August 20, 2022
Greetings! Here’s a roundup of the latest from the MIT community.
 
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Boosting Wind Power
 
MIT engineers developed a method to increase wind farms’ energy output — with no need for new equipment. “We’re really just making a software change, and there’s a significant potential energy increase associated with it,” says Professor Michael Howland.
Top Headlines
Sen. Elizabeth Warren visits MIT to celebrate passage of CHIPS and Science Act
The Massachusetts senator toured MIT.nano and held a roundtable with university leaders to discuss how the new law could advance research and education in the state.
MIT Heat Island
A new test may predict Covid-19 immunity
The paper test measures neutralizing antibodies in a blood sample and could help people decide what protections they should take against infection.
MIT Heat Island
Engineers fabricate a chip-free, wireless electronic “skin”
The device senses and wirelessly transmits signals related to pulse, sweat, and ultraviolet exposure, without bulky chips or batteries.
MIT Heat Island
Why it’s a problem that pulse oximeters don’t work as well on patients of color
New research ties inaccuracies in pulse oximeter readings to racial disparities in treatment and outcomes.
MIT Heat Island
Innovators under 35: Who made the list from MIT?
MIT Technology Review’s annual list of Innovators Under 35, a roster of the 35 most promising young people working in technology today, includes seven MIT alumni, two faculty members, and a former postdoc.
#ThisisMIT
In the Media
Five skills college students will need for their future careers // The Wall Street Journal
Associate Professor Miho Mazereeuw speaks about courses she is teaching at MIT focused on environmental risk and disaster-resilient design. During her course last semester, “students weighed how to build environments that can cope with a changing climate as well as the social inequities that disasters reveal.”
Woburn startup is saving water as droughts spread // The Boston Globe
Gradiant, an MIT startup founded by Anurag Bajpayee PhD ’12, SM ’08 and Prakash Govindan PhD ’12, developed a system that purifies water by mimicking rainfall cycles. “Nature has the advantage of having all the surface area of the oceans available freely and a free source of energy from the sun,” Govindan says. “We have to engineer this into a compact, highly efficient, and energy-efficient industrial device.”
Anna Stansbury on how to boost worker bargaining power // Bloomberg
Assistant Professor Anna Stansbury discusses her research on the labor market and worker power: “In my work, when I’m trying to measure worker power, I’m trying to say, ‘What would a given worker be paid in a kind of market situation without that power? And then how do different factors give that worker the ability to share in the profits of the firm?’”
Alumni in Action
“A lot of superhero stories are based on complete nonsense,” says Amy Chu ’91, who brought science and diversity to comics following her own transformation from management consultant to comic book writer. “Every story I do I try to ground in science.”
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We’re all used to hearing “Hey, guys” in a meeting, but what if I said “Hey, gals”? It should feel the same, but it doesn’t. So, what if we said “Hey, everyone” instead?
—Yeti Khim, MBA candidate and co-founder of Inclusively.ai, which aims to use artificial intelligence and natural language processing to detect bias in daily correspondence and offer suggestions for more inclusive language
Scene at MIT
George Lordos is not your typical graduate student. A degree in economics from Oxford University, an MBA from MIT, and a 20-year professional career were not the end of his learning journey. His longtime passion for space, particularly the prospect of making a sustainable society on Mars a reality, drew him back to school yet again, this time to study aeronautics and astronautics at MIT. Now, he’s developing technologies to support human life on the Red Planet. “One advantage of being a mature student is that, for me, after a lifetime of experiences, it is natural to see the big picture and also to know which details matter most,” Lordos says.
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