Latest MIT Stories

Prestigious universities such as American University, Harvard and Vassar College join Stanford, MIT and others in hosting iD Teen Academies. Campbell, CA (PRWEB) January 26, 2011 iD Tech Camps has expanded the locations of its three Teen Academies: iD Gaming Academy, iD Programming Academy and iD Visual Arts Academy. The Academies are summer teen programs that provide students with immersive, project-based technology classes in the industry of their choice. The idea is for teens to...

Researchers from Boston College, MIT, Clemson University and the University of Virginia have used nanotechnology to achieve a 60-90 percent increase in the thermoelectric figure of merit of p-type half-Heusler, a common bulk semiconductor compound, the team reported in the journal Nano Letters.The dramatic increase in the figure of merit, used to measure a material's relative thermoelectric performance, could pave the way for a new generation of products "“ from car exhaust systems and...

Blood-vessel cells can combat aggressive tumors, helping to prevent them from spreading through the body, new study findsMIT scientists have discovered that cells lining the blood vessels secrete molecules that suppress tumor growth and keep cancer cells from invading other tissues, a finding that could lead to a new way to treat cancer.Elazer Edelman, professor in the MIT-Harvard Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST), says that implanting such cells adjacent to a patient's tumor...

2011 Lemelson-MIT Invention Index uncovers inventive perception among young AmericansInvention and innovation are essential to remaining globally competitive, and a new survey shows an untapped group of potential inventors in the U.S. The 2011 Lemelson-MIT Invention Index, announced today, indicates that American women ages 16 "“ 25 possess many characteristics necessary to become inventors, such as creativity, interest in science and math, desire to develop altruistic inventions, and...

Neuroscientists at MIT's Picower Institute of Learning and Memory have uncovered why relatively minor details of an episode are sometimes inexplicably linked to long-term memories. The work is slated to appear in the Jan. 13 issue of Neuron."Our finding explains, at least partially, why seemingly irrelevant information like the color of the shirt of an important person is remembered as vividly as more significant information such as the person's impressive remark when you recall an...

The new nanoparticle, which delivers the drug in a form activated when it reaches its target, also treats tumors more effectively than the unadorned drug in mice.Researchers at MIT and Brigham and Women's Hospital have shown that they can deliver the cancer drug cisplatin much more effectively and safely in a form that has been encapsulated in a nanoparticle targeted to prostate tumor cells and is activated once it reaches its target.Using the new particles, the researchers were able to...

BOSTON, Jan. 10, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Entrega, Inc., a new company developing oral drug delivery technologies, today announced its formation by Enlight Biosciences, a Boston-based company established in partnership with a group of leading global pharmaceutical companies. As part of its initial development program, Entrega will use its unique spatially-directed proprietary drug delivery platform to create orally bioavailable formulations of several of the biologic drugs of Enlight's...

Biologist shows why some strains are more dangerous than othersAbout one-third of the human population is infected with a parasite called Toxoplasma gondii, but most of them don't know it. Though Toxoplasma causes no symptoms in most people, it can be harmful to individuals with suppressed immune systems, and to fetuses whose mothers become infected during pregnancy. Toxoplasma spores are found in dirt and easily infect farm animals such as cows, sheep, pigs and chickens. Humans can be...

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Dec. 8, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- The MIT Press has just published an iPad edition of NONOBJECT, by Branko Lukic and Barry Katz. The print edition of this imaginative book was published in early November and the iPad app edition is now available from the Apple iPad store for an introductory price of $19.95. NONOBJECT offers a series of dramatic explorations of objects that can't exist but perhaps should. Branko Lukic and Barry Katz imagine what happens when design starts from...

NEW YORK, Dec. 7, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Designing Media, written by the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt Director Bill Moggridge and published by MIT Press Nov. 29, examines connections between old and new media. In his book, Moggridge describes the changing media landscape and the growth of new patterns of media consumption. The long-dominant forms--television, radio, newspapers, magazines and books--have had to respond to emergent digital media. Newspapers have interactive websites,...