How do people become addicted to online games and social networking sites?
By using them. The principles of online interaction aren’t so different from those of a slot machine…
How can solar cells become cost-effective enough to be commercially viable?
In December of 2008, researchers from MIT tested a process that caused photovoltaic cells to produce as much as 50 percent more elect...
What is the energy of gasoline compared to the same cost of other fuels in BTUs per dollar?
Of natural gas, fuel oil, and electricity, natural gas takes the prize right now as cheapest energy source…
Project Sandcastle
On a foggy night in San Francisco, a Bat-Signal appears in the sky. It flickers above a house on the highest hilltop in the city, whe...
The Creation of a Public Engineer
“In my lab, we bridge a gap,” says Hadley Sikes. “We try to figure out how to take established science and implement it in clin...
Cleaning up industrial filtration
If you wanted to get pasta out of a pot of water, would you boil off the water, or use a strainer? While home cooks would choose the ...
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...
The impact of climate change on the ocean
“I think ocean engineering as a field is really interesting because it marries the holistic side of living on planet Earth with sol...
Future Engineers
We are dedicated to making science and engineering open to everyone. Too often, kids’ zip codes play a larger role in determining t...
The Warmup
With graduation on the horizon, MIT students Gabe Alba and Victoria Gregory have work to do. They have a promising idea, a series of ...