News & Stories

At UN climate change conference, trying to “keep 1.5 alive”

After a one-year delay caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, negotiators from nearly 200 countries met this month in Glasgow, Scotland, at COP26, the United Nations climate change conference, to hammer out a new global agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and prepare for climate impacts. A delegation of approximately 20 faculty, staff, and students from […]

Radio-frequency wave scattering improves fusion simulations

In the quest for fusion energy, understanding how radio-frequency (RF) waves travel (or “propagate”) in the turbulent interior of a fusion furnace is crucial to maintaining an efficient, continuously operating power plant. Transmitted by an antenna in the doughnut-shaped vacuum chamber common to magnetic confinement fusion devices called tokamaks, RF waves heat the plasma fuel […]

J-WAFS launches Food and Climate Systems Transformation Alliance

Food systems around the world are increasingly at risk from the impacts of climate change. At the same time, these systems, which include all activities from food production to consumption and food waste, are responsible for about one-third of the human-caused greenhouse gas emissions warming the planet. To drive research-based innovation that will make food […]

Toward speech recognition for uncommon spoken languages

Automated speech-recognition technology has become more common with the popularity of virtual assistants like Siri, but many of these systems only perform well with the most widely spoken of the world’s roughly 7,000 languages. Because these systems largely don’t exist for less common languages, the millions of people who speak them are cut off from […]

Networking on a global scale

While international travel continues to be limited in much of the world, MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives (MISTI) sought to capitalize on the increased digital connectivity brought about by the pandemic by developing cutting-edge virtual programs designed to allow students to be exposed to international education and build connections around the world. MISTI is […]

Solving puzzles of international trade, war, and order

For Mariya Grinberg, the start of a research project often begins with a near-tangible sense of irritation. “I’d read something, a definition or idea that doesn’t make sense, that seems logically inconsistent — and it prickles,” says Grinberg, who joined the Department of Political Science as an assistant professor on July 1. “I try to […]

At the crossroads of language, technology, and empathy

Rujul Gandhi’s love of reading blossomed into a love of language at age 6, when she discovered a book at a garage sale called “What’s Behind the Word?” With forays into history, etymology, and language genealogies, the book captivated Gandhi, who as an MIT senior remains fascinated with words and how we use them. Growing […]

Refugee learners aim to lift up their communities

The MIT Refugee Action Hub (ReACT) recently celebrated the graduation of its third Certificate in Computer and Data Science cohort in an online ceremony. ReACT is a yearlong online learning program that creates education-to-employment pathways for talented refugees and displaced populations. The graduating cohort of 50 learners represented 22 countries worldwide — by far the […]

Call for Proposal: Skoltech-MIT Pilot Grants 2022

MIT Skoltech Program 2022 Call for Pilot Grant Proposals After the 2020 successful round of pilot grants, the MIT Skoltech Program is calling for another round of proposals from MIT Principal Investigators from any of the Institute’s schools, departments, laboratories, or centers. The pilot grants are designed to seed and support idea generation for MIT […]

Call for Proposal: MIT Sloan Latin America Office 2021-2022

The MIT Sloan Latin America Office (MSLAO) is excited to announce the call for seed fund proposals for the 2021-2022 academic year. The main goal of the MSLAO is to promote long- term collaboration between MIT and Latin America. The maximum amount of funding per project is $25,000 and we plan on distributing up to […]