| Honoring the Classes of 2020 and 2021 | | | | | | Last Saturday, MIT held a special celebration honoring the classes of 2020 and 2021, after Covid-19 forced Commencement ceremonies online the previous two years. More than 2,500 alumni returned to Killian Court in caps, gowns, and broad smiles, while poet Kealoha Wong ’99 called on the recent graduates to consider their lives within the enormity of the universe. |
| Artificial intelligence predicts patients’ race from their medical images Study shows AI can identify self-reported race from medical images that contain no indications of race detectable by human experts. |  |
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| Joel Moses, Institute Professor Emeritus and computer science trailblazer, dies at 80 Known as a visionary who brought together faculty from across MIT, Moses pioneered an influential symbolic mathematics program and held many top leadership posts. |  |
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| New research center focused on brain-body relationship established at MIT K. Lisa Yang Brain-Body Center to investigate the brain’s complex relationship with other body systems. |  |
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| A passion for science and music Fieldwork campfire jam sessions and geology lessons helped inspire senior Zoe Levitt '22 to pursue songwriting full time. |  |
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| How the universe got its magnetic field By studying the dynamics of plasma turbulence, MIT researchers are helping to solve one of the mysteries of the origins of cosmological magnetic fields. |  |
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| MIT holds special commencement ceremony for classes of 2020, 2021 // The Boston Globe MIT celebrated the classes of 2020 and 2021 during a special ceremony that featured an address by Kealoha Wong ’99, Hawaii’s first poet laureate. “We may make some esoteric discovery or some small contribution to our industries, but most likely, our most significant impact will be in our communities and in our families,” Kealoha said. “Our impact will be felt in the way that we treat others and the way that we treat ourselves.” |
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| Opinion: Republicans want to hand-count paper ballots. That’s less accurate. // The Washington Post Professor Charles Stewart III provides evidence that hand counting paper ballots is less accurate than using ballot scanners to tabulate results. “Computers — which ballot scanners rely on — are very good at tedious, repetitive tasks,” writes Stewart. “Humans are bad at them. And counting votes is tedious and repetitive.” |
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| Compared to gas-powered, electric vehicles cut greenhouse emissions over 30% // Forbes Professor Jessika Trancik discusses carbon emissions associated with gas, hybrid, and electric vehicles, and the website she and her research group developed that lets consumers compare vehicles against climate change mitigation targets. |
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| MIT research explores whether plant DNA can help solve our plastics problem // Radio Boston Professor Kristala Prather discusses her work using synthetic biology to develop materials that function like plastic, but don’t rely on fossil fuels and can biodegrade after use. |
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| | | In an inspiring address to the classes of 2020 and 2021 that seemed to incorporate elements of Hawaiian “talk story,” rap, and slam poetry, Kealoha Wong ’99 — who goes by Kealoha professionally — spoke of chemistry, evolution, the universe, humanity, and our fleeting existence. “I wish for you to walk through life knowing that you gave it all that you had to give, to experience everything you ever deemed important,” he said. “I challenge you to treat your life as the longest, most important, epic problem set you’ve ever been presented with.” |
| | | It’s known on campus as “The Sponge.” But junior Karyn Nakamura recently transformed Simmons Hall’s iconic façade into an interactive canvas. “In Karyn we have an artist who is a peer,” says Joshua Higgason, a technical instructor in theater arts. |
| | | In 2020, Sangeeta Bhatia, Susan Hockfield, and Nancy Hopkins launched the Future Founders Initiative to encourage female faculty to start biotechnology companies. Nine finalists in the inaugural MIT Future Founders Initiative Prize Competition recently gained hands-on instruction in how to commercialize their ideas. “The models can be different,” Bhatia says, “if we participate and change the game.” |
| | | Nearly 60 years ago, Noam Chomsky and Morris Halle established the MIT Department of Linguistics. Recently, a wing of the Stata Center was dedicated to the two luminaries. “Together, they defined and transformed the entire field of linguistics,” says Danny Fox, head of today’s Department of Linguistics and Philosophy. In this photo of a photo displayed in the new wing, Halle (left) and Chomsky hold a photo of themselves holding a photo themselves from earlier years. |
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