MIT News Newsletter

	Massachusetts Institute of Technology
April 12, 2018
MIT News: around campus
A weekly digest of the Institute’s community news

TESS readies for takeoff

Satellite developed by MIT aims to discover thousands of nearby exoplanets, including at least 50 Earth-sized ones.

Q&A: Composer Tod Machover presents “Philadelphia Voices”

Ambitious new piece in his “City Symphony” series features the birthplace of American democracy.

Jasmin Joseph: “I love the idea of making an impact on global health”

MIT senior and varsity softball co-captain brings positivity and determination to life-saving biology research.

2018 Change Makers honored for their work to combat sexual misconduct

Violence Prevention and Response and Title IX and Bias Response Office celebrate individuals making a difference in the fight to end sexual harassment and assault.

Lessons in NASA leadership

Johnson Space Center Director Ellen Ochoa and AeroAstro Professor Dava Newman share experiences as leaders of the U.S. space program.

Asking the questions that unlock innovation

The MIT Leadership Center's Hal Gregersen says brainstorming in “question bursts” is the best way for innovative leaders and problem solvers to find solutions.

In the Media

CBS Evening News correspondent Jim Axelrod spoke with Dean Melissa Nobles about the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice law clinic at Northeastern. Nobles is a faculty collaborator with the clinic, which investigates lynching deaths in the U.S. "We are now beginning to change the narrative such that the families who have had that violence visited upon them now can talk about it and it be understood,” said Nobles.

Synlogic, founded by Prof. Jim Collins and Associate Prof. Tim Lu, is programming probiotic bacteria to treat certain genetic or acquired metabolic disease, reports Robin Seaton Jefferson for Forbes. One product is used for people whose bodies can’t maintain a healthy level of ammonia and “has been specifically engineered to convert the excess ammonia to a harmless metabolite,” explains Seaton Jefferson.

Brian Marquard of The Boston Globe writes about the life of Prof. Morris Halle, who passed away on April 2. Prof. Halle, who helped found MIT’s linguistics program, was “considered one of the field’s most influential scholars,” writes Marquard.