News & Stories

Study offers a new view of when and how governments distribute land

Allocating land for people to use is one of the most powerful tools a government can have. A newly published study by an MIT scholar now identifies the extent to which state land distribution can be a politically charged act. The research, focused on Kenya in recent decades, challenges some conventional wisdom while bringing new […]

Learner in Afghanistan reaches beyond barriers to pursue career in data science

Tahmina S. was a junior studying computer engineering at a top university in Afghanistan when a new government policy banned women from pursuing education. In August 2021, the Taliban prohibited girls from attending school beyond the sixth grade. While women were initially allowed to continue to attend universities, by October 2021, an order from the […]

Encouraging a scientific habit of the mind

As a child growing up in northern Nigeria, Abdullahi Tsanni always knew he had a passion for writing. Some of his earliest memories are trying to read his mother’s writings in Arabic and Hausa. It was in secondary school when Tsanni also developed an interest in science. When Tsanni was studying biochemistry at Ahmadu Bello […]

MIT Energy Conference grapples with geopolitics

As Russia’s war in Ukraine rages on, this year’s MIT Energy Conference spotlighted the role of geopolitics in the world’s efforts to lower greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the worst effects of climate change. Each year, the student-run conference, which its organizers say is the largest of its kind, brings together leaders from around the […]

2023 Marine Robotics Summer School in Portugal

MIT D-Lab students collaborate with adaptive design center in Mexico

Participating in an intensive three-week lab in Yucatán, Mexico, changed how MIT junior Penelope Herrero-Marques views her role as an engineer. The January trip was the first step in a new partnership between MIT D-Lab and Perkins School for the Blind, a Massachusetts-based national service provider and international nonprofit that strives to make education accessible […]

Responding to Ukraine’s “ocean of suffering”

Within 72 hours of the first Russian missiles striking Kyiv, Ukraine, in February 2022, Ian Miller SM ’19 boarded a flight for Poland. Later, he’d say he felt motivated by Kyiv’s “tragic ocean of suffering” and Ukrainian President Zelensky’s pleas for help. But he arrived with little notion of what to do. As he’d anticipated, […]

Aviva Intveld named 2023 Gates Cambridge Scholar

MIT senior Aviva Intveld has won the prestigious Gates Cambridge Scholarship, which offers students an opportunity to pursue graduate study in the field of their choice at Cambridge University in the U.K. Intveld will join the other 23 U.S. citizens selected for the 2023 class of scholars. Intveld, from Los Angeles, is majoring in earth, […]

José Maria Neves, president of Cape Verde, tours MIT

President José Maria Neves of Cape Verde visited MIT on Tuesday, meeting with Associate Provost Richard Lester and other members of the campus community, and conducting a public event about e-governance in Africa that highlighted the ways technology has helped his country. “Technology and information are a mechanism or means to establish links between [our] […]

Clothing brand helps give survivors of sexual violence a path forward

When Congolese doctor Denis Mukwege won a share of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018, Milain Fayulu SM ’22 was filled with pride in his home country. He eagerly set an alarm from Miami to wake up in the early hours and watch Mukwege’s speech in Norway. In the speech, Mukwege discussed his experience caring […]