Squeeze Power | | | Mechanical engineers have found that squeezing cells can trigger them to grow and divide faster than they normally would. The reason: When proteins are brought into close proximity, they can trigger cell signaling and activate genes within the cell. Full story via MIT News → |
How many votes will be counted after election night? Study measures the “blue shift” from absentee and provisional ballots, underscores uncertainties of 2020 vote. Full story via MIT News → | |
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Institute Professor Emeritus Mario Molina, environmental leader and Nobel laureate, dies at 77 | The atmospheric chemist shared the Nobel Prize for the discovery that chemicals known as CFCs deplete the ozone layer. Full story via MIT News → | |
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Scientists uncover new clues about Parkinson’s disease A tool developed at MIT simultaneously measures chemical and electrical brain signals, revealing unexpectedly complex relationship between brain signals. Full story via MIT News → | |
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Kofi Blake is bringing people together “There’s no greater feeling than when you’re with all your classmates and they’re having a great time,” says MIT’s senior class president. Full story via MIT News → | |
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MIT Full STEAM Ahead offers scalable, hands-on remote learning for K-12 | Website created in response to Covid-19 yields unexpected insights into what’s possible for reaching learners at a distance. Full story via MIT News → | |
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Opinion: We made a realistic deepfake, and here’s why we’re worried // The Boston Globe | “Combatting misinformation in the media requires a shared commitment to human rights and dignity — a precondition for addressing many social ills, malevolent deepfakes included,” write Professor D. Fox Harrell, Francesca Panetta, and Pakinam Amer of the MIT Center for Advanced Virtuality. Full story via The Boston Globe → |
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Why does a Patrick Mahomes football pass look so beautiful? These physicists believe they have the answer // The Wall Street Journal A study co-authored by Senior Lecturer Richard Price explores the physics behind the spiraling flight of a thrown football. “Physicists get interested in stuff that bores other people,” Price says. Full story via The Wall Street Journal→ |
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Water could be extracted from desert air using heat from sunlight // New Scientist | MIT researchers have developed a solar-powered system that can extract drinkable water from dry air. “In areas where water scarcity is a problem, it’s important to consider different technologies which provide water, particularly as climate change will exacerbate many water scarcity issues,” says graduate student Alina LaPotin. Full story via New Scientist→ |
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Blacks still pay more than others for home ownership // Reuters | An MIT study finds Black homeowners in the U.S. continue to have to pay more to own a home. The researchers found an “annual difference of $743 in mortgage interest payments, $550 in mortgage insurance premiums and $390 in property taxes, when invested over 30 years results in lost retirement savings of $67,320 for Black homeowners.” Full story via Reuters→ |
| | Last week, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert poked a little fun at MIT in response to a set of research articles validating the physics behind SPARC, the MIT-designed fusion experiment that aims to be a model for new emissions-free power plants. Thanks for the chuckle, Mr. Colbert! Watch the clip→ | | Thursday was Global Handwashing Day. After months of relentless handwashing, you may feel tempted to cut your scrubbing short at times. But to do so would be to disable one of the most potent weapons we have against not only Covid-19, but other germs as well. Keep washing to stay safe! Learn more via MIT Medical→ | |