To help speed up the process, MIT researchers have developed […]

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends screening all infants for hearing loss before six months of age to prevent permanent damage such as speech and language impairment, learning disabilities and much more. In Brazil, the government has gone so far as to mandate screenings for all infants, but despite these efforts many infants go without […]

In some isolated clinics in parts of Africa, the electricity needed to power lights and medical devices is generated by expensive imported diesel fuel; the water supply can be so cold in winter that health workers can’t even wash their hands properly. But a startup company established by a team of MIT students and alumni […]

For about a dozen years, synthetic biologists have been working on ways to design genetic circuits to perform novel functions such as manufacturing new drugs, producing fuel or even programming the suicide of cancer cells. Achieving these complex functions requires controlling many genetic and cellular components, including not only genes but also the regulatory proteins […]

Researchers at MIT and the University of Central Florida (UCF) have developed a versatile new fabrication technique for making large quantities of uniform spheres from a wide variety of materials — a technique that enables unprecedented control over the design of individual, microscopic particles. The particles, including complex, patterned spheres, could find uses in everything […]

Bonnie Berger, a professor of applied mathematics and computer science at MIT and a principal investigator at the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL), has been named a 2012 fellow of the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB). The ISCB fellows program honors members that have distinguished themselves through outstanding contributions to the fields […]