Volume 52, Number 19 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 TechTalk S e r v i n g Th e MIT Co mm u n i t y MIT boosts aid for students Increases number of undergraduates who can attend tuition-free More MIT students will have their tuition and fees completely covered next year under a series of financial aid enhancements that the Institute unveiled March 7. Under the new plan, families earning IMAGE / ELLENZWEIG ARCHITECTURE | PLANNING less than $75,000 a year will have all tuition covered. For parents with total annual David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research groundbreaking income below $75,000 and typical assets, MIT will ensure that all tuition charges are An artist’s rendering of the new David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT, which will be constructed at the corner covered with an MIT scholarship, federal of Main and Ames streets. Groundbreaking on the research institution was held on March 7, for more on the event see page 8. and state grants and/or outside scholar- ship funds. Nearly 30 percent of MIT stu- dents fall into this tuition-free category. For families earning less than $75,000 a year, MIT will eliminate the student loan Marine bacteria’s mealtime dash is a swimming success expectation. MIT will no longer expect Denise Brehm take up nutrients before they students from families with total annual Civil and Environmental Engineering undergo chemical changes. A income below $75,000 and typical assets to paper published in the March 10 take out loans to cover expenses beyond online edition of the Proceedings tuition. Under this provision, for example, Goldfish in an aquarium are of the National Academy of Sci- students in this income group who par- able to dash after food flakes at ences describes the research. ticipate in MIT’s paid Undergraduate mealtime, reaching them before “Our experiments have shown Research Opportunities Program (UROP) they sink or are eaten by other that marine bacteria are able to each semester would be able to graduate fish. Researchers at MIT recently home in very rapidly on short- debt-free. proved that marine bacteria, the lived nutrient patches in the For families earning less than $100,000, smallest creatures in the ocean, ocean,” said Roman Stocker, the MIT will eliminate home equity in deter- behave in a similar fashion at Doherty Assistant Professor of mining need. On average, this will reduce mealtime, using their swimming Ocean Utilization and lead author parental contributions by $1,600. For fami- skills to reach tiny food patches on the paper. “This suggests that lies who rent rather than own a home, MIT that appear randomly in the ocean P. haloplanktis’ performance is will provide a comparable reduction in the blue. finely tuned to the oceanic nutri- expected parental contribution. The behavior of bacteria at ent landscape. If you are a bacte- MIT will reduce student work-study these small scales could have rium, the ocean looks like a desert requirements for all financial aid recipi- global implications, possibly even to you, where food mostly comes ents. During the past decade, MIT has impacting the oceans’ health dur- in small patches that are rare and steadily lowered the amount it expects stu- ing climate change. ephemeral. When you encounter dents to provide through term-time work. Scientists in the Department one, you want to use it rapidly.” MIT will take a further step in this direc- of Civil and Environmental Engi- Co-authors on the paper are tion by reducing the work-study expecta- neering demonstrated for the first postdoctoral associate Justin Sey- tion for all financial aid recipients by an time in lab experiments that the mour, graduate student Dana Hunt additional 10 percent. 2-micron-long, rod-shaped marine and Associate Professor Martin The Institute has a long tradition of bacterium P. haloplanktis is able to Polz, all of MIT, and Assistant Pro- opening its doors to talented students from locate and exploit nutrient patches fessor Azadeh Samadani of Bran- a full range of economic backgrounds. For extremely rapidly, thanks to its deis University. more than four decades, MIT has made keen swimming abilities. The researchers were able to its undergraduate financial aid decisions Food sources for these micro- prove the behavior of P. haloplank- by following a three-part financial aid phi- organisms come as dissolved tis by recreating a microcosm of losophy. nutrients and often appear as the bacteria’s ocean environment “First, we are need-blind in admissions, localized patches that, if not eaten, using new technology called meaning that we admit all undergraduates are rapidly dissipated by physical microfluidics. Microfluidics con- on the basis of academic merit alone, with- processes like diffusion. Foraging, sists of patterns of minute chan- out considering their ability to pay,” said then, becomes a race against time nels engraved in a clear rubbery Dean for Undergraduate Education Daniel for a bacterium. A rapid response PHOTO / MICAELA PILOTTO See MEALTIME See TUITION gives it a strong advantage over Roman Stocker, the Doherty Assistant Professor of Ocean competitors and may allow it to Page 3 Utilization, holds microfluidics devices. Page 3

NEWS RESEARCH/EDUCATION PEOPLE

GET OUT THE VOTE ‘ON A ROLL’ INTERVIEW WITH THE DEAN: SURESH Alternative voting system that allows voters to rank MIT researchers discover a way to sort out cells, School of Engineering Dean Subra Suresh talks by preference is getting noticed by MTV. which could lead to inexpensive testing for diseases. about engineering’s future, both at MIT and globally. Page 2 Page 6 Page 4-5

DIGITALK: WHERE IT’S AT MACVICAR DAY 2008 GOOD ‘KNIGHT’ Making computer repairs, GeoWeb and what to do Alumnus and Nobel winner Carl Wieman leads Symposium sees bright future for science with your old cell phones. annual celebration. journalism. Page 7 Page 7 Page 6 PAGE 2 March 12, 2008 NEWS MIT Tech Talk Voting for more than just either-or David Chandler have access to the Internet can then cast their votes, pro- other candidate”—four first-place votes out of 16—but “he News Office viding an instant tally. was very polarizing and was ranked near last on most of There’s even an ultrasimple version that works through the other ballots,” Hill explains. So in a traditional vote, the cell phones using basic text messaging. The system is so vast majority of the voters would have been very unhappy Traditional voting systems allow people to make only simple that hundreds of people have been using it for deci- with the outcome. a single choice—a limitation many voters find frustrating, sions as simple and immediate as where to go for dinner or Instead, with the Selectricity preferen- particularly when there is a crowded field of candidates, when to hold a meeting. tial voting system—which allows the as there was early in the current presidential nominating But the system is also sophisticated results to be scored using any of a cycle. enough to handle real elections, at least on variety of different known mathemat- But it doesn’t have to be that way. a small scale. In February, a beta version ical systems for selecting winners— Alternative voting systems, which allow people to rank of the new, improved software was used the first-place winner using most of the their preferences in order instead of simply picking one, by a national student organization to methods had only two first-place votes, have been known for centuries, but have been devilishly elect its first board of directors—and but was in the top three or four on almost difficult to implement and often result in a very slow tally- the way that election turned out was every ballot. ing of results. One example is the system used in the Iowa a dramatic confirmation of the value of “It ended up being a real caucuses, in which supporters of candidates who fail to the new system. example of the power of pref- reach a certain threshold in the first round can then move Each of 16 campus chapters of the group erential elections,” leaving a on to their second choices, and so on, until a clear winner Students for Free Culture got an equal vote majority of voters satisfied, Hill emerges. to select five members of its governing says. A new computer software system developed by MIT board from among a slate of 13 candi- Selectricity users can pick which selec- researchers promises to make such ranking systems just dates. But, as it turned out, the result tion method to use when they set up a as easy as traditional voting—and to give results that leave would have been very different had they ballot, but once votes are cast the web more people satisfied. The system is about to get its first used a traditional voting system. site also allows users the option of mass-market trial with the cable music network MTV. Hill, now a research fellow at MIT’s new analyzing the results using several Benjamin Mako Hill, while he was a graduate student in Center for Future Civic Media, says “the alternative methods, so that the out- the MIT Media Lab’s Computing Culture group, created a first-place winner in plurality didn’t even IMAGE / SELECTRICITY comes can be compared. system called Selectricity, which has been online as a free make it into the top five” using the more MTV is planning to use Selectricity to service since last fall and is about to unveil an upgraded sophisticated preferential voting system, in which each allow viewers to vote for their preferences among a selec- version with more options. With this software, any user chapter was able to rank all of the candidates in order of tion of music videos to be presented in a new program that can go to the web site (www.selectricity.org) and set up a preference. That candidate, who would have been the win- will be airing in the next few weeks. Details are still being “Quickvote” in just a few seconds, and users anywhere who ner in an ordinary election, “was ranked first more than any worked out with the network, Hill says. OBITUARIES AWARDS AND HONORS intelligence, and spurred debate about the Joseph Weizenbaum, role of computer systems in decision mak- The MIT Sea Grant College Program Moisture and Temperature Estimation.” professor emeritus of ing for many years,” said Eric Grimson, has selected two MIT faculty as recipi- Flores presented it at the AGU’s meet- head of the Department of Electrical Engi- ents of the 2008 Doherty Professorship ing in September 2007. computer science, 85 neering and Computer Science at MIT. in Ocean Utilization. Franz Hover, School of Engineering Dean Subra Weizenbaum’s more recent book, assistant professor in the Department of Suresh, DMSE Department Head Ned Joseph Weizenbaum, professor emeri- “Kurs auf den Eisberg,” dealt with the dif- Mechanical Engineering, and Eric Alm, Thomas and Professor Carl Thompson assistant professor with appointments in have been named among the 34 chosen tus of computer science at MIT who ficult role of the scientist in an immoral the Department of Biological Engineer- as the inaugural class of fellows for the grew skeptical of artificial intelligence world. Weizenbaum held academic appoint- ing and the Department of Civil and Materials Research Society. after creating a program that made many ments at ’s Graduate Environmental Engineering, will each Jimmy Bartolotta, an MIT junior, users feel like they were speaking with an School of Education, Stanford University, receive a supplemental award of $25,000 has been named to the 2008 “ESPN The empathic psychologist, died March 5 in the Technical University of Berlin and the per year for two years. Magazine” Academic All-America First Berlin. He was 85. University of Hamburg in Germany. He The Doherty Fellowship encourages Team in men’s basketball. Weizenbaum, who was Jewish, fled was a fellow of the American Association promising, nontenured professors to Bartolotta was the only junior select- Nazi Germany with his parents and for the Advancement of Science, a mem- undertake marine-related research ed to the college division first team. A arrived in the United States in the mid- ber of the New York Academy of Science that will further innovative uses of the native of Littleton, Colo., Bartolotta 1930s. At the beginning of his career with and of the European Academy of Science. ocean’s resources. The area of research maintains a converted 3.79 grade-point computers, in the early 1950s, he worked may address any aspect of marine use average while majoring in management on analog computers; later, he helped and/or management, whether social, science and physics. He also averaged design and build a digital computer at Miriam Yoffa Rich, political, environmental or technologi- an Institute-record 23.9 points per game Wayne University in Detroit, Mich. cal. this season. In 1955, Weizenbaum became a mem- longtime lab technician, 88 Hover’s research with autonomous An MIT undergraduate and two grad- underwater vehicles (AUVs) will focus uate students studying in the Harvard- ber of the General Electric team that Miriam Yoffa Rich, who worked for 41 on developing and demonstrating a MIT Health Sciences and Technology designed and built the first computer years as a laboratory technician at MIT, manipulation system for unknown envi- program were recently named fellows system dedicated to banking operations. died Wednesday, Feb. 6. She was 88. ronments; Alm will be studying genetic in the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship Among his early technical contributions Born in Gardner, Mass., Rich was one diversity in ocean bacteria. program—which recognizes students were the list processing system SLIP of 11 children born to Pearl B. and Joseph Joseph M. Sussman, the JR East who are immigrants or children of immi- and the natural language understanding Yoffa. She lived most recently in Venice, Professor in the Department of Civil grants. program ELIZA, which was an important Fla.; before that she lived in Brookline, and Environmental Engineering and the MIT undergraduate Sudeb Dalai; development in artificial intelligence and Mass. Engineering Systems Division, has been and Robert Koffie and Vijay Yanama- cemented his role in the folklore of com- Rich was employed at MIT for many named chair of the federal Intelligent dala, both in the Harvard-MIT program, puter science research. years as a laboratory technician in the Transportation System (ITS) Advisory have each received up to $16,000 a year ELIZA was perhaps the first instance Department of Materials Science and Committee. for their tuition, and $20,000 mainte- of what today is known as a chatterbot Engineering, beginning in 1947 until her The ITS, under the auspices of the nance grants. Each award lasts two program. Specifically, the ELIZA pro- retirement in 1988. She was an American U.S. Department of Transportation’s years. gram simulated a conversation between Red Cross volunteer for many years in Research and Innovative Technology Research by Moshe Ben-Akiva, the a patient and a psychotherapist by using a Massachusetts. She was also a volunteer Administration, advises the U.S. Sec- Edmund K. Turner Professor of Civil person’s responses to shape the comput- at the U.S. Public Health Service Hospital retary of Transportation on the study, and Environmental Engineering, was development and implementation of featured in an episode of The History er’s replies. Weizenbaum was shocked to and the American Cancer Association. “intelligent” transportation systems. Channel’s “Modern Marvels,” which discover that many users were taking his She was a wonderful dancer, consum- mate bridge player, and an avid news fol- Alejandro N. Flores, a PhD student aired Thursday, Feb. 28. program seriously and were opening their lower. Her tremendous sense of humor in the Department of Civil and Environ- The episode, titled “Superhighways,” hearts to it. The experience prompted him and zest for life will be missed by all her mental Engineering, won the Outstand- also featured a short interview with MIT to think philosophically about the implica- friends and family. ing Student Paper Award of the Ameri- alumnus Ramachandran Balakrishna tions of artificial intelligence, and, later, to Rich was the beloved wife of the can Geophysical Union’s Hydrology sec- PhD ’06 describing the traffic modeling become a critic of it. deceased Kenneth B. Rich. She was the tion. program, MITSIM. Weizenbaum joined MIT’s faculty in beloved aunt of seven surviving nieces The paper, co-authored with Profes- MITSIM simulates traffic the way the 1960s. In 1976, he authored “Comput- and one nephew and many great- and sors Rafael Bras and Dara Entekha- drivers experience it—cars following er Power and Human Reason,” in which great-great-nieces and nephews. She is bi, is titled, “Modeling Uncertainty and each other, changing lanes, braking he displayed ambivalence toward comput- also survived by two stepsons. Correlation in Soil Properties Using when the car in front slows down—and er technology. A service will be held at 11:45 a.m. on Restricted Pairing and Implications for models the drivers’ responses in real “‘Computer Power and Human Reason’ Sunday, April 6, at Sharon Memorial Park Ensemble-Based Hillslope-Scale Soil time. raised questions about the role of artificial in Sharon, Mass.

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look like a clear film. Transparent, efficient, it could one day be poured onto the object it’s powering, like a coat of energizing paint. Fabricating viral films, Belcher says, may provide new path- ways for organizing molecules to help create electronic, optical and magnetic materials. And she keeps studying the ancient abalone for clues to those new pathways. She keeps a cache of abalone shells on her MIT desk. “It builds exquisite materials. It’s a very nice animal,” vegetar- ian Belcher notes, offering a shell to a guest. In her research, Belcher is careful to avoid harming or killing her subjects, who live in abalone condominiums. To get samples of their secretions to study, she inserts glass slides beneath their shells, rather than endanger them. Shell shock Belcher still enjoys heady moments like the one in her ocean- front office, when delight makes her feel like running down the PHOTO / ROMAN STOCKER Sarah H. Wright hall outside her lab in Building 16. A microfluidics device on the microscope News Office But her work at MIT is driven by a different question than the one that arose when she stood on her desk, scanning the periodic table, abalone shell in hand. n MIT materials scientist’s research on sea snails has “Back then, I asked, ‘What if? Wouldn’t it be interesting if?’” MEALTIME helped transform battery technology and may end the she says. “Now, the questions are more like, ‘What’s the most Continued from Page 1 A era when cell phones die if they’re dropped and PDAs efficient, useful material we could make?’” must be replaced if they get dunked in the tub. Ultra-tiny computer chips, fuel cells, “smart” nanocrystal sen- material and sealed with a glass slide. The Thanks to those sea snails and a eureka moment, Angela sors—anything is possible with hybrid materials, she says. researchers injected bacteria and nutrients Belcher, Germeshausen Professor of Materials Science and “Abalone shells are self-assembling. What if we could make a into the microchannels at specific locations Engineering and Biological Engineering, is developing smart material that is self-reassembling? What if iPods and Blackber- and, using video-microscopy, recorded the nanomaterials—hybrids of organic and inorganic components— rys could genetically mend their own cracks? These devices bacteria as they foraged on two simulated beginning with a rechargeable, biologically based battery that get dropped; they break; what material can we make so they fix food sources: a lysing algal cell that cre- looks like plastic food wrap. themselves?” ates a sudden explosion of dissolved nutri- Belcher’s eureka moment occurred 10 years ago; it arose ents and the small nutrient plume trailing from her long, delighted fascination with abalone, the sea snail, Eureka is a column that aims to show how real-life experi- behind particles that sink in the ocean. and from her willingness to ask a wide-open question: “What if?” ences outside the lab can inspire breakthroughs in research or new The question of whether the bacteria Holding up an abalone shell before a visitor, Belcher directions in academic thought. If you’ve had or know of an MIT could or couldn’t put their swimming skills describes the moment when the two threads—persistent inter- “Eureka” example, please e-mail [email protected]. to use in this race against time has gener- est and sudden insight—came together, forming the basis of her ated considerable interest in the scientific current research, which spans inorganic chemistry, materials community over the past decade, because chemistry, biochemistry, molecular biology and electrical engi- there’s a great deal riding on P. haloplank- neering. tis’ and its relatives’ ability to reach these A seventh-generation Texan, Belcher began studying abalone nutrients and recycle them for other ani- when she entered the University of California, Santa Barbara, as mals in the food web. a graduate student (abalone cling to California’s coastal rocks). Scientists who study Earth’s carbon Intrigued since childhood by pearls and pearl-making mollusks, cycle know that accounting for all the she was impressed by the abalone’s shell: It’s 98 percent calcium organic matter in the marine food web is critical, including the matter that exists carbonate—what we call chalk, only 3,000 times stronger. in these tiny, discrete nutrient patches “The abalone makes this amazing material out of a common bacteria feed on. In fact, the carbon in mineral,” she says. those patches is so important that some As a doctoral student at Santa Barbara, Belcher had an office scientists believe marine bacteria’s capac- with an ocean view. Working on her dissertation, a study of how ity to utilize it will determine whether the the abalone produces both its rough outer shell and its opales- oceans become a carbon sink or source cent interior simultaneously, she could see whales and dolphins during global warming. in the Pacific. Until 25 years ago, scientists weren’t On the wall opposite her desk hung a huge periodic table. really aware of the microbial loop, the “Suddenly, I wondered, what if we could assemble materials processing of organic material among the like the abalone does—but not be limited to one element? What smallest creatures in the ocean: bacteria, if we could bond protein to other elements in the periodic table phytoplankton, nanozooplankton, viruses, and grow new materials?” she says. etc. Now they know that the roughly one Belcher recalls she stood on her desk to get closer to the million bacteria per milliliter of ocean play chart of 110 elements, and that she felt like running down the a pivotal role in the microbial loop; by hall in excitement. recycling that organic matter, they pass it “It seemed so logical and easy. Shells had been self-assem- on to larger animals and prevent it from bling, manufacturing amazing materials for 500 million years,” dropping out of the marine food web. she says. But quantifying the importance of bac- Belcher received her PhD in 1997 and came to MIT in 2002. teria in the microbial loop has been dif- She won a MacArthur “Genius” award in 2004 and was named ficult, because creating a realistic microen- Researcher of the Year by Scientific American in 2006. vironment wasn’t possible until recently. Her eureka moment has launched a new chapter in bioengi- “You can hope to study an organ- neering; it has led to the development of smart new nanomateri- ism’s behavior only in the context of its als, essential to advances in optics and electronics. environment. The habitat of a bacterium, on the other hand, is extremely small, With MIT colleagues Paula Hammond, Bayer Professor of on the order of microns to millimeters,” Chemical Engineering, and Yet-Ming Chiang, professor of mate- said Stocker. “This has made the study of rials science and engineering, Belcher grew the first biologically PHOTO / DONNA COVENEY microbial behavior a formidable technical based, nanoscale rechargeable battery—the one that may end challenge to date. We have been able to short-lived cell phones. Germeshausen Professor of Material Science and Engineering create realistic environmental landscapes Belcher’s MIT battery is comprised of a virus she and her and Biological Engineering Angela Belcher’s interest in abalone for studying marine bacteria in the lab by colleagues engineered to latch itself to cobalt oxide. It does helped transform battery technology. using microfluidic technology.” P. haloplanktis is a rapid swimmer, pro- pelling itself by a single rotating flagellum in bursts of speed up to 500 body lengths per second (the fastest land animal, the cheetah, travels at bursts of speed up to 30 TUITION body lengths per second). During experi- Continued from Page 1 for undergraduates—what students and families pay after finan- ments, Stocker and team observed that cial aid—has, on average, dropped by more than 15 percent when the bacteria used their rapid motility very Hastings. “Second, MIT meets the full demonstrated financial need adjusted for inflation. effectively to swim toward and follow their of all students we admit. Third, we award all our aid based on need “For those receiving an MIT scholarship, which is six out of food sources. That directed movement in alone; MIT does not award any academic, athletic or other forms of every 10 MIT undergraduates, net tuition is $8,100—an amount response to a chemical gradient (in this merit scholarships.” that approximates the in-state cost of many public universities,” case, nutrients) is known as chemotaxis. Building on this commitment, MIT will increase its financial aid Hastings added. “It will be important to see how wide- budget to $74 million. MIT’s total financial aid budget is one of the MIT has long taken an aggressive position on aid because its spread the use of rapid chemotaxis is in highest per enrolled student in the nation. Sixty percent of MIT students demonstrate a much higher level of need than students the ocean,” said Stocker. “We expect this undergraduates receive scholarship aid from the Institute’s internal at peer institutions. More than 22 percent of MIT undergraduates to depend on the environment; in algal resources. Fully 90 percent of MIT undergraduates receive finan- come from families with annual incomes less than $60,000 a year; blooms, for example, nutrient patches and cial aid of some kind, from a range of sources. While MIT focuses 17 percent come from families with incomes under $45,000. plumes will be abundant, and speedy bac- assistance on those with fewer resources, it also provides aid to Two years ago, the Institute took a leadership role in the nation- teria will be favored. Whenever this is the families with incomes well above $100,000 who demonstrate need— al debate on financial aid when it became the first private university case, nutrients get recycled much more for example, because they have more than one child in college at a to match federal Pell Grants, dollar for dollar, effectively doubling rapidly, making the food web more pro- time. In fact, approximately 38 percent of current MIT scholarship this federal grant for the neediest students. Approximately 14 per- ductive and potentially affecting the rates recipients come from families earning more than $100,000. cent of MIT undergraduates receive a Pell Grant, the largest fed- at which carbon is cycled in the ocean.” Tuition and fees for the upcoming academic year will increase 4 eral grant program for undergraduate education. The National Science Foundation, percent to $36,390; however, this figure represents less than half of “We will continue our longstanding financial commitment to the Department of Energy’s Genomes to what it costs MIT to educate an undergraduate. As Hastings noted, students and their families in the years ahead,” Hastings said. Life Program, the Woods Hole Center for “In a pattern MIT has followed for many years, we are increas- “That we can welcome to our campus such extraordinary students, Ocean and Human Health, and the Gor- ing funds available for financial aid this year at a far greater rate regardless of their economic background, is due to our historic don and Betty Moore Foundation funded than the rise in tuition.” During the past decade, the net tuition dedication to need-based financial aid.” this research. PAGE 4 March 12, 2008 PEOPLE MIT Tech Talk Interview with the dean: Subra Suresh, School of Engineering Over the course of the spring semester, Tech Talk will be bringing readers a series of interviews with each of MIT’s five school deans. The second in this series features Dean Subra Suresh, a former head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE) who took charge of the School of Engineering last summer. In the following interview with Greg Frost and David Chandler of the MIT News Office, Suresh outlines his hopes and dreams for the School of Engineering and the changing face of engineering both at MIT and globally.

It’s admittedly early in your tenure, best practices to mentor them, to nurture Q. but can you give us a sense of your top them, and to provide a supporting environ- short- and long-term goals? ment for their intellectual growth? This is also a strong focus of our strategic planning The School of Engineering at MIT process. A. has been perceived both nationally Are there novel mechanisms through and internationally as the leading engineer- which we should be thinking about provid- ing school. The long-term goal would be ing our students the opportunity for a broad not only to maintain that lead in the face education without necessarily sacrificing of ever-increasing competition, but also to depth? In addition to well-established fields enhance significantly the gap between us of specialization—as, for example, mechani- and peer institutions that compete with us. cal engineering, electrical engineering, In the face of changing intellectual climate computer science—should we explore the of engineering on a global scale, we must possibility of a broader engineering degree make sure that the next wave of engineer- for those who would use it as a foundation ing inventions and innovations—by that I to launch a career in a different field? What mean the way engineering is taught in would be the intellectual content of such academic institutions for both graduate an MIT engineering degree? Would such a and undergraduate students and the way broad first degree in engineering enhance engineering innovations impact industrial the appeal of science and engineering in practice and society—nucleates here. For society? example, engineering science was a con- A second near-term and very important cept that started in goal is to significantly MIT’s School of Engi- increase the propor- neering, and now it is tion of women and followed all over the underrepresented world. The goal is to ❞ minority groups in provide opportunities As a leading engineering faculty and student that enhance excel- ranks. lence in education, school ... we have not A third item is research and innova- that individual faculty tion. only an opportunity but members at MIT in As a leading engi- general, and at the neering school, I also an obligation and a School of Engineer- would say that we responsibility to lead ing in particular, have have not only an been extremely suc- opportunity but also the profession. cessful in engaging an obligation and a globally in education- responsibility to lead Subra Suresh al and research activ- the profession. ities. There are a few The pace of intel- examples where MIT lectual change in has centrally created engineering has been very rapid, and opportunities for faculty and students. So multidisciplinary view of education and one of the things we’ve started to do for research has grown significantly within the near term is to develop a strategic plan the past decade. Historically, engineering for the school, with respect to international has emerged from the intellectual founda- and global engagement. We have a faculty tions of physics, chemistry and mathemat- director of international programs for the ics. But more recently biology has become school who is working very closely with the an important part of that intellectual core. Institute committees to chart the course for Economics, management and humanities, international engagement in a coordinated as well as communication skills, engineer- manner. ing ethics and teamwork have also become The fourth major goal is to enhance important flavors of that core. We must con- opportunities to translate successes from tinually ask if we are preparing our students scientific discoveries to practice so that the the right way. greatest benefits to society are realized as Any faculty member at MIT has the quickly as possible. MIT and the School of opportunity to work across departmental Engineering have done remarkably well in boundaries within the school and across creating an ecosystem to translate funda- school boundaries within the Institute as far mental research into practice. One recent as multidisciplinary research is concerned. initiative we have put in place involves We must ensure that administrative and internationalization of the best practices of organizational barriers are minimized or the Deshpande Center. This is a program, eliminated to develop educational and intel- known as I-cubed, International Innovation lectual activities across schools. The time Initiative, that we launched several months constant for organizational change in aca- ago. This is expected to create new oppor- demia is much longer than the time con- tunities for MIT faculty to translate research stant for the evolution of a new intellectual into practice on a global scale by bringing discipline. One of the key things that we are the best practices of the Deshpande Center focusing on is how to make the intraschool in our international collaborations. and interschool organizational structures more nimble. For example, with respect to Within the broad range of engineering teaching, is there duplication of subjects? Q. disciplines, are there particular areas With respect to research, with respect MIT needs to increase its emphasis? At the PHOTO / DONNA COVENEY to recruitment of junior faculty whose same time, are there areas that are impor- School of Engineering Dean Subra Suresh discusses the future of engineering, both at MIT and around the world. research interest may lie in more than one tant now but may be less so in coming years? department, we want to make it easier to ability are two major areas of intellectual gram with research activities in the areas of work effectively across organizational silos. Broadly, there are areas within engi- pursuit with significant implications for the water, environment and sensing technology. We know that there are growing numbers A. neering that play a major role in inter- global society. In fact, I was very pleased to This is the CENSAM Program, a research Suresh named of faculty who join MIT with more than one disciplinary activities at the Institute. For see the Schools of Engineering and Science component of the Singapore-MIT Alliance one of 34 academic field of interest, and with activi- example, the MIT Energy Initiative. In the partner with the MIT Energy Initiative in for Research and Technology Centre (or fellows for ties in more than one department. So this latest round of seed funding, approximate- the first round of seed funding for research SMART Centre). is going to be a very challenging task, but ly 70 percent of the seed funding went to into energy. We also jointly supported the A third important area for us lies at the the Materials a very important task for us to examine and the School of Engineering—not by design; creation of several broad subjects on energy intersection of engineering and life sciences. Research refine. that’s just how it evolved. That’s very impor- taught across our two schools. There are a number of activities there Society. Given the blurring of disciplinary bound- tant because we have a lot of strength in I don’t think we can separate the envi- where the School of Engineering plays an See Awards & aries, we need to develop a system that not only fundamental research but also in ronment from the energy discussion. More active role—I will mention four of them. The Honors, page 2 continues to attract the best faculty and stu- applying the fundamental research to prac- than 12 faculty members from the School of first is that the Koch Institute for Integra- dents. How do we continually improve our tice, and energy and environmental sustain- Engineering are participating in a new pro- tive Cancer Research was launched recent- MIT Tech Talk PEOPLE March 12, 2008 PAGE 5

done solely in Cambridge, Mass. Bernard Gordon Program for Educational A final example is a virtual activity in Leadership with a $20 million commitment microbiology that just started a new PhD for support from MIT alumnus Bernie Gor- program, that has roughly half of the faculty don over a 10-year period. And the purpose involved from biology and the School of Sci- of the program is exactly what you just ence, and the other half from several depart- mentioned, which is to provide our under- Interview with the dean: ments in the School of Engineering. We graduate students an opportunity for much have supported that program with fellow- greater hands-on experience, for learning ships. It is my understanding that for next through teamwork and for leadership train- fall, there is a large number of applicants ing. In an increasingly virtual, software-con- for that program. That brings me to another trolled world, the real hardcore, hands-on very important point and experience in engineering priority for the school to should not be overlooked, engage very actively with SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING and one of the purposes of Subra Suresh, School of Engineering other schools, much more this program is to create so than we’ve done in the BY THE much greater opportuni- Over the course of the spring semester, Tech Talk will be bringing readers a series of interviews with each of MIT’s five school deans. The second in this series features Dean Subra Suresh, a former head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering past. The Dean of Science ties for our students to (DMSE) who took charge of the School of Engineering last summer. In the following interview with Greg Frost and David Chandler of the MIT News Office, Suresh outlines his hopes and dreams for the School of Engineering and the changing face of engineering and I have been meeting NUMBERS experiment, explore and to both at MIT and globally. almost once a week, ever learn by working with real since both of us became systems and components. deans, to facilitate this • ’07-’08 undergraduate The challenge there is the inter-school interaction. enrollment: 1,803 scale. I mean, having a lab We’ve also started expand- for a thousand students is ing formal interactions and • ’07-’08 graduate not that easy, but we want collaborations with other enrollment: 2,740 every undergraduate stu- schools. So Dean Santos dent to have that experi- of the School of Architec- • ’07-’08 faculty ence some day. ture and Planning and I includes 255 have been talking about professors, 71 As a follow-up ques- priorities in such areas Q. tion, is MIT doing as transportation and associate professors this because it worries that energy, and about captur- and 46 assistant incoming students aren’t ing and showcasing MIT’s as comfortable doing the excellence in the arena of professors kind of hands-on work as, innovation and invention say, previous generations of in a visible manner across MIT students? the Institute. Working with the School of Architecture and the MIT Museum, we are Great question. EECS has done this exploring ways of highlighting the excite- A. for their freshmen, but there are also ment of activities facilitated by the Desh- other examples of this. About eight years pande Center, Lemelson-MIT Program, ago, the Department of Aeronautics and various student prize programs and I-cubed Astronautics revamped its undergraduate in various prominent locations across the curriculum. So they have a unified under- institute. That’s the mid-term goal. Similarly, graduate curriculum that combines learn- the dean of the School of Humanities, Arts, ing with practical experience through and Social Sciences, Dean Fitzgerald, and experimentation, design and teamwork. I have plans for several interschool activi- The other example is in the Department of ties in new and emerging interdisciplinary Materials Science and Engineering, where areas, from the viewpoints of both teaching we built modern undergraduate teach- and research. ing labs along the . In the An example of a successful joint activ- sophomore year, we have a curriculum now ity with the Sloan School of Management where the students not only take lectures involves the joint executive education pro- but also work in coordinated labs. That gram offered for British Petroleum. We meant creating new labs that did not exist have BP Academy and BP Projects Acade- and also required that we change our teach- my, which are joint activities between Sloan ing assignment. Across many departments and the School of Engineering, and we want in the school, colleagues feel that such to expand and enhance such activities in the experiences are very important in under- coming year through our professional edu- graduate education. cational program. Another goal would be to There is a broad sentiment across the engage with the Innovation Center and the school that we cannot get away from real Entrepreneurship Center of Sloan School hands-on experience for engineering educa- with I-cubed in the School of Engineering. tion. It requires a lot of resources, so I think One other mid-term goal is to develop inno- it needs to be done carefully. vative mechanisms to engage a broader cross-section of faculty within the school in Looking ahead, how important do you leadership roles in new and exciting initia- Q. see engineering education being to a tives. We have many wonderful, mid-career country’s competitiveness in an increasingly faculty, who have a lot of energy and very interconnected world? good ideas, and they really care about MIT. So in the last few months we’ve encouraged This is going to be the century of mid-career faculty to meet together and A. technology, more so than the previ- come up with ideas for innovative initiatives ous century. The engineers trained by insti- within the school, and we are exploring tutions such as MIT will not only have many mechanisms to support these ideas. more career changes than their parents or grandparents did, but What is the they are also likely to Q. most surprising live and work abroad thing you’ve run across ❞ more frequently than thus far in your lead- In an increasingly virtual, the previous gen- ership of the School of erations of engineers Engineering? software-controlled world, did. I believe that it is the real hardcore, extremely important I’ve been a stu- for MIT’s School of A. dent at MIT. hands-on experience Engineering to help I’ve been a faculty train outstanding member at MIT for 15 should not be overlooked. engineers and global years. I’m also an MIT citizens whose tech- parent. I’ve looked at Subra Suresh nological prowess MIT from very differ- and leadership skills ent angles, and I was helps solve complex also a professor at another institution for 10 global problems. Such engineers, scientists, years before returning to MIT. The excel- technologists and innovators will hold the lence of the School of Engineering is not a key to our country’s competitive edge in an PHOTO / DONNA COVENEY surprise to me. But the breadth and depth of increasingly interconnected global econo- School of Engineering Dean Subra Suresh discusses the future of engineering, both at MIT and around the world. that excellence—seeing it from this office— my. Major American corporations such as has been a very pleasant surprise. I’ve seen IBM, General Electric, Microsoft or Google ly, and the School of Engineering will have the large interdisciplinary research groups it on all levels, from the senior-most to the have large research centers abroad in places 12 faculty members set up their research in the area of infectious disease. Just like junior-most faculty member, among under- like Bangalore and Shanghai. As an intellec- Suresh named laboratories in the new building for which CENSAM, there is an infectious disease graduate and graduate students, and among tual leader, knowledge creator and educa- one of 34 groundbreaking ceremonies were held last program of the SMART Centre, through technical and support staff. tional and research innovator, the School of fellows for week. The new Department of Biological which a number of faculty members from Engineering at MIT is a key player in this Engineering came into existence last year, the School of Engineering work closely What do you see in the future in terms global engineering enterprise. As greater the Materials and the first batch of undergraduate stu- with colleagues from biology and from Q. of the degree to which engineering edu- numbers of engineers are produced in rap- Research dents will receive their degrees this June. our partner institutions abroad. There are cation involves real hands-on work—actually idly growing economies with large popula- Society. This department is redefining the intel- four major diseases that are being studied: building things or working in a lab as opposed tions, role models such as MIT’s School See Awards & lectual landscape of intersections between tuberculosis, avian flu, malaria and respira- to sitting at a computer screen? of Engineering are also very much sought Honors, page 2 quantitative engineering science and biol- tory syncytial virus. These strategic global after for advice and input, and for develop- ogy with implications for human health. A alliances give us a unique opportunity to A few months ago, we established a ing high standards that the international third example of this engagement is one of undertake research beyond what can be A. new program in the school called the community can be proud of. PAGE 6 March 12, 2008 RESEARCH MIT Tech Talk Science journalism: bright future ahead David Chandler News Office

“There’s never been a better time to become a journalist,” declared Dianne Lynch, dean of the Park School of Communications at Ithaca College, in her talk at a two-day MIT Knight Science Journalism Fellow- ships symposium held Feb. 18-20 on the future of science journalism. Some people might have thought otherwise, given the spate of reports recently about the falling circulation and revenues of newspapers and the resulting staff layoffs and buyouts. But those problems have nothing to do with journalism itself, Lynch said, but only with “the demise of a busi- ness model” that’s based on “an out- PHOTO / WILLIAM LITANT dated delivery system.” Flight out of the past The news business is changing fast, but it’s not going away. In fact, Senior Technical Instructor Dick Perdichizzi prepares a life-size model of a prehistoric four-winged bird-like creature for testing in more people than ever are reading Aero-Astro’s Wright Brothers Wind Tunnel. The model is conjectured on fossils discovered in China. Aerodynamicists and paleontolo- about science and technology, but gists from the United States and China, along with a crew from the PBS ‘Nova’ program, descended on the MIT facility last summer, just doing it in different ways—for experimenting with the articulated model to see if and how it might have flown. The resulting program, ‘The Four-Winged Dinosaur,’ the most part, online instead of in tra- first aired Feb. 26. ditional, printed newspapers, Lynch explained. The symposium, held to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the MIT fel- lowship program that has become On a ‘roll’: MIT researchers the leading professional program for mid-career science journalists, drew 192 ex-Knight fellows (or Bush fel- lows, as the program was known in its initial years) and other journalists devise new cell-sorting system from around the country and several other nations. Process could yield low-cost tool for diagnosing cancer, other diseases The event also marked another milestone, the impending retirement David Chandler of the program’s director, Boyce News Office Rensberger, after 10 years. He will Nobody has ever done❞ anything like this before. be replaced in June by Philip Hilts, who teaches science journalism at Capitalizing on a cell’s ability to roll along Rohit Karnik, assistant professor of mechanical engineering . The program was a surface, MIT researchers have developed founded by Victor McElheny in 1983. a simple, inexpensive system to sort dif- MIT President Susan Hockfield ferent kinds of cells—a process that could opened the meeting by stressing the result in low-cost tools to test for diseases to do several steps,” Karnik said. With the The work was a collaboration between importance of good science commu- such as cancer, even in remote locations. new system, “you can sort cells in a very Karnik and six other researchers: MIT Rohit Karnik, an MIT assistant professor simple way, without processing.” Institute Professor Robert Langer, Jeffrey nications in this era when people are of mechanical engineering and lead author Now that the basic principle has been Karp of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health constantly faced with increasingly of a paper on the new finding appearing last harnessed in the lab, Karnik estimates it Sciences and Technology, Seungpyo Hong, complex scientific and technical week in the journal Nano Letters, said the may take up to two years to develop into a Ying Mei and Huanan Zhang of MIT’s issues. “We need to help the public cell-sorting method was minimally invasive standard device that could be used for labo- Department of Chemical Engineering, and make decisions based on fact, not and highly innovative. ratory research purposes. Because of the Daniel Anderson of the Center for Cancer fear,” she said. “Without incisive, “It’s a new discovery,” he said. “Nobody need for extensive testing, development of Research. nuanced writing, we at MIT might as has ever done anything like this before.” a device for clinical use could take between The work was funded by a grant from well fold up our solar collectors and The method relies on the way cells five and 10 years, he estimated. the National Institutes of Health. go home.” sometimes interact with a surface (such as The role of journalists is chang- the wall of a blood vessel) by rolling along ing in this evolving media landscape, it. In the new device, a surface is coated said Tom Rosenstiel, director of the with lines of a material that interacts with Project for Excellence in Journal- the cells, making it seem sticky to specific ism. While their role has often been types of cells. The sticky lines are orient- described as that of gatekeepers, ed diagonally to the flow of cell-containing the more appropriate role is now fluid passing over the surface, so as certain that of authenticator—helping read- kinds of cells respond to the coating they ers figure out, from the vast array of are nudged to one side, allowing them to be sources of information now available, separated out. what can be believed and trusted and Cancer cells, for example, can be sepa- “where the good stuff is.” Comparing rated from normal cells by this method, science to sports, he said the jour- which could ultimately lead to a simple nalist’s role is evolving from that of device for cancer screening. Stem cells also color commentator to being a referee exhibit the same kind of selective response, on the field. so such devices could eventually be used in But as much as the means of dis- research labs to concentrate these cells for tribution may change and business further study. models may need to shift accord- Normally, it takes an array of lab equip- ingly, people’s interest in reading ment and several separate steps to achieve authoritative reporting has not this kind of separation of cells. This can make such methods impractical for wide- diminished, Rosenstiel said. “The spread screening of blood samples in the problem is not a demand problem,” field, especially in remote areas. “Our sys- he said. For example, “more people tem is tailor-made for analysis of blood,” actually read what comes out of The Karnik said. In addition, some kinds of cells, New York Times newsroom” than including stem cells, are very sensitive to ever before. Although we are now external conditions, so this system could in a period of transition in terms of allow them to be concentrated with much how people receive their news and PHOTO / DONNA COVENEY less damage than with conventional multi- information, “things will work out,” stage lab techniques. Professor Rohit Karnik works in the lab with the new method for cell separation that he, he predicted. “There’s a golden age “If you’re out in the field and you want to Institute Professor Robert Langer and other colleagues have developed. It involves steering of science journalism ahead.” diagnose something, you don’t want to have rolling cells and could lead to devices for rapidly detecting diseases. MIT Tech Talk NEWS March 12, 2008 PAGE 7

DIGITALK: Where IT’s at A flair for computer repairs IS&T’s Walk-In Help and Service Center in Building N42 han- dles computer repairs, consulting and troubleshooting. With cross- trained staff and a simplified pricing structure, this single “front door” at 211 Massachusetts Ave. makes it easy for community members to get expert diagnosis and help. You don’t need to know whether your computer problems are caused by a hardware mal- function, corrupted operating system, virus—or a combination of factors. Call the Computing Help Desk at 617-253-1101 to talk to a consultant before bring- ing your computer to N42. Depending on the nature of the problem, this phone call may save you the trip. If not, you can make an appointment for an in-person consulta- tion or a drop-off. There is no charge for the first 15 to 30 minutes you spend with a consultant. If the problem has not been resolved in that time, you can choose to leave your machine for repair. At this point, you will be charged $60 an hour for any soft- ware repair or nonwarranty hardware repair plus the cost of any parts. There is no charge for work on hardware under warranty. For more information, see http://web.mit.edu/ist/helpdesk.

PHOTO / DONNA COVENEY MIT GeoWeb The MacVicar teachings awards were announced and celebrated at a gathering at Gray MIT GeoWeb, a new interface to the MIT Geodata Repository, enables users to House on Friday evening. Gathered to celebrate were, from left, Dean for Undergraduate access Geographic Information Systems (GIS) data, once accessible only in ArcGIS, Education Daniel E. Hastings; Provost Raphael L.. Reif; Sanjay E. Sarma, associate profes- through a standard web browser. sor of mechanical engineering; Tania Baker, professor of biology; President Susan Hockfield; The web interface lets users search, view and download GIS data and metadata Barton Zwiebach, professor of physics; Stephen James Tapscott, professor of literature; from the MIT Geodata Repository, an international collection of GIS data maintained and W. Craig Carter, professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. by MIT GIS Services, which is jointly sponsored by the MIT Libraries, IS&T and the Office of Educational Innovation and Technology. Users will find data in the MIT sys- tem not freely available on the web or in Google Earth, and can download, manipu- late and analyze data in whatever system they choose. MIT certificates are required Wieman: To lecture is for access. To learn more and see a video tutorial, go to http://web.mit.edu/geoweb. Options for unwanted cell phones human, to engage divine Many options are available for reuse or disposal of cell phones that are old or that you no longer need. If your phone is from one of MIT’s preferred vendors—Sprint/ Nextel or Verizon Wireless—find out if anyone else in your department can use a Alumnus and Nobel that he realized that something was going cell phone from that vendor. If so, you can have your phone number removed from wrong for undergraduate science students. the device and the service provider can assign a new one. If you don’t find a taker, winner leads celebration At the same time, students who entered your administrative officer may want to keep the deactivated phone to serve as a physics graduate programs were miracu- backup for a lost or broken phone, or to give to a staff member in the future. of MacVicar Day lously transformed—from largely the same If you can’t identify a business need for your unwanted cell phone, consider donat- launching point as their nonscience class- ing it. There are several donation programs that are linked to charities, or which mates—into expert physicists. recycle mobile devices in an environmentally responsible way. To learn about these Deborah Halber How did this happen? Wieman started programs, go to http://web.mit.edu/ist/topics/telecommunications/disposal.html. News Office Correspondent looking to the increasing body of class- room-based studies, brain function investi- New phone and network proxy charges gation and cognitive psychology research Beginning in fiscal year 2008, most telephone and network services at MIT are for an answer. As a young professor, Carl E. Wieman being billed on a new proxy pricing methodology. Departments, labs and centers SB ’73 figured it would be easy to get his He found that a dismal retention rate— only 10 percent of students correctly (DLCs) are no longer receiving individual charges for IP addresses, analog or ISDN students as excited about physics as he telephones, long-distance and international calling and Tether. was. He would simply explain the subject, recalled a nonobvious fact 15 minutes after they heard it in a lecture—was “exactly Instead, IS&T and the Office of Budget Operations now determine a DLC’s cost for and students would see it with the same these services based on a proxy count of full-time employees multiplied by the rate per sterling clarity he did. what you would expect,” he said. Because our short-term memory is very limited, proxy. To ensure that no DLC is adversely affected by the change in pricing methodol- It didn’t work. ogy, the Office of Budget Operations is working with the assistant deans in each school “For many years, it was a frustrating puz- it’s not surprising to brain researchers that most students have only “a vague sense” of to make budget adjustments as needed. zle to me” that students left the classroom The annual proxy rate for FY08 is $1,275. This rate includes a 10 percent price as baffled—sometimes more baffled—than what a lecture was about immediately after hearing it. increase, which DLCs are expected to absorb. Telephone and network rates have not when they came in, said Wieman, a 2001 increased since fiscal year 2004 and, in fact, decreased by 15 percent in fiscal year recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics for Within the context of brain research, the inability of students to change their mode 2006, despite significant increases in infrastructure-related costs during this time. his work on Bose-Einstein condensation. If you have questions about the new telephone and network rates, contact Angie As part of MacVicar Day 2008, an annu- of thinking from novice to expert also was not surprising, he said. Becoming an expert Milonas at [email protected] or John Donnelly at [email protected]. al MIT celebration of undergraduate educa- Digitalk is compiled by Information Services & Technology. tion, Wieman spoke March 7 about “Sci- changes the brain physically to include an ence Education in the 21st Century: Using organizational structure that allows retriev- the Tools of Science to Teach Science.” al and deployment of knowledge; simply Spending less time reciting textbook delivering expert knowledge to students VALERE NOVARINA AT MIT facts, and more time actively engaging stu- does not make them experts. dents with the same kind of puzzles and Wieman found that graduate students, THE SPECTACLE OF THE ACTOR AT WORK: by working with an expert tutor, learn by challenges that intrigue experts, goes a developing their own understanding. An long way toward boosting student motiva- AN EVENING OF LIVE THEATER expert individual tutor can have a large tion and achievement, Wieman said. “Lec- impact on even large lecture classes by tures listened to passively are completely focusing on motivation, he said. “The goal is With the participation of: worthless,” he said. “They’ll probably get to convince students that physics is impor- Valère Novarina (dramatist, France) the material better reading the text on their tant and fascinating; probe where they are own. Use classroom time for making sure starting from, get them to actively process Dominique Pinon (actor, France) students are prepared to learn, for process- ideas and then probe and guide their think- ing concepts and deeper understanding.” ing,” he said. Posing questions instead of Hilario Saavedra (actor, U.S.A.) This year’s MacVicar Faculty Fellows, imparting information; getting students announced at a reception hosted by Presi- to explain material to the professor and to dent Susan Hockfield following Wieman’s each other; and allowing students to make talk, are Tania Baker, professor of biology; mistakes and correct them on their own all W. Craig Carter, professor of materials sci- result in dramatic improvements in reten- ence and engineering; Sanjay E. Sarma, tion and conceptual understanding, he said. associate professor of mechanical engi- Technology such as personal response neering; Stephen J. Tapscott, professor of clickers can enhance engagement and pro- literature; and Barton Zwiebach, professor vide instant feedback on what students do of physics. and don’t understand. Wieman, who founded and directs the “You can’t assume they’re interested in Carl Wieman Science Education Initia- (the subject matter), but if you can make tive at the University of British Columbia them interested in it, they’ll learn it a lot Valère Novarina (http://www.cwsei.ubc.ca), said that “enor- better,” he said. “Think about every ques- mous global-scale issues,” such as global tion you pose: Is it obvious why someone warming, require a scientifically literate would care about that answer besides a DOCUMENTARY FILM SCREENING population. Yet science educators are fail- physics professor posing it on a test?” ing to turn out students—aside from the 1 ON NOVARINA: percent who go on to scientific careers— Monday, March 17, 7 p.m. Room 32-155 (Stata Building) capable of “thinking about and using sci- CLASSIFIED ADS ence like a scientist,” he said. Wieman’s undergraduate experience at Members of the MIT community may submit MIT was unorthodox: he pursued his own one ad each issue. Ads should be 30 words LIVE STAGE PERFORMANCE IN research in Lester Wolf Professor Daniel maximum; they will be edited. Submit by e-mail to [email protected] or mail to Classifieds, Kleppner’s group and “spent countless Rm 11-400. Deadline is noon Wednesday the ENGLISH AND FRENCH: hours” discussing physics with graduate week before ­publication. Tuesday, March 18, 7:30 p.m. Killian Hall (14W-111) students and postdocs, including David E. Pritchard, now Cecil and Ida Green Profes- sor of Physics, but managed to take few FOR SALE These events are sponsored by the formal classes. Yamaha Motif ES8 music production synthesiz- MIT Foreign Languages and Literatures Section and the It was when Wieman first starting teach- er for sale, like new – not used. $1,800 or BO. MIT Contemporary French Studies Fund, with the cooperation of the ing physics at the University of Michigan Contact 978-263-4420 or kushkuley@gmail. French Cultural Services of Boston, Massachusetts com. and later at the University of Colorado PAGE 8 March 12, 2008 NEWS MIT Tech Talk

IMAGE / ELLENZWEIG ARCHITECTURE | PLANNING An artist’s rendering of the new David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT, as it would be seen at dusk. Groundbreaking research MIT kicks off construction of the new Koch Institute Anne Trafton this disease altogether,” Hockfield said. News Office The Koch Institute will be equipped with the most sophisticated research tools currently available, including facilities for bioinformatics and computing, MIT broke ground on Friday for the new David H. genomics, proteomics and flow cytometry, large-scale Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, a facil- cell and animal facilities for genetic engineering and ity that its director, Tyler Jacks, said will usher in “the testing, advanced imaging equipment and nanomate- next generation in cancer research.” rials characterization labs. The state-of-the-art institute, scheduled to open in National Cancer Institute Director John Niederhu- December 2010, will house 25 laboratories occupied ber said the new facility will set the “gold standard” by MIT engineers, scientists and clinicians for research on cancer and other diseases. working together toward a common goal— “This is not only an historic moment for creating better ways to detect, prevent and MIT, but also for the nation’s very impor- tant cancer center program,” Niederhuber cure cancer. ❞ PHOTO / JUSTIN KNIGHT “The challenges of cancer are immense, This said. “What you are beginning today is a and the solution to the problem does not new era in how we approach and study the From left, Koch Institute Director Tyler Jacks and David H. Koch listen lie in a single field of study,” Jacks said dur- occasion processes that lead to disease.” during the groundbreaking ceremony. ing the groundbreaking luncheon. “Only by The new institute will replace and build working together can we prevail.” is one I on the work of MIT’s Center for Cancer The institute will be largely funded by a Research, which was established in 1974, Professors detail research pursuits $100 million donation from David H. Koch have long shortly after the federal government Dozens of journalists from national and international publications SB ’62, SM ’63. Koch, who was diagnosed waited for. declared a “war on cancer.” Hockfield said attended a special media briefing Thursday, March 6, in which several with prostate cancer 16 years ago and given that much progress has been made since MIT faculty members discussed research they will pursue at the new only a short time to live, said he became a David H. Koch then, but more is needed. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. “passionate crusader” for cancer research “This is a moment to invest in a decisive “Cancer remains a devastating problem and a major health issue, and after beating the disease himself. change,” she said. we at MIT want to do something about it,” Tyler Jacks, director of the “This occasion is one I have long waited for,” Koch Several Cambridge city officials, including Mayor Koch Institute, said in his opening remarks. said Friday. “The synergy between these two groups Denise Simmons, attended the groundbreaking. Sim- The daylong event at the featured discussions of topics (scientists and engineers) will be very powerful and mons thanked MIT administrators and faculty for such as why some cancer drugs fail, nanotechnology, cellular pathways in accelerate the development of cures. I’m very hopeful “stepping up to the plate” to fight cancer. cancer cells and the immune system’s response to cancer. that by the time my children grow up, such cures will “We wait with bated breath to learn about your Robert Weinberg, professor of biology, explained current theories of be available.” advancements,” she said. how cancer spreads through the body, a process known as metastasis. Koch, who received a stand- Researchers believe that metastasis, which causes 90 percent of cancer ing ovation after his remarks, deaths, occurs when cancer cells regain the embryonic ability to move said that having the cancer through the body. institute named for him is the Sangeeta Bhatia, associate professor of health sciences and technol- greatest honor he has ever ogy and electrical engineering and computer science, described efforts to received. “This is a day I will build nanoscale devices that could detect, monitor and treat cancer. always remember,” he said. Institute Professor Robert Langer discussed his laboratory’s work on The new institute will be nanodevices, and Institute Professor Phillip Sharp described advances in built on the corner of Main RNA interference, which could be used to silence genes that cause cancer. and Ames streets, across from the Broad and White- Other presenters were Frank Gertler, the Ross Scholar Professor head institutes. That location of Biology; Michael Hemann, the Latham Family Career Development puts it directly in the center Assistant Professor of Biology; David Housman, the Ludwig Professor of the science and engineer- of Biology; Angela Belcher, the Germeshausen Professor of Materials ing nexus that includes not Science and Engineering and Biological Engineering; Michael Cima, the only Broad and Whitehead but Sumitomo Electric Industries Professor of Engineering; Nancy Hopkins, MIT’s departments of biologi- the Amgen, Inc. Professor of Biology; Jacqueline Lees, professor of biol- cal and chemical engineering, PHOTO / JUSTIN KNIGHT ogy and associate director of the Koch Institute; Forest White, the Mit- the and Brain and From left, MIT President Susan Hockfield; David H. Koch; Cambridge Mayor sui Career Development Assistant Professor of Biological Engineering; Cognitive Sciences Complex, Denise Simmons; Tyler Jacks, director of the Koch Institute; National Cancer Michael Yaffe, associate professor biology and biological engineering; said MIT President Susan Institute Director John Niederhuber; Provost L. Rafael Reif; Executive Vice Scott Manalis, associate professor of biological and mechanical engineer- Hockfield. President and Treasurer Theresa Stone; Vice President of Institution Affairs ing; Paula Hammond, the Bayer Chair Professor of Chemical Engineer- “The kind of ideas being and Corporation Secretary Kirk Kolenbrander; Vice President of Research and ing; Darrell Irvine, the Eugene Bell Career Development Professor in developed here ... could revo- Associate Provost Claude Canizares; School of Science Dean Mark Kastner; Tissue Engineering; and Dane Wittrup, the Carbon P. Dubbs Professor of lutionize the way we detect School of Engineering Dean Subra Suresh; and Corporation Chairman Dana Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering and associate director of the cancer, the way we treat it, and G. Mead break ground on the new David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Koch Institute. the steps we take to prevent Cancer Research on March 7. — Anne Trafton