The Niger River at Mopti, Mali (© Owen Franken).
Curious about Owen Franken? View more of his work via the Franken Photo of the Week category, learn more in this profile, read a What Matters opinion column he wrote called “Life in Brownian Motion,” or visit his Web site.
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Crew members attired in training versions of their shuttle launch and entry suits await the start of a training session at NASA's Johnson Space Center. From left: Mark Kelly, commander; Michael Fincke, mission specialist; Gregory H. Johnson, pilot; European Space Agency astronaut Roberto Vittori, NASA astronauts Greg Chamitoff and Andrew Feustel, all mission specialists. Photo taken February 2011. Credit: NASA
Space Shuttle Endeavour is scheduled to lift off the pad at 3:47 p.m. EDT in Florida today with a very special payload. Not only will two seasoned MIT astronauts be on board–Greg Chamitoff ’92 and Mike Fincke ’89–the shuttle will also be carrying 13 Lego sets that will be used aboard the International Space Station for playtime (which NASA euphemistically refers to as “research”). Chamitoff and Fincke will MIT join alumna Cady Coleman ’83 aboard the ISS.
The launch marks the final mission for Endeavour, which, along with Atlantis, will be retired by NASA this year. President Obama and his family are expected to attend the shuttle’s launch, as is Rep. Gabby Giffords, whose husband Mark Kelly is leading the crew on mission STS-134.
Over the course of the two-week mission, the Endeavour crew is slated to perform four spacewalks and deliver the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer and spare parts, a high-pressure gas tank, and of course the Lego sets.
Still curious about the Legos? NASA says Earthbound students and children will have access to similar sets, so they’ll be able to perform tasks parallel to the crew members. Some tasks, for example, might focus on the complexity of building things in a microgravity space environment. Leland Melvin, NASA’s associate administrator for education, says, “These projects not only foster creativity but also instill in the young builders a real sense of the engineering and design principles that NASA uses every day. Fun learning activities like these can help inspire kids to become the next generation of explorers.”
Launch: Watch live streaming coverage of the launch and ongoing NASA TV coverage of the STS-134 mission on NASA Television.
Tweetup: More than 150 @NASA followers are attending a massive Tweetup scheduled to take place the day of the launch. Those who aren’t on site can follow Tweetup activities in real time by visiting the Buzzroom or keeping an eye out for Twitter hashtag #NASATweetup.
Learn: Brush up on STS-134 trivia by visiting NASA’s website for the mission.
Legos: Maybe you know a student or child (or ::cough:: yourself) who would be into engaging with the NASA-Lego project. If so, head over to legospace.com.
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Alumni, neighbors, and the public are all invited to MIT from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. this Saturday, April 30, to experience a bit of MIT. You can witness the landing of a Blackhawk helicopter, hear talks by Nobel laureates, learn about MIT inventions, see micro-aerial vehicles controlled by iPhone, and hang out with robots.
Use the Under the Dome online guide to search among the 600+ events for topics of interest or types of experiences. You can create an itinerary and then print out your choices and a map that guides you around campus.
Search by topic:
Life Sciences and Biotechnology—see scheduled or all day activities including volunteering to have your voice tested in the Real-Time Voice Transformation demonstration and visiting Bits, Electrons, and Robots for robot competitions and demos.
Engineering, Technology, and Invention—visit the Startup Showcase to meet entrepreneurs founding their own businesses, learn How Computers Work, and play a game that allows you to redesign the health care system.
Browse by experience:
Tours—38 activities including explore MIT’s public art collection, find out about game research at the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab, or fly a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle).
Galleries and Exhibits—108 activities including the High Tech Show and Tell to understand what powers everything from e-book readers to electric cars; Bits, Electrons, and Robots for robot competitions and research demos; and a Carbon Nanotube Display.
This is not MIT’s first open house! See the Slice of MIT blog post on the history of MIT open houses.
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For many MIT students, a high school teacher changed their lives. Sometimes it was the enthusiasm and insight the teacher offered, sometimes the teacher boosted their ambition and self esteem. The MIT Inspirational Teacher Award recognizes outstanding secondary school teachers who changed the lives of today’s MIT students. Here are stories about two of this year’s 33 winners.
Ben Chun's faculty page at the Galileo Academy of Science and Technology.
Ben Chun ’00, a computer science teacher in a San Francisco public high school, was a pivotal teacher for Jenny Cheng ’11. Chun’s gift to Cheng did not occur in California, though, but in Jerusalem, as part of Middle East Education Through Technology (MEET), a program founded at MIT to use technology to create a common language between Israeli and Palestinian high school students.
Before becoming a teacher, Chun, a CSEE major like Cheng, worked at Simple Star as a programmer prior to their acquisition by Roxio. As a volunteer, he helped the MIT students succeed as MEET instructors—often their first teaching experiences.
“During MEET, one night, I was extremely stressed about the lab the kids were going to do the next day,” Cheng wrote in the nomination. “I consulted Mr. Chun on how to guide the kids to arrive at their own answers. Mr. Chun took one of my computer science questions and asked, ‘So how would you implement this?’ I answered with a rough idea of how to accomplish this. Mr. Chun listened and asked some questions about testing for edge cases. After I gave a full answer, Mr. Chun said ‘See, you don’t have to know everything; you have to know how to guide them.’ I was astonished at the way he made me derive an answer. From this, I learned ways to prompt the kids.”
Economics major Ruben Alonzo ’11 nominated his math teacher, Irma Martinez, who is now principal of Benito Juarez Elementary School in Crystal City, TX.
“I can honestly say that I would not be at MIT if it were not for Ms. Martinez,” wrote Alonzo in the nomination. “After my father passed away and my brother was sent to prison, my future looked bleak…. Drugs were always a large part of my childhood experiences. Overdoses were common and so were prison sentences among family members… Ms. Martinez soon served as my role model and mentor… Ms. Martinez helped me realize my potential and strong gift in mathematics.”
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On Saturday, April 30–during the MIT150 Open House –six MIT authors will be present for book signings at the MIT Press Bookstore in Kendall Square. Each author has recently published a book with the MIT Press, MIT’s renowned publishing house. Visitors are invited to come and meet the authors, learn about their research, and check out the newly expanded bookstore.
A schedule for the signings is posted below.
11:30am
Alex (Sandy) Pentland
“Honest Signals: How They Shape Our World”
How understanding the signaling within social networks can change the way we make decisions, work with others, and manage organizations.
(Available as an eBook)
12:00pm
Sanjoy Mahajan
“Street-Fighting Mathematics: The Art of Educated Guessing and Opportunistic Problem Solving”
An antidote to mathematical rigor mortis, teaching how to guess answers without needing a proof or an exact calculation.
12:30pm
Samuel Jay Keyser
“Mens et Mania: The MIT Nobody Knows”
A memoir of MIT life, from being Noam Chomsky’s boss to negotiating with student protesters.
1:00pm
David A. Mindell
“Digital Apollo: Human and Machine in Spaceflight”
How human pilots and automated systems worked together to achieve the ultimate in flight–the lunar landings of NASA’s Apollo program.
1:30pm
Philip N. Alexander
“A Widening Sphere: Evolving Cultures at MIT”
How MIT¹s first nine presidents helped transform the Institute from a small technical school into a major research university.
2:00pm
Erik Brynjolfsson
“Wired for Innovation: How Information Technology is Reshaping the Economy”
An expert on the information economy explore the true economic value of technology and innovation.
(Available as an eBook)
If you’re an eBook enthusiast, this might be the point where you’re asking, what about me?? Fear not, eBook readers; when it comes to book signings you have options beyond a)not attending and b)arming the author with a metallic Sharpie®. Consider:
Autograph, a free app for iPhone and iPad that accepts signatures and inserts them into documents. Unclear whether signatures can be inserted into eBooks.
Autography, an app that allows authors to sign a blank digital page with a stylus. The signed page is then sent to the reader electronically and can be inserted behind the title page of most eBooks. (Note: This app isn’t currently listed in the iPad app store. Stay tuned for an update.)
Looks like there’s still room for growth in the realm of eBook autography. If anyone has additional suggestions for useful apps, leave a comment!
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This Faculty Forum Online event took place April 27, 2011. Debate the topic in the comments. Also view the first webcast, about collective bargaining.
Update (4/27/2011): MIT releases “The Future of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle” report, which indicates that storage for spent nuclear fuel is more crucial than ever.
Recent events in Japan have shaken public confidence in the safety of nuclear power plants. Although the health consequences have so far been small, the Fukushima accident has rekindled fears of radiation around the globe and has renewed the discussion on the risks and costs of nuclear power. This puts into question the future of an industry that had been seen as one of the keys to avoiding the long-term threat of global climate change as well as nearer-term conflicts over scarce fossil-fuel resources.
Richard Lester PhD '80, head of MIT's Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering
The new Faculty Forum Online series continues. On Wednesday, April 27, from 12:00 to 12:30 p.m. EDT Richard Lester PhD ’80, head of MIT’s Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, will offer his thoughts on nuclear energy and take questions from the worldwide MIT alumni community via video chat.
Register for this free event to receive the link for live viewing. After the event, come back here and continue the conversation about nuclear energy in the comments.
Lester, who earned his undergraduate degree in chemical engineering from Imperial College (London) and a doctorate in nuclear engineering from MIT, has been a member of the MIT faculty since 1979. In addition to leading the nuclear science and engineering department, he is Japan Steel Industry Professor and the faculty cochair and founding director of MIT’s Industrial Performance Center (IPC). At the IPC, interdisciplinary teams analyze and report on the technological transformation of industry and the consequences for society and the global economy.
According to the MIT News Office, “Lester’s early studies of the nuclear fuel cycle laid the foundation for nearly three decades of interdisciplinary teaching and research on energy and environmental technology applications and the management and control of nuclear technology.”
He has led several major studies of national and regional productivity, competitiveness, and innovation performance in a range of industries commissioned by governments and industrial groups around the world.
Lester has authored or coauthored seven books on the nuclear fuel cycle, energy technology applications, and innovation management and policy. Made in America (MIT Press, 1989) with Michael Dertouzos and Robert Solow, which identifies five national priorities for America regaining the productive edge, is one of MIT Press’s all-time bestsellers. Lester also coauthored the MIT reports on The Future of Nuclear Power (2003) and The Future of Coal (2007), and has published many articles on the management and control of nuclear technology.
Recent books, authored or coauthored:
Lester on the Culture of Innovation
Lester’s MIT150 Infinite History interview about productivity, innovation, nuclear power in the U.S., and more.
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A church in the Lorraine region of France (© Owen Franken).
Curious about Owen Franken? View more of his work via the Franken Photo of the Week category, learn more in this profile, read a What Matters opinion column he wrote called “Life in Brownian Motion,” or visit his Web site.
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I’m not sure how they find the time, but Sloan students love to parody popular TV shows. Really, they’re quite good at it and have been doing it for years now. So for your Friday enjoyment, I give you Sloan Follies 2010: The Biggest Schmoozer, a spoof of, you guessed it, The Biggest Loser. Yes, it’s a year old, but still relevant and funny.
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Data on Easter bunny shipments.
A company co-founded by an MIT alumnus to track business shipping is reporting on a pressing contemporary issue: the decline of shipments of Easter bunnies in the runup to Easter.
According to Panjiva, shipments of bunnies to the United States has dropped off 33 percent in the past four years while Easter egg products jumped 21 percent in a single year, notes a Boston Globe article. You may not care much about the bunny market (chocolate or plush) or the fact that Guinness shipments quadrupled for St. Patrick’s day 2011 (compared to 2010), but you might be interested in how such assessments could help finetune a supply chain and boost business efficiency and profitably.
Panjiva was launched by MIT doctoral student James Psota SM ’06 in response to a need facing his friend, Josh Green. In 2005, Green was working at the electronics firm E Ink (a spinoff of the MIT Media Lab) when he was asked to find a component supplier in China. That was a difficult task—potential suppliers were plentiful, which to trust? Psota felt he could design software that would do for importing what Google has done for the Web: make search smarter, according to a FastCompany article. So he developed software that analyzes bills of lading for ships bringing goods to the United States, and the pair founded Panjiva in 2006.
These days, in addition to bunny futures, Panjiva’s research tracks detailed information from multiple data sources on 1.5 million companies in 190 countries. Recent results on the website show a modest uptick in global trade activity in March, for example, and you can check a product, say, wool sweaters, in the TrendSpotting feature to see sales movements in the global marketplace. For Panjiva’s moment-to-moment takes on global markets, check their tweets.
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The first-ever live guerrilla robot performance was in Washington Square Park in Manhattan on August 9, 2010. On "stage" was the Nao robot of Aldebaran Robotics, which is 23 inches tall, humanoid, and widely used as a robotic platform in academic research today.
Look out, stand-up comedians. Yours might be the next industry infiltrated by robots. And they won’t get all flustered when a joke bombs. At the TED Women conference back in December, roboticist Heather Knight ’05, MNG ’08 introduced Data, a ham of a ’bot that tells jokes and modifies its act based on audience feedback and response. Does Data have a career in the spotlight? You decide.
Knight is currently doing doctoral research at Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute focused on the intersection of robotics and entertainment. She creates socially intelligent robot performances and sensor-based electronic art through her Marilyn Monrobot Labs in NYC. And she’s codesigned impressive Rube Goldberg installations. She’s also responsible for the world’s first robot census.
Filmmakers! Knight is hosting a Robot Film Festival in New York City, July 9-10, 2011. The festival is seeking submissions of short films that include a real or fictional robot as a main character or framing device. Research bloopers welcome! Follow it on Twitter: @robotfilmfest.
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