[Editors] MIT Research Digest, April 2007

[Elizabeth Thomson]

MIT News Office
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Room 11-400
77 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA  02139-4307
Phone: 617-253-2700
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/www

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MIT Research Digest, April 2007
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For Immediate Release
MONDAY, APR. 2, 2007
Contact: Elizabeth A. Thomson, MIT News Office
Phone: 617-258-5402
Email: thomson at mit.edu

A monthly tip-sheet for journalists of recent research advances
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Latest research news: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/research.html
RSS -- research feed: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/mitresearch-rss.xml

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IN THIS ISSUE: Science Festival * Toward Clean Water, More
Molecular Screen * Cell Squeeze * Eelgrass * Cancer Clue
Robotic Brace * Nuclear Fuel Supply * Vitamin Mystery: Solved
Interplanetary Supply Chain * Super-Strong Suture * Pay Attention!
Modeling Microbes * Pulsing Light & Neurons * Turbulent Tangle
Congressional Kudos * Future of Coal
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SCIENCE FESTIVAL
For nine days this month, the streets of Cambridge, Massachusetts 
will come alive in a first-of-its-kind celebration of science and 
technology.  The Cambridge Science Festival, presented by the MIT 
Museum, will take place April 21-29, 2007 and will highlight the 
excitement of discovery and the impact of science in all of our 
lives. The festival will feature over 150 events throughout the city, 
including many at MIT, that will showcase scientific discovery in the 
region. For a complete list of events and more information, go to the 
URL below.
MORE: http://www.cambridgesciencefestival.org/.

TOWARD CLEAN WATER, MORE
An MIT engineer working toward clean drinking water in Nepal 
describes in a recent issue of the Journal of International 
Development how people from developed and developing countries can 
work together to solve key humanitarian problems, ultimately meeting 
the basic human needs for security, broadly defined. Such a 
collaboration "begins with a relationship among partners in the 
global village, taking into consideration the specific conditions of 
the local culture, environment and location," said Susan Murcott, a 
senior lecturer in MIT's Department of Civil and Environmental 
Engineering. Murcott has personal experience of a global engineering 
partnership of this kind--she calls it "co-evolutionary engineering 
design"-through her work in developing countries. She and MIT 
students have worked for years with citizens of Nepal and, since 
2005, of Ghana, to design, test and distribute inexpensive household 
water filters that simultaneously remove arsenic and microbial 
contamination from the available water supply.
PHOTOS, VIDEO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/nepal-water.html

MOLECULAR SCREEN
MIT researchers have created an inexpensive method to screen for 
millions of different biomolecules (DNA, proteins, etc.) in a single 
sample--a technology that could make possible the development of 
low-cost clinical bedside diagnostics. The work, based on tiny 
customizable particles, could also be used for disease monitoring, 
drug discovery or genetic profiling. Even though the particles are 
thinner than the width of a human hair, each is equipped with a 
barcoded ID and one or more probe regions that turn fluorescent when 
they detect specific targets in a test sample. Using a new, extremely 
versatile technique, the researchers can produce a "virtually 
unlimited" array of particles to test for DNA, RNA, proteins and 
other biomolecules. The work, led by Professor Patrick Doyle of 
chemical engineering, appeared in a March issue of Science. The 
research was funded by the NSF and the Dumbros Fellowship.
PHOTO, GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/particles.html

CELL SQUEEZE
Millions of times during their four-month lifespan, human red blood 
cells must squeeze through tiny capillaries to deliver their payload 
of oxygen and pick up waste carbon dioxide--functions essential to 
life. Now, for the first time, MIT researchers have developed a 
dynamic, molecular-level model that describes how the cells deform 
their normal disc shape to pass through vessels that are often much 
narrower than the cells themselves.  Blood cells must rearrange 
components of their internal scaffolding (so-called cytoskeleton), 
allowing the cells to become almost liquid-like, in order to squeeze 
through the narrowest capillaries found in the body, the researchers 
report in a paper published in the March 12 online edition of the 
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Studying the 
mechanics of how a blood cell can transform from a soft object to an 
almost fluid-like state will help researchers better understand 
several types of blood disorders, said Subra Suresh, senior author of 
the paper and the Ford Professor of Engineering with joint 
appointments in materials science and engineering, biological 
engineering, mechanical engineering and health sciences and 
technology. The research was funded by the NIH.
PHOTOS, GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/blood.html

EELGRASS
A project led by MIT Sea Grant to bring a special plant back to 
Boston-area harbors is also giving students in Massachusetts and 
Rhode Island a hands-on education in the importance of healthy marine 
ecosystems. Eelgrass--a delicate, flowering marine plant--is a 
primary source of food for many plants and animals, as well as a 
critical nursery and shelter for shellfish and finfish. In short, 
eelgrass is extraordinarily useful in maintaining healthy marine 
ecosystems. Once abundant in New England waters, this species of 
plant was largely wiped out in the region in the 1930s due to a 
wasting disease. For decades, coastal development and pollution made 
the restoration of these grasses all but impossible. However, 
improved water quality in Massachusetts' coastal waters is now giving 
eelgrass a second chance. And this, in turn, has given middle and 
high school students the chance to get involved with bringing 
eelgrass back. Since 2004, MIT Sea Grant has been engaging public 
school students in hands-on learning, with classes growing eelgrass 
in recirculating aquaculture systems. The project was developed in 
collaboration with the Massachusetts Office of Coastal Zone 
Management.
PHOTOS AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/eelgrass.html

CANCER CLUE
MIT researchers have identified how a missing protein causes tissue 
to become precancerous--a finding that could help doctors identify 
patients at high risk to develop tumors. Most breast and prostate 
tumors are missing the protein, known as 14-3-3 sigma, but until now 
it has not been clear what role it plays in tumor growth. The MIT 
researchers report in the March 15 issue of Nature that when the 
protein is knocked down, dividing cells fail to separate fully and 
become precancerous. "The cells try to divide and try to divide, and 
they just give up. They can't finish cytokinesis (the final stages of 
cell division)," said Michael Yaffe, associate professor of biology 
and biological engineering and leader of the research team. Failing 
to divide completely, the cells recombine into a single cell with two 
nuclei. Such fused, or binucleate, cells have recently been shown to 
be precursors to cancer cells. The research was funded by the Anna 
Fuller Fund, the NIH, the European Molecular Biology Organization, 
the David H. Koch Cancer Research Fund, and a Burroughs-Wellcome 
Career Development Award.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/tumorigenesis.html

ROBOTIC BRACE
At age 32, Maggie Fermental suffered a stroke that left her right 
side paralyzed. After a year and a half of conventional therapy with 
minimal results, she tried a new kind of robotic therapy developed by 
MIT engineers. A study in the April 2007 issue of the American 
Journal of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation shows that the device, 
which helped Fermental, also had positive results for five other 
severe stroke patients in a pilot clinical trial. The wearable, 
portable, lightweight robotic brace slides onto the arm. By sensing 
the patient's electrical muscle activity through 
electromyography--which detects muscle cells' electrical activity 
when they contract--and sending that data to a motor, it allows 
stroke patients to control their affected limbs. "This brace will 
allow people who have suffered from neurological trauma to rebuild 
strength, rehabilitate and gain independence," said Woodie Flowers, a 
professor of mechanical engineering at MIT, who led the original 
research team that developed the device. The Boston-based company 
Myomo is developing the device. The initial work was funded by MIT's 
Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation.
PHOTOS AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/brace.html

NUCLEAR FUEL SUPPLY
Limited supplies of fuel for nuclear power plants may thwart the 
renewed and growing interest in nuclear energy in the United States 
and other nations, says an MIT expert on the industry. Over the past 
20 years, safety concerns dampened all aspects of development of 
nuclear energy: No new reactors were ordered and there was investment 
neither in new uranium mines nor in building facilities to produce 
fuel for existing reactors.  Instead, the industry lived off 
commercial and government inventories, which are now nearly gone. 
Worldwide, uranium production meets only about 65 percent of current 
reactor requirements. That shortage of uranium and of processing 
facilities worldwide leaves a gap between the potential increase in 
demand for nuclear energy and the ability to supply fuel for it, said 
Dr. Thomas Neff, a research affiliate at MIT's Center for 
International Studies.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/fuel-supply.html

VITAMIN MYSTERY: SOLVED
Solving a mystery that has puzzled scientists for decades, MIT and 
Harvard researchers have discovered the final piece of the synthesis 
pathway of vitamin B12--the only vitamin synthesized exclusively by 
microorganisms. B12, the most chemically complex of all vitamins, is 
essential for human health. Four Nobel Prizes have been awarded for 
research related to B12, but one fragment of the molecule remained an 
enigma--until now. The researchers report that a single enzyme 
synthesizes the fragment, and they outline a novel reaction mechanism 
that requires cannibalization of another vitamin. The work, which has 
roots in an MIT undergraduate teaching laboratory, "completes a piece 
of our understanding of a process very fundamental to life," said 
Graham Walker, MIT professor of biology and senior author of a paper 
on the work that appeared in the March 22 online edition of Nature. 
The research was funded by the NIH and the Jane Coffin Childs 
Memorial Fund for Medical Research.
PHOTOS, GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/b12.html

INTERPLANETARY SUPPLY CHAIN
If you think shipping freight from Cincinnati to El Paso is 
challenging, imagine trying to deliver an oxygen generation unit from 
the Earth to a remote location on the moon. By 2020, NASA plans to 
establish a long-term human presence on the moon. To make such a 
scenario possible, a reliable stream of consumables such as fuel, 
food and oxygen, spare parts and exploration equipment would have to 
make its way from the Earth to the moon as predictably as any 
Earth-based delivery system.  Or more predictably: One missed 
shipment could have devastating consequences when you can't easily 
replenish essential supplies. To figure out how to do that, MIT 
researchers Olivier de Weck, associate professor of aeronautics and 
astronautics and engineering systems, and David Simchi-Levi, 
professor of engineering systems and civil and environmental 
engineering, created SpaceNet, a software tool for modeling 
interplanetary supply chains. The latest version, SpaceNet 1.3, was 
released this month. The work was sponsored by NASA.
PHOTOS, GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/spacenet.html

SUPER-STRONG SUTURE
With the help of a new type of suture based on MIT research, patients 
who get stitches may never need to have them removed. A biopolymer 
suture cleared last month by the FDA is made of materials that the 
human body produces naturally, so they can be safely absorbed once 
the wound is healed. They are also 30 percent stronger than sutures 
now used and very flexible, making them easier for surgeons to work 
with. The sutures, developed by Tepha, Inc., could be used for 
abdominal closures, which are prone to re-opening, and to stitch 
tendons and ligaments. The absorbable sutures are the first made from 
material produced by genetically modified bacteria. The work leading 
to the sutures originated about 20 years ago in the laboratory of MIT 
biology professor Anthony Sinskey. That original work was funded by 
the NIH.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/sutures.html

PAY ATTENTION!
If you spotted an anaconda poised to strike, the signal to pay 
attention would originate in a different part of your brain than if 
you gazed at an anaconda in the zoo, neuroscientists at MIT's Picower 
Institute for Learning and Memory report in the March 30 issue of 
Science. The work, which could have implications for treating 
attention deficit disorder, is the first concrete evidence that two 
radically different brain regions--the prefrontal cortex and the 
parietal cortex--play different roles in these different modes of 
attention. What's more, when you focus your attention, the electrical 
activity in these two brain areas synchronizes and oscillates at 
different frequencies. "It's as if the brain is using two different 
stops on the FM radio dial for different types of attention," said 
study co-author Earl Miller, Picower Professor of Neuroscience. This 
work is supported by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders 
and Stroke and the NSF.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/attention.html

MODELING MICROBES
Scientists at MIT have created an ocean model so realistic that the 
virtual forests of diverse microscopic plants they "sowed" have grown 
in population patterns that precisely mimic their real-world 
counterparts. This model of the ocean is the first to reflect the 
vast diversity of the invisible forests living in our oceans--tiny, 
single-celled green plants that dominate the ocean and produce half 
the oxygen we breathe on Earth. And it does so in a way that is 
consistent with the way real-world ecosystems evolve according to the 
principles of natural selection. Scientists use models such as this 
one to better understand the oceans' biological and chemical cycles 
and their role in regulating atmospheric carbon dioxide, an important 
greenhouse gas.  The output of the new model has been tested against 
real-world patterns of a particular species of phytoplankton that 
dominates the plant life of some ocean regions. The work, reported in 
the March 30 issue of Science, was led by Dr. Mick Follows of MIT's 
Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences and Professor 
Penny Chisholm of the Departments of Civil and Environmental 
Engineering, and Biology. It was funded by the Gordon and Betty Moore 
Foundation through MIT's new Darwin Project.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/microbes.html

PULSING LIGHT & NEURONS
Scientists at the MIT Media Lab have invented a way to reversibly 
silence brain cells using pulses of yellow light, offering the 
prospect of controlling the haywire neuron activity that occurs in 
diseases such as epilepsy and Parkinson's. Such diseases often must 
be treated by removing neurons that fire incorrectly. The new MIT 
research could lead to the development of optical brain prosthetics 
to control neurons, eliminating the need for surgery. "In the future, 
controlling the activity patterns of neurons may enable very specific 
treatments for neurological and psychiatric diseases, with few or no 
side effects," said Edward Boyden, assistant professor in the Program 
in Media Arts and Sciences and leader of the Media Lab's new 
Neuroengineering and Neuromedia Group. Boyden and a colleague 
published their results in the March 21 issue of the online journal 
Public Library of Science ONE. The research was funded by an 
anonymous donor, the MIT Media Lab and the Helen Hay Whitney 
Foundation.
PHOTO, GRAPHICS AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/brain-block.html

TURBULENT TANGLE
Picture the flow of water over a rock. At very low speeds, the water 
looks like a smooth sheet skimming the rock's surface. As the water 
rushes faster, the flow turns into turbulent, roiling whitewater that 
can overturn your raft. Turbulence is important in virtually all 
phenomena involving fluid flow, such as air and gas mixing in an 
engine, ocean waves breaking on a cliff and air whipping across the 
surface of a vehicle. However, a comprehensive description of 
turbulent fluid motion remains one of physics' major unsolved 
problems. Now, in a paper to be published in an upcoming issue of 
Physical Review Letters, MIT researchers led by Professor George 
Haller of the Department of Mechanical Engineering report that they 
have visualized for the first time a convoluted tangle underlying 
turbulence. This work may ultimately help engineers design better 
planes, cars, submarines and engines. The work was supported by the 
NSF, the AFOSR and the ONR.
GRAPHIC, VIDEO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/turbulence.html

CONGRESSIONAL KUDOS
A major mathematical feat by a team of 18 scientists, including two 
from MIT, has received a commendation from Congress, one week after 
the work was unveiled at MIT. On Tuesday, March 27, Rep. Jerry 
McNerney (D-Calif.) read a statement to Congress about the work, 
which involved mapping one of the largest and most complicated 
structures in mathematics. If written out on paper, the calculation 
describing this structure, known as E8, would cover an area the size 
of Manhattan. The work is important because it could lead to new 
discoveries in mathematics, physics and other fields. In addition, 
the innovative large-scale computing that was key to the work likely 
spells the future for how longstanding math problems will be solved 
in the 21st century. On March 19 MIT's David Vogan, a professor in 
the Department of Mathematics and member of the research team, 
unveiled the team's results in a talk at MIT to a standing-room-only 
crowd.
GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/e8-congress.html

FUTURE OF COAL
Leading academics from an interdisciplinary MIT panel issued a report 
in mid March that examines how the world can continue to use coal, an 
abundant and inexpensive fuel, in a way that mitigates, instead of 
worsens, the global warming crisis. The study, "The Future of 
Coal--Options for a Carbon Constrained World," advocates that the 
United States assume global leadership on this issue through adoption 
of significant policy actions. Led by co-chairs John Deutch, 
Institute Professor, Department of Chemistry, and Ernest Moniz, a 
professor of physics and engineering systems, the report states that 
carbon capture and sequestration is the critical enabling technology 
to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions significantly while also 
allowing coal to meet the world's pressing energy needs.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/coal-report.html

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