Author: Ms. R.

From Oct. 21 to 22, a delegation of 21 MIT students and one postdoc met in Washington for the 14th Executive Visit Days (ExVD). Organized by the MIT Science Policy Initiative (SPI) and the MIT Washington Office, ExVD enables students to engage with officials and scientists from federal agencies. Students are given a platform to form connections in the capital while learning about the many facets of science policy work and careers. In two days, the delegation visited eight different……

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Troy Van Voorhis, the Robert T. Haslam and Bradley Dewey Professor of Chemistry, will step down as department head of the Department of Chemistry at the end of this academic year. Van Voorhis has served as department head since 2019, previously serving the department as associate department head since 2015. “Troy has been an invaluable partner and sounding board who could always be counted on for a wonderful mix of wisdom and pragmatism,” says Nergis Mavalvala, the Kathleen and……

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Capping global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius is a tall order. Achieving that goal will not only require a massive reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from human activities, but also a substantial reallocation of land to support that effort and sustain the biosphere, including humans. More land will be needed to accommodate a growing demand for bioenergy and nature-based carbon sequestration while ensuring sufficient acreage for food production and ecological sustainability. The expanding role of land in a 1.5……

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Whether you’re manufacturing cement, steel, chemicals, or paper, you need a large amount of heat. Almost without exception, manufacturers around the world create that heat by burning fossil fuels. In an effort to clean up the industrial sector, some startups are changing manufacturing processes for specific materials. Some are even changing the materials themselves. Daniel Stack SM ’17, PhD ’21 is trying to address industrial emissions across the board by replacing the heat source. Since coming to MIT in……

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The MIT Press has released a comprehensive report that addresses how open access policies shape research and what is needed to maximize their positive impact on the research ecosystem. The report, entitled “Access to Science and Scholarship 2024: Building an Evidence Base to Support the Future of Open Research Policy,” is the outcome of a National Science Foundation-funded workshop held at the Washington headquarters of the American Association for the Advancement of Science on Sept. 20. While open access……

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Immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) therapies can be very effective against some cancers by helping the immune system recognize cancer cells that are masquerading as healthy cells.  T cells are built to recognize specific pathogens or cancer cells, which they identify from the short fragments of proteins presented on their surface. These fragments are often referred to as antigens. Healthy cells will will not have the same short fragments or antigens on their surface, and thus will be spared from……

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Captivated as a child by video games and puzzles, Marzyeh Ghassemi was also fascinated at an early age in health. Luckily, she found a path where she could combine the two interests.  “Although I had considered a career in health care, the pull of computer science and engineering was stronger,” says Ghassemi, an associate professor in MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and the Institute for Medical Engineering and Science (IMES) and principal investigator at the Laboratory for……

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