In the News

To Replace Needles, Patients Could Turn to Microchips

by Jay London on February 22, 2012

in Design,Health,In the News,Research,Science

Patients looking for relief from medication-via-injection may be in luck, thanks to a microchip that can be implanted in the body and release drugs on command from an external wireless control.

Building on 15 years of work at MIT, the research was published in the February 16 online edition of Science Translational Medicine. Members of MicroCHIPS, Inc., whose research team includes Professors Robert S. Langer and Michael J. Cima, authored the study.

From Fox News:

The study is believed the first attempt at using a wirelessly controlled drug chip in people. If this early-stage testing eventually pans out, the idea is that doctors one day might program dose changes from afar with the push of a button, or time them for when the patient is sleeping to minimize side effects.

“It’s like ‘Star Trek,’” said Langer, who co-authored the study. “Just send a signal over a special radio wave, and out comes the drug.”

Microchips containing 20 doses of the osteoporosis medication teriparatide were implanted in eight Denmark women between 65 and 70 years old during 30-minute, local anesthetic procedures. In seven cases, the device delivered dosages with no negative side effects, and the women reported a preference for microchip delivery over daily injection. (The device did not work in the eighth patient and was removed.)

Implanted medicine can help patients adhere to a strict medication schedule and better deliver those drugs directly to the part of the body needing care. If future trials are successful, the device could be available for clinical use in four years.

Cima and Langer originally conceived the microchip-delivery idea at MIT in the late 1990s and believe the technology could eventually improve the method of delivering multiple or potent drugs.

From WebMD:

“Patient compliance is a big issue, especially when we are asking patients to give themselves daily injections of a drug,” Cima said. “This could take patient compliance completely out of the question.”

And because the devices can be controlled remotely, physicians and patients can change dosing as needed. “You could literally have a pharmacy on a chip,” Langer said.

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Folding Car to Transform Urban Driving…and Make Parallel Parking Obsolete

by Jay London on February 8, 2012

in Alumni Life,Design,Economics,Energy,Engineering,In the News,Modern Geekhood,Research,Transportation

Looking for a parking space in a major city can make public transportation very appealing. The biggest urban driving hassles usually come not with driving itself, but with the stopping, turning, parallel parking, and the can-I-fit-in-this-space challenges that arise when you’ve reached your destination.

Enter the Hiriko (the Basque word for “urban”), a new compact vehicle designed by the MIT Media Lab whose first fleet of 20 vehicles will debut in Vitoria Gasteiz, Spain, in 2013.

From the New York Times:

The pod-like electric vehicle, whose battery pack would be leased, is a two-seater with 4-wheel drive and a range in excess of 100 kilometers, or about 60 miles. Because its wheelbase can collapse, a single parking space can accommodate three vehicles. Driver and passenger enter through a windshield that swings upward.

Instead of a single electric engine, each wheel has an independent dedicated engine, which allows for an amazing degree in control in suspension, steering, and turning. Smaller than a Smart Car, the Hiriko spins and rotates on its axis, a technique that MIT researchers call an “O-turn.” It also moves sideways, making parallel parking obsolete.

Professor Kent Larson leads the car’s Media Lab researcher team. A production model was unveiled before the European Union Commission in Brussels last week. In addition to Spain, future trials are planned in Boston, San Francisco, Berlin, Hong Kong, and Malmo, Sweden. Similar to ZipCar in the United States, the cars will be shared by users who will have access for a few hours at a time. Cars may be sold to individuals in the future, with cost estimates currently ranging around $16,000.

In addition to the Hiriko, a Media Lab team led by doctoral candidates Ryan Chin and William Lark has also created a three-wheel electric vehicle prototype that can function as a bicycle and meets all European bike-lane regulations.

For more information and video on Hiriko (formerly the MIT CityCar), visit the “Changing Places” section on the Media Lab site.

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Of Sunflowers and Solar Plants

by Jay London on February 1, 2012

in Design,Energy,Engineering,In the News,Learning,Research

When looking for ways to increase solar energy efficiency, MIT researchers simply stopped and smelled the…sunflowers.

Using the flower as inspiration, a team of researchers led by Professor Alexander Mitsos developed a solar panel layout that mimics the arrangement of sunflower florets, a pattern called Fermat’s spiral.

From MIT News:

“The MIT team…looked to nature for inspiration — specifically, to the sunflower. The florets of a sunflower are arranged in a spiraling pattern, known as a Fermat spiral, that appears in many natural objects and has long fascinated mathematicians: The ancient Greeks even applied the patterns to buildings and other architectural structures. Mathematicians have found that each sunflower floret is turned at a ‘golden angle’—about 137 degrees—with respect to its neighboring floret.”

The new layout takes up to 20 percent less space than Spain’s PS10 Solar Power Plant, Europe’s first concentrated solar power plant, which can covert enough electricity to power 6,000 homes.  Compared with the PS10’s configuration, where mirrors are arranged around in circles and the distance between mirrors akin to the seats in a movie theater, the new layout reduces shading and blocking, and increases total efficiency.

The research team, which includes Corey Noone SM ’11 and Manuel Torrihon of RWTH Aachen University in Germany, found that their new pattern could reduce shadowing and blocking throughout the day. Their findings were published in the journal Solar Energy, and the team has recently filed for patent protection.

From MIT News:

“…the spiral pattern reduced shading and blocking and increased total efficiency compared with PS10’s radially staggered configuration.

Mitsos says arranging a CSP plant in such a spiral pattern could reduce the amount of land and the number of heliostats required to generate an equivalent amount of energy, which could result in significant cost savings.”

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DIY-IAP: What is Your Definition of a Successful Scientist?

by Jay London on January 26, 2012

in IAP,In the News,Science,Student Life

Late last year, Science Magazine invited the “next generation of scientists” to answer the questions, “How will the practice of science change in your lifetime?” and “What will improve and what new challenges will emerge?” The queries kicked off Science Magazine’s new section, NextGen VOICES, and highlighted the need for young scientific voices to address the critical challenges in an increasingly resource-limited world. The top 50 responses were posted in the January 2012 edition, which included four MIT graduate students.

Dianne Kamfonik (Civil and Environmental Engineering): “Science, more than ever, is being bottlenecked by politics. For example, scientists have not only shown that climate change is happening, but they have also already developed many ways to combat it.”

Andrew David Warren (Health Sciences and Technology): “Should researchers be afraid of being replaced? Not for a long time—scientists will continue to provide the creativity. Computers will simply help us identify what we do (and don’t) know.”

Vyas Ramanan (Health Sciences and Technology): “As robotic labor overtakes humans in efficiency across many industries and at many points along the value chain, new types of jobs must be created to ensure stable employment for the working-age population.”

Yiftach Nagar (Sloan School of Management): “Increasing stratification will cause many talented people to give up academic careers for work in rising multinational corporations, which will fund applicative research. As larger data sets become owned by companies, free dissemination and open scrutiny of findings will be challenged.”

Now, it’s your turn. The second NextGen VOICES survey asks, “What is your definition of a successful scientist?” and “How has this definition changed between your mentor’s generation and your own?” The question is open to any young scientists and the deadline is February 17. Click here to post your answers (250 words or less).

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DIY-IAP: Watch a Robotics Tournament…in Space

by Jay London on January 23, 2012

in Campus Culture,Design,Events,IAP,In the News,Modern Geekhood,Research,Science,Space

If you’re feeling spaced out this morning, you’re not alone. Teams of high school students are at MIT today for the finale of the third annual Zero Robotics SPHERES Challenge, a worldwide competition where students program satellites to complete tasks onboard the International Space Station (ISS).

The MIT Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics has joined with NASA, Aurora Flight Sciences, TopCoder, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in sponsoring the competition. The finale takes place today at MIT from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Watch it live on NASA TV or the Zero Robotics site.

In the competition, NASA will upload software developed by the high school students onto SPHERES (Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites), basketball-sized satellites created at MIT, aboard the ISS. Students wrote algorithms for the SPHERES satellites, giving them the opportunity the opportunity to act as simulated ground controllers for space research.

The tournament began in September with over 2,000 students from 147 teams creating algorithms and devising codes. The top 27 teams will have their code sent to the space station where, during today’s competition, astronauts in microgravity will command the satellites to execute the teams’ flight programs. The team with the highest software performance over several rounds of the competition wins the challenge.

SPHERES satellites were developed at MIT in 1999 and first used aboard the ISS in 2006. In addition to the competition, the satellites are used inside the space station to conduct formation flight maneuvers for spacecraft guidance navigation, control, and docking, and they can test a wide range of hardware and software at an affordable cost.

David W. Miller, professor of aeronautics and astronautics, and research scientist Alvar Saenz-Otero PhD ’05 serve as principal investigator and co-investigator, respectively, of the challenge.

For more information on SPHERES, watch a 2009 video where the MIT SPHERES Team held a test session with astronauts Michael Barratt and Timothy Kopra aboard the International Space Station set to the score from “An der schönen blauen Donau” (On The Beautiful Blue Danube) by Johann Strauss II.

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DIY IAP: Tune In to Xconomy on PBS

by Nancy DuVergne Smith on January 17, 2012

in Economics,Health,In the News,Management

Xconomy has MIT roots. Before starting the business and technology news organization, many key staffers worked and/or graduated from MIT (see below). Their output includes a news website with localized blogs in six major cities, events, and a regular Friday morning update on Boston’s WGBH radio. You can also sign up for their RSS feed or newsletters.

Xconomy online and on air.

Xconomy online and on air.

What stories do they cover? Startups, life sciences, health IT, and clean tech are interest areas. Recent stories include an interview with the CEO of Paris-based biotech giant Sanofi, survey results on tech managers’ salaries for 2011, and Morgenthaler Ventures investments in the fast-growing Silicon Valley startup Evernote.

Localized blogs hail from Boston, Detroit, New York, San Francisco, and Seattle. Learn about new social media research expansion at Microsoft Research New England (Boston); Walk Score, an online service that ranks rental properties, cities, and neighborhoods by how pedestrian-friendly they are (Seattle); and funding progress for the Kalamazoo, MI-based startup Axonia Medical (Detroit).

Who is Xconomy? Founder Robert Buderi was a research fellow in MIT’s Center for International Studies and served as editor in chief of MIT’s Technology Review, which also published these folks: Cofounder, COO, Executive Editor Rebecca Zacks worked in an MIT neuroscience lab and was a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT. Wade Roush PhD ’94 is chief correspondent and editor of Xconomy’s San Francisco bureau. Gregory T. Huang SM ’02, PhD ’99 is national IT editor and editor of Xconomy Boston. Luke Timmerman, a former MIT Knight fellow, is the national biotechnology editor and editor of Xconomy Seattle.

Keep your ear tuned to innovation news at Xconomy.

 

 

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DIY IAP: Build an Electric Unicycle (Or Just Watch the Video)!

by Jay London on January 11, 2012

in Design,Engineering,IAP,In the News,Modern Geekhood,Research,Student Life,Transportation

Photo Credit: Stephan Boyer, Double Dispatch blog

Recent data shows that thousands of commuters in Boston-Cambridge area ride their bicycle to work, with ridership more the doubling since 2007. But unicycle ridership? Not current data exists.

Meet Stephan Boyer, a third-year student in the School of Engineering who has created The Bullet, a sort of unicycle-meets-Segway device that can hit 15 miles per hour and can travel for five miles on a single charge.

The Bullet, an electric unicycle with a safety kill switch, does some self-balancing, with components that help prevent the device from falling forward or backward (good luck if you’re falling left or right!). Boyer uses the Bullet to travel around campus, even relying on semantics to travel inside.

Boyer writes on his Double Dispatch blog:

“Bullet is the primary way I navigate MIT and the surrounding Cambridge area. I often zoom past students, faculty, custodians, and tourists, with generally positive reactions from everyone. I’ve been told one can be fined for riding a scooter in the Infinite Corridor. Fortunately, Bullet ain’t no scooter.”

Boyer currently has no plan to market the Bullet for commercial use, but estimates the device cost only a few hundred dollars to build. Boyer (and Slice) urges caution to any burgeoning uni-enthusiasts and likens navigating the Bullet to learning to ride a bike with no hands.

“Unfortunately, one cannot simply pick up a self-balancing unicycle and ride it with ease. It took me several hours to be able to ride in a straight line without crashing, and it took several days to learn how to turn in a controlled manner. Many of my friends have tried riding it, usually with little success (including some actual unicyclers).”

For more information on how the Bullet was assembled, including its kit list and software, and some helpful riding tips, visit Boyer’s Double Dispatch blog entry.

Editor’s note: In honor of MIT’s Independent Activities Period (IAP) in January, Slice is focusing on activities you can do yourself and on the experiences of students serving this month as externs with alumni in their workplaces. Stay tuned!

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DIY IAP: Make a Folding Ukulele

by Nancy DuVergne Smith on January 4, 2012

in Engineering,IAP,In the News

Brian Chan ’02, SM ’04, PhD ’09 has done it again. The origami master who now designs graphics, metal and paper items, and products has a new invention—a quick-fab instrument that you can make yourself and then fold and toss in your backpack so it’s ready when you want to make music.

Make a ukulele in about half a day.

Make a ukulele in about half a day.

Chan designed the Folding Ukulele to be made from laser-cut bamboo plywood, and the kit, which takes about half a day to assemble, is offered online from Ponoko, a New Zealand-based software company that allows creative types to make prototypes of objects as small as jewelry or as large as furniture.

Self described as a maker of anything, Chan is a Cambridge-based freelance engineer and artist who has won honors for mobile-phone concept designs and for his idea for using thermal depolymerization to produce biofuels while sequestering carbon pollution. He’s  also recently begun working with the MIT Hobby Shop.

You can watch this video to see Chan explain the instrument, demonstrate how to fold it, and hear what it sounds like.

And you can build it too—Kits are available at Ponoko.

See some of Brian’s recent work and follow him on Facebook or Twitter for updates.

Editor’s note: In honor of MIT’s Independent Activities Period (IAP) in January, Slice  is focusing on activities you can do yourself and on the experiences of students serving this month as externs with alumni in their workplaces. Stay tuned!

 

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Anytime, anywhere, any pace, any age

by Patrick on January 1, 2012

in Classroom,In the News,Prof. Winston's Ideas

Professor Patrick Henry Winston ’65, SM ’67, PhD ’70

Like all years, it was the best of years and the worst of years. People of future influence were born; people of past influence died. Companies started up; countries almost went broke.

At MIT, it was a special year because we made it to our 150th birthday, and all the celebrating encouraged us to think about the next 150 years. Here is my prediction: MIT will change more in the next 20 years than it has in the past 100. We have to. Our students learn differently. They have the web. They have Skype. They are on line. We have an obligation and an opportunity to change the way we engage with them.

Many of our successes will be exportable. So, I’m betting that if MIT lasts another 150 years, 2011 will be known as the year when the Provost Rafael Reif launched MITx. Here is what he had to say:

Many members of the MIT faculty have been experimenting with integrating online tools into the campus education. We will facilitate those efforts, many of which will lead to novel learning technologies that offer the best possible online educational experience to non-residential learners. Both parts of this new initiative are extremely important to the future of high-quality, affordable, accessible education.

We are going global, and, eventually, you will be able to earn certificates for completing subjects from MIT, anytime, anywhere, at any pace, at any age, and it won’t cost $50,000/year. And perhaps the best part is that we are doing it all open source and inviting other universities to join with us.

Of course, distance education has been around for a long time. What’s new is that technical advances have just about reached a threshold where on-line is not just a poor shadow of the real thing but rather a different thing with relative advantages and disadvantages, just as movies are different from live theater, with relative advantages and disadvantages.

No one has a crystal ball good enough to see what lies on the other side of the coming education revolution. Are we talking about adjustments or starting over? Are we freeing faculty to spend more time with students one-on-one or are we automating the faculty out of work? And of course it is easier to predict the future than it is to predict when it will happen.

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What’s it like to be 75 years old? Try this on.

by Jay London on December 28, 2011

in Design,Health,In the News,Learning,Modern Geekhood,Research

The U.S. population of persons 65 years or older numbered 39.6 million in 2009 and is expected to increase to 72.1 million by 2030. Coupled with falling birth rates and lengthening age expectancies, the U.S. population is rapidly aging.

For engineers and designers, this creates design challenges that didn’t previously exist with younger populations. Existing and developing products may need to be altered to cater to the older demographic.

Thanks to MIT’s Agelab, young designers may be better equipped to understand the needs of their aging clients. Under the direction of Joe Coughlin, Agelab has created AGNES (Age Gain Now Empathy System), a suit designed to approximate the motor, visual, flexibility, dexterity, and strength of a person in their mid-70s.

AGNES simulates a gerontological atmosphere in retail, public transportation, and workplace environments. Braces and bands mimic joint stiffness and muscular fatigue. Leg straps create slower leg movements, and helmet attachments give the wearer an age-induced curved spine. Yellow eyeglasses make it difficult to read small print, and earplugs simulate difficulty with sounds and tones.

MIT Research Fellow Rozanne Puleo told Fastcodesign.com:

“We’ve suited up students and taken them to the grocery store to purchase foods with low sugar, low sodium, and low fat—foods commonly purchased by older adults. They found that it was very challenging to locate these items on the shelf. That’s valuable information that we can take back to organizations.”

Part of the Engineering Systems Division, MIT AgeLab works to transform technologies into practical solutions that improve how products are designed and services are delivered. In addition to AGNES, the AgeLab has created AwareCar (a vehicle that monitors driver state); Miss Daisy (a driving simulator used for evaluating cognitive distraction and the effects of disease and medication); and Miss Rosie (a Volkswagen Beetle that evaluates a driver’s capacity for vehicle operation), among others.

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