News & Stories

MIT scientists build the world’s largest collection of Olympiad-level math problems, and open it to everyone

Every year, the countries competing in the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) arrive with a booklet of their best, most original problems. Those booklets get shared among delegations, then quietly disappear. No one had ever collected them systematically, cleaned them, and made them available, not for AI researchers testing the limits of mathematical reasoning, and not […]

Transforming deep-space signals into cathedral sound

A new immersive sound installation at Oulu Cathedral, Finland, brings the research of MIT astrophysicist and associate professor of physics Kiyoshi Masui into a striking sensory form, transforming more than 4,000 cosmic signals into spatial audio. With its grand opening on April 4, “The Logos” project invites visitors to experience deep-space phenomena not as distant […]

Improving understanding with language

When she was a child, MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt would spend summers on her grandparents’ farm in rural Alabama outside Birmingham. The practical and cultural differences between farm and city life became more pronounced by comparison. “Life and the way we lived it slowed down on the farm,” she says. “It was a nice change […]

How to expand the US economy

It’s an essential insight about our world: Innovation drives economic growth. For the U.S. to thrive, it must keep innovating. But how, and in what areas? A new book co-authored by MIT faculty members focuses on six key areas where technology advances can drive the economy and support national security. Those sectors — semiconductors, biotechnology, […]

A regulatory loophole could delay ozone recovery by years

Often hailed as the most successful international environmental agreement of all time, the 1987 Montreal Protocol continues to successfully phase out the global production of chemicals that were creating a growing hole in the ozone layer, causing skin cancer and other adverse health effects. MIT-led studies have since shown the subsequent reduction in ozone-depleting substances […]

Seeing sounds

As one of the first students in MIT’s new Music Technology and Computation Graduate Program, Mariano Salcedo ’25 is researching the intersection between artificial intelligence and music visuals. Specifically, his graduate research focuses on neural cellular automata (NCA), which merges classical cellular automata with machine learning techniques to grow images that can regenerate. When paired with […]

MIT hackathon tackles real-world challenges in Ukraine

During this year’s Independent Activities Period (IAP), students, researchers, and collaborators across seven time zones came together to tackle urgent technical challenges facing Ukraine as the full-scale war enters its fourth year. A four-week hackathon, Build for Ukraine 2.0, brought MIT students and Ukrainian collaborators into a shared innovation environment where power outages, air-raid alerts, […]

Active Surfaces aims to install peel-and-stick solar panels everywhere

Active Surfaces, a startup based on solar-energy technologies rooted in MIT research, is well on its way to developing what co-founder Richard Swartwout SM ’18, PhD ’21 calls “solar 2.0.” The company’s technology is in response to a need Swartwout recognized while observing energy challenges in India during an MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI) fellowship. Within […]

Advancing international trade research and finding community

The sense of support and community was palpable when Sojun Park, a postdoc at the Center for International Studies (CIS), delivered a recent presentation on The Global Diffusion of AI Technologies and Its Political Drivers. The event, part of the CIS Global Research and Policy Seminar, filled the venue with audience members from across MIT. […]

Improving cartilage repair through cell therapy

Researchers have developed a new method for monitoring iron flux — the movement and rate at which cells take in, store, use and release iron — in stem cells known as mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs). The system can provide insights within a minute about a cell’s ability to grow cartilage tissue for cartilage repair. The […]