July 20, 2019
Greetings, and happy Moon Day! 🌎🚀🌙 Here’s a roundup of the latest from MIT.
 
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Remembering Apollo
A giant leap, 50 years ago: With a huge assist from members of MIT’s Instrumentation Lab, who developed the guidance, navigation, and controls systems for NASA’s Project Apollo, as well as numerous others around the Institute, Buzz Aldrin ScD ’63 climbed down to the surface of the moon on July 20, 1969, joining Neil Armstrong as the second Earthling to visit another world. Armstrong snapped Aldrin’s iconic portrait shortly thereafter.
Learn more via MIT News →
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Top Headlines
Artificial “muscles” achieve powerful pulling force
A new MIT system of contracting fibers could be a boon for biomedical devices and robotics.
Full story via MIT News →
 MIT Heat Island
Flying for MIT
Test pilot and MIT-trained aeronautical engineer Thomas Washington ’92, SM ’94 flew for the U.S. Air Force and Aurora Flight Sciences before returning to the Institute.
Full story via Slice of MIT →
 MIT Heat Island
Why urban planners should pay attention to restaurant-review sites 🥡
A study finds online restaurant information can closely predict key neighborhood indicators, in lieu of other data.
Full story via MIT News →
MIT and Fashion Institute of Technology join forces to create innovative textiles
An advanced functional fabrics workshop, held jointly with AFFOA and New Balance, develops concepts for biodegradable footwear and active textiles.
Full story via MIT News →
 MIT Heat Island
Photo worthy
Research scientist Felice Frankel shares eight tips for showcasing research with compelling images.
Full story via MIT Technology Review →
 MIT Heat Island
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
#ThisIsMIT
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In the Media
“They worried that the men might rebel. They didn’t” // The Guardian
Margaret Hamilton, whose work leading the development of the onboard flight software for the Apollo missions at MIT was “critical to landing astronauts on the moon for the first time,” discusses her trailblazing career as a computer scientist.
Full story via The Guardian →
How Massachusetts made the Apollo 11 moon landing possible // The Boston Globe
Former researchers from the MIT Instrumentation Lab discuss their work helping to pave the way for humans to set foot on the moon. For the Apollo 11 mission, they “developed one of its most vital components: the guidance and navigation systems that directed the Apollo command and landing crafts to — and onto — the moon.”
Full story via The Boston Globe →
New designs could boost solar cells beyond their limits // Wired
MIT researchers have developed a new method for potentially increasing solar cell efficiency beyond the theoretical limit.
Full story via Wired →
MIT professor renews warning about the possibility of mass extinction event in ocean // The Boston Globe
“We should limit carbon dioxide emissions,” says Professor Daniel Rothman of his findings showing that if carbon emissions exceed a critical threshold, it could lead to severe ocean acidification and a mass extinction. “The carbon cycle is a non-linear system, and if you perturb it, surprising things may happen.”
Full story via The Boston Globe →
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
“
The disasters that are coming with climate change really dwarf earthquakes. If we don’t deal with climate change there’s no point in dealing with earthquakes.
—Lucy Jones PhD ’81, known as “the Beyoncé of earthquakes” and “the earthquake lady,” in an interview covering her groundbreaking career in seismology and her thoughts on other natural disasters
Full story via The New York Times →
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The Telegram
In celebration of 50 years since the first moon landing, we look back at MIT’s first involvement in the Apollo program: It all started with this 1961 telegram, which indicated NASA was putting the Institute in charge of developing the computer guidance and navigation system to land humans the moon. It was the first major Apollo contract, and the only one to go to a university.
Learn more via the NASA History Office →
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Look Back
MIT played a critical role in developing the flight software for NASA’s Apollo 11 mission. A key contributor to this effort was Margaret Hamilton (above left), who led the Software Engineering Division of the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory (now the independent Draper Laboratory), which contracted with NASA to produce Apollo’s guidance system. But Hamilton was just one of a number of women working on Apollo at the I-Lab. Others included Madeline Sullivan (second from left), who programmed dynamics and control systems; Elaine Denniston (second from right), who keypunched data written by staff programmers; and Saydean Zeldin (right), who designed software that allowed astronauts to control Apollo’s engines.
Photo of Maia Weinstock
This edition of the MIT Weekly was brought to you by MechE space cadets. 👩‍🚀

Thanks for reading, and enjoy your week!

—Maia, MIT News Office
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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