| Reopening a Cosmic Case | | | | | | A mysterious surplus of energy, in the form of gamma rays, lies at the heart of the Milky Way. Physicists had ruled out dark matter as a likely source of this energy excess, but new findings put the mysterious substance back on the table. Full story via MIT News → |
| Two MIT seniors named 2020 Marshall Scholars Talya Klinger and Steven Truong will begin graduate studies in the UK next fall. Full story via MIT News → | |
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| Planning for death, as a way to improve life |
Cake, a startup co-founded by Suelin Chen ’03 SM ’07 PhD ’10, helps people share their end-of-life wishes with loved ones. Full story via MIT News → | |
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| Design for the Hayden Library renovation takes shape Renovated spaces will be more flexible and welcoming, maximizing views and natural light. Full story via MIT News → | |
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| Controlling attention with brain waves |
An MIT study shows that people can boost attention by manipulating their own alpha brain waves. Full story via MIT News → | |
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| Bringing figures in anticolonial politics out of the shadows MIT historian Sana Aiyar sheds new light on the complexities of independence movements and global migration. Full story via MIT News → | |
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| We need new research hubs — but not on the coasts. Here’s how we get them. // The Washington Post “To boost economic growth, we should strengthen scientific fields where breakthroughs are imminent and where any other country — China in particular — threatens to forge ahead,” write professors Jonathan Gruber and Simon Johnson. Full story via The Washington Post → |
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| 2019 economics laureates to donate Nobel Prize money to next generation of economists // The Boston Globe |
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MIT professors Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo as well as Michael Kremer of Harvard University will donate their $916,000 in prize money to the Weiss Fund for Research in Development Economics. Full story via The Boston Globe → |
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| What makes a Nor’easter a Nor’easter? // WGBH |
Research affiliate Judah Cohen discusses what distinguishes a Nor’easter, an extratropical cyclone powered by “strong differences in temperature,” from other storms. Full story via WGBH → |
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| Major quantum achievement lets physicists “see” gravitational waves from deeper in the universe // Gizmodo |
“The method enables us to increase the distance in the universe at which we can detect gravitational waves,” says principal research scientist Lisa Barsotti of a new instrument developed by MIT researchers that has improved LIGO’s detection of gravitational waves. Full story via Gizmodo → |
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| | | As part of MIT’s Educational Justice Institute, Lecturer Lee Perlman teaches “inside-out” classes that bring MIT students inside local prisons to learn alongside incarcerated men and women. In this short film, WGBH visits Boston’s South Bay House of Correction, where “inside” and “outside” students come together for a philosophy class about the power of forgiveness. Watch the video via WGBH → |
| | | | | The next 10 years could be the best 10 years we’ve ever seen or the worst decade, and that depends less on the technology and more on the choices we make. |
| | —Erik Brynjolfsson, director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy, whose comment leads the Ideas Made to Matter list of the year’s top 18 quotes for business and management Read the other 17 quotes via MIT Sloan → |
This edition of the MIT Weekly was brought to you by a very MIT holiday wreath. 🔌
Thanks for reading, and enjoy your week!
—MIT News Office |
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