ENGINEERING IN ACTION
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A hands-on class responds to Covid
When Professor Stefanie Mueller needed to adapt her laboratory class to the Covid-19 pandemic, she was initially overwhelmed by the amount of work that would need to be done. That’s because Mueller’s hands-on building and fabrication class, 6.810 (Engineering Interactive Technologies), is entirely about the ways that humans interact with technology in the physical world. As […] -
Faster tracking of treatment responses
When MIT announced plans to welcome back some undergraduates, ramp up research operations, and increase the number of staff on campus this past fall, its administration was faced with the challenge of doing so in a way that minimized the risk of an outbreak on campus. In typical MIT fashion, several teams of engineers and […] -
Deploying no-contact vitals-sensing kiosks across campus
When MIT announced plans to welcome back some undergraduates, ramp up research operations, and increase the number of staff on campus this past fall, its administration was faced with the challenge of doing so in a way that minimized the risk of an outbreak on campus. In typical MIT fashion, several teams of engineers and […] -
Cracking the Secrets of an Emerging Branch of Physics
Thanh Nguyen is in the habit of breaking down barriers. Take languages, for instance: Nguyen, a third-year doctoral candidate in nuclear science and engineering (NSE), wanted “to connect with other people and cultures” for his work and social life, he says, so he learned Vietnamese, French, German, and Russian, and is now taking an MIT […] -
Lessons from the Clean Air Car Race 50 Years Later
1970 was a milestone year for efforts to combat air pollution. On April 22, the first Earth Day was celebrated. The 1970 Clean Air Act was the first policy to establish federal regulations on car and industry emissions. In July, President Nixon announced his plan to establish the United States Environmental Protection Agency by the […]
IN THE NEWS
Examining the world through signals and systems
Assistant Professor Cathy Wu aims to help autonomous vehicles fulfill their promise by better understanding how to integrate them into the transportation system. go
Brewing up a dirty-water remedy (and more) with kombucha-inspired biosensors
PhD student and 2017 J-WAFS graduate fellow Tzu-Chieh Tang designs living materials to solve environmental challenges, with an emphasis on safety and scalability. go- Researchers improve efficiency of next-generation solar cell...
- Data transfer system connects silicon chips with a hair’s-...
- New “metalens” shifts focus without tilting or moving
- Researchers develop speedier network analysis for a range of...
- Metabolic mutations help bacteria resist drug treatment
- Eight from MIT named 2021 Sloan Research Fellows
ASK AN ENGINEER
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How do I get into MIT?
It should be less about getting in and more about getting it right — cultivate the interests and work on the projects you love anyway…
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Is there a way to check a building for structural damage without knocking down walls?
Signs of deep structural distress are often visible on the surface…
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Does the outside edge of a ceiling fan blade move faster than the inside edge?
It does, but its angular velocity may be tampering with your sense of its speed…
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Why hasn’t commercial air travel gotten any faster since the 1960s?
In an era when everything else is accelerating, airplanes are actually flying at slower speeds than they used to…
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How does an aircraft steer while taxiing on a runway?
When it’s going slow, it’s like your car. But when it’s going fast…
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Can we use heat generated from an air conditioner or refrigerator?
Unfortunately, that waste heat isn't quite hot enough to be useful...