In our article about solar power, we already wrote about concentrated solar power (CSP) power plants. In order to function, these plants need a lot of space and sunlight, and researchers at MIT collaborated with RWTH Aachen University in Germany to come up with a design that increases the amount of sunlight its mirrors collect, ... »
MIT engineers have developed a nanoscale biological coating that can halt bleeding nearly instantaneously. Although such materials exist for nearly a decade, their success was in creating an easily portable version where thrombin – a clotting agent found in blood – is coated on sponges. The coating could be easily stored and carried for application ... »
David DeSteno, an associate professor of psychology at Northeastern University, and researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University, are examining how social robots can aid preschoolers in language learning. In order to make the learning more fun and interesting for the younger children, the robot prototype used in this project resembles ... »
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have produced something they’re calling an “artificial leaf” – a silicon solar cell with different catalytic materials bonded onto its two sides which enable it to produce oxygen and hydrogen. Once the material is placed under water and illuminated by sunlight, it needs external sources of power ... »
Researchers from MIT combined two innovative algorithms developed there to build a new robotic motion-planning system that calculates much more efficient trajectories through free space. Although such tasks seem intuitive and simple to us, most of the existing path finding algorithms rely to collision avoiding rather than finding more efficient paths between the robot’s initial ... »
MIT researchers have combined a simple physical interface with computer-vision algorithms to create GelSight – a portable imaging system that can achieve resolutions previously possible only with large and expensive lab equipment. The device could provide manufacturers with a way to inspect products too large to fit under a microscope and it shows potential for ... »
Currently, nuclear powerplant inspectors use indirect methods to monitor buried piping by generating a voltage gradient to identify areas where pipe coatings may have corroded, and by using ultrasonic waves to screen lengths of pipe for cracks. A team of researchers from MIT is developing small, egg-sized robots designed to inspect nuclear reactor underground pipes ... »
