[Editors] MIT Research Digest, November 2007
Elizabeth Thomson
thomson at MIT.EDU
Wed Nov 7 17:55:08 EST 2007
MIT News Office
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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MIT Research Digest, November 2007
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For Immediate Release
WEDNESDAY, NOV. 7, 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
IN THIS ISSUE: Electronic Nose * Cholesterol Link * Near-Earth Asteroid
New Hearing Mechanism * Unexpected Protein Role * Iron & Blood
Color-Changing Gel * New Cognitive Theory * Capturing Cells
Ozone & Crop Damage * Ancient Cargo * 'Tractor Beam' for Cells
Optical Microchips * Dementia & Driving * Insights on Cancer
Cornucopia of Planets * Regulating Stem Cells * Evolution of Language
Biofuels & Water
ELECTRONIC NOSE
A tiny "electronic nose" that MIT researchers have engineered with a
novel inkjet printing method could be used to detect hazards
including carbon monoxide, harmful industrial solvents and
explosives. Led by MIT professor Harry Tuller, the researchers have
devised a way to print thin sensor films onto a microchip, a process
that could eventually allow for mass production of highly sensitive
gas detectors. "Mass production would be an enormous breakthrough for
this kind of gas sensing technology," said Tuller, a professor in the
Department of Materials Science and Engineering who presented the
research Oct. 30 at the Composites at Lake Louise Conference in
Alberta, Canada. The prototype sensor consists of thin layers of
hollow spheres made of the ceramic material barium carbonate, which
can detect a range of gases. Using a specialized inkjet print head,
tiny droplets of barium carbonate or other gas-sensitive materials
can be rapidly deposited onto a surface, in any pattern the
researchers design. The miniature, low-cost detector could be used in
a variety of settings, from an industrial workplace to an air-
conditioning system to a car's exhaust system, according to Tuller.
The research is funded by the NSF.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/printer-1030.html
CHOLESTEROL LINK
MIT researchers have discovered a link between a gene believed to
promote long lifespan and a pathway that flushes cholesterol from the
body. The finding could help researchers create drugs that lower the
risk of diseases associated with high cholesterol, including
atherosclerosis (clogged arteries) and Alzheimer's disease. The study
focused on a gene called SIRT1, which the researchers found prevents
cholesterol buildup by activating a cellular pathway that expels
cholesterol from the body via HDL (high density lipoprotein or “good
cholesterol”). “SIRT1 is an important mediator of cholesterol efflux,
and as such it's predicted to play a role in the development of age-
associated diseases where cholesterol is a contributing factor,” said
Leonard Guarente, MIT professor of biology and senior author of a
paper on the work published in Molecular Cell. The research was
funded by the NIH.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/cholesterol-1011.html
NEAR-EARTH ASTEROID
In research that could aid decisions about future asteroids on a
collision course with Earth, MIT scientists have for the first time
determined the composition of a near-Earth asteroid that has a very
slight possibility of someday hitting our planet. That information
could be useful in planning any future space mission to explore the
asteroid, called Apophis. And if the time ever were to come when this
object or another turned out to be on its way toward an impact on
Earth, knowing what it's made of could be one important factor in
deciding what to do about it. "Basic characterization is the first
line of defense," said Richard Binzel, a professor in the Department
of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences. "We've got to know the
enemy." Binzel presented the new findings at the annual meeting of
the Division for Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical
Society. This work was sponsored by NASA and the NSF.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/asteroid-1013.html
NEW HEARING MECHANISM
MIT researchers have discovered a hearing mechanism that
fundamentally changes the current understanding of inner ear
function. This new mechanism could help explain the ear's remarkable
ability to sense and discriminate sounds. Its discovery could
eventually lead to improved systems for restoring hearing. The
research is described in the Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences. MIT Professor Dennis Freeman and colleagues found that the
tectorial membrane, a gelatinous structure inside the cochlea of the
ear, is much more important to hearing than previously thought. It
can selectively pick up and transmit energy to different parts of the
cochlea via a kind of wave that is different from that commonly
associated with hearing. Freeman is in MIT's Department of Electrical
Engineering and Computer Science, the Harvard-MIT Division of Health
Sciences and Technology, MIT's Research Laboratory of Electronics and
the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary. This research was funded by
the NIH.
PHOTO, VIDEO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/hearing-1010.html
UNEXPECTED PROTEIN ROLE
In a finding that may lead to potential new treatments for diseases
such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, researchers at the Picower
Institute for Learning and Memory at MIT report an unexpected role in
the brain for a well-known protein. A study by Morgan Sheng, a
professor of neuroscience and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute
investigator, and colleagues appearing in the Oct. 23 issue of
Current Biology shows that the same protein that enables a yeast cell
to bud into two daughter cells also helps neurons sprout the branch-
like protrusions used to communicate with other neurons. The work
revolves around septins--proteins known since the 1970s to play an
essential function in the process through which the cytoplasm of a
single yeast cell divides. "In yeast, septin is localized exactly at
the neck between the yeast mother cell and the bud or emerging
daughter cell," Sheng said. "Amazingly, we found septin protein
localized at the base of the neck of neuronal dendritic spines and at
the branchpoint of dendritic branches." This work is supported by the
NIH and the RIKEN-MIT Neuroscience Research Center.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/brain-protein-1017.html
IRON & BLOOD
MIT scientists have uncovered a protein that plays a key role in the
recycling of iron from blood. Their work, described in the Journal of
Clinical Investigation, could lead to new therapies for certain
inherited blood disorders such as beta-thalassemia, a condition that
causes chronic anemia. The team is led by Jane-Jane Chen, a principal
research scientist in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and
Technology. Two years ago Chen and colleagues showed that a protein,
heme-regulated eukaryotic translational initiation factor 2 a-subunit
(eIF2-alpha) kinase, or HRI for short, keeps mice with beta-
thalassemia alive. This protein minimizes an abnormal and toxic
imbalance of globin chains, the protein base for the hemoglobin found
in red blood cells. Hemoglobin carries oxygen to our organs and carts
away carbon dioxide waste. In the new work, the team has found that
HRI also plays a key role in the body's iron recycling process. Chen
observed that this process falters in mice lacking HRI. As a result,
less iron was available for use in the creation of new red blood
cells. The work was funded by the NIH and the Cooley's Anemia
Foundation.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/iron-1011.html
COLOR-CHANGING GEL
MIT researchers have created a new structured gel that can rapidly
change color in response to a variety of stimuli, including
temperature, pressure, salt concentration and humidity. Among other
applications, the structured gel could be used as a fast and
inexpensive chemical sensor, says Professor Edwin Thomas, head of the
Department of Materials Science and Engineering. One place where such
an environmental sensor could be useful is a food processing plant,
where the sensor could indicate whether food that must remain dry has
been overly exposed to humidity. Thomas is senior author of a paper
on the work in Nature Materials. A critical component of the
structured gel is a material that expands or contracts when exposed
to certain stimuli. Those changes in the thickness of the gel cause
it to change color, through the entire range of the visible spectrum
of light. The work was funded by the Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency and the NSF.
PHOTOS, VIDEO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/lightgels-1021.html
NEW COGNITIVE THEORY
MIT scientists propose that blood may help us think, in addition to
its well-known role as the conveyor of fuel and oxygen to brain
cells. “We hypothesize that blood actively modulates how neurons
process information,” explains Christopher Moore, a professor in the
McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT, in an invited review in
the Journal of Neurophysiology. “Many lines of evidence suggest that
blood does something more interesting than just delivering supplies.
If it does modulate how neurons relay signals, that changes how we
think the brain works.” According to Moore's Hemo-Neural Hypothesis,
blood is not just a physiological support system but actually helps
control brain activity. Specifically, localized changes in blood flow
affect the activity of nearby neurons, changing how they transmit
signals to each other and hence regulating information flow
throughout the brain. Moore's theory has implications for
understanding brain diseases such as Alzheimer's, schizophrenia,
multiple sclerosis and epilepsy. “Many neurological and psychiatric
diseases have associated changes in the vasculature,” says Moore, who
is also in MIT's Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences. This
work was funded by Thomas F. Peterson, the Mitsui Foundation and the
McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/brain-1016.html
CAPTURING CELLS
MIT and University of Rochester researchers report important advances
toward a therapeutic device that has the potential to capture cells
as they flow through the blood stream and treat them. Among other
applications, such a device could zapp cancer cells spreading to
other tissues, or signal stem cells to differentiate. Their concept
leverages cell rolling, a biological process that slows cells down as
they flow through blood vessels. As the cells slow, they adhere to
the vessel walls and roll, allowing them to sense signals from nearby
tissues that may be calling them to work. Immune cells, for example,
can be slowed and summoned to battle an infection. “Through
mimicking a process involved in many important physiological and
pathological events, we envision a device that can be used to
selectively provide signals to cells traveling through the
bloodstream,” said Jeffrey Karp of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health
Sciences and Technology. “This technology has applications in cancer
and stem cell therapies and could be used for diagnostics of a number
of diseases.” This work was funded by CellTraffix, Inc., and the NSF.
PHOTOS, GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/cell-catch-1022.html
OZONE & CROP DAMAGE
An MIT study concludes that increasing levels of ozone due to the
growing use of fossil fuels will damage global vegetation, resulting
in serious costs to the world's economy. The analysis, reported in
the November issue of Energy Policy, focused on how three
environmental changes (increases in temperature, carbon dioxide and
ozone) associated with human activity will affect crops, pastures,
and forests. The research shows that increases in temperature and in
carbon dioxide may actually benefit vegetation. However, those
benefits may be more than offset by the detrimental effects of
increases in ozone, notably on crops. Ozone is a form of oxygen that
is an atmospheric pollutant at ground level. The economic cost of the
damage will be moderated by changes in land use and by agricultural
trade, with some regions more able to adapt than others. But the
overall economic consequences will be considerable. According to the
analysis, if nothing is done, by 2100 the global value of crop
production will fall by 10 to 12 percent. “Even assuming that best-
practice technology for controlling ozone is adopted worldwide, we
see rapidly rising ozone concentrations in the coming decades,” said
John Reilly, associate director of the MIT Joint Program on the
Science and Policy of Global Change. “That result is both surprising
and worrisome.” Reilly's colleagues are from MIT and the Marine
Biological Laboratory. The research was supported by the DOE, the
EPA, the NSF, NASA, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric
Administration, and the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy
of Global Change.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/ozone-1026.html
ANCIENT CARGO
For the first time, researchers have identified DNA from inside
ceramic containers in an ancient shipwreck on the seafloor, making it
possible to determine what the ship's cargo was even though there was
no visible trace of it. The findings, by a team from MIT, the Woods
Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and Lund University in Sweden,
are being reported in the Journal of Archeological Science. By
scraping samples from inside two of the containers, called amphoras,
the researchers were able to obtain DNA sequences that identified the
contents of one as olive oil and oregano. The other probably
contained wine, and the researchers are conducting further analyses
to confirm this. Brendan Foley, a lecturer in MIT's Program in
Science, Technology and Society (STS) and a researcher at WHOI, and
Maria Hansson, a biologist at WHOI and at Lund University, found the
DNA evidence in the remains of a 2,400-year-old shipwreck that lies
70 meters deep near the Greek island of Chios. Foley, along with
Professor David Mindell, director of STS, led an expedition in 2005
that explored the wreck and recovered the amphoras.
PHOTOS AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/ancient-wine-1029.html
'TRACTOR BEAM' FOR CELLS
In a feat that seems like something out of a microscopic version of
Star Trek, MIT researchers have found a way to use a “tractor beam”
of light to pick up, hold, and move around individual cells and other
objects on the surface of a microchip. The new technology could
become an important tool for both biological research and materials
research, say Matthew Lang and David Appleyard, whose work is being
published in the journal Lab on a Chip. Lang is an assistant
professor in the Department of Biological Engineering and the
Department of Mechanical Engineering. Appleyard is a graduate student
in Biological Engineering. The idea of using light beams as tweezers
to manipulate cells and tiny objects has been around for at least 30
years. But the MIT researchers have found a way to combine this
powerful tool for moving, controlling and measuring objects with the
highly versatile world of microchip design and manufacturing. Optical
tweezers, as the technology is known, represent “one of the world's
smallest microtools,” says Lang. “Now, we're applying it to building
[things] on a chip.” Says Appleyard, “We've shown that you could
merge everything people are doing with optical trapping with all the
exciting things you can do on a silicon wafer…There could be lots of
uses at the biology-and-electronics interface.” The work was
supported by the NIH, the W.M. Keck Foundation, and MIT's Lincoln
Laboratory.
PHOTOS, VIDEO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/nano-assembly-1031.html
OPTICAL MICROCHIPS
A new theory developed at MIT could lead to “smart” optical
microchips that adapt to different wavelengths of light, potentially
advancing telecommunications, spectroscopy and remote sensing. Drawn
by the promise of superior system performance, researchers have been
exploring the concept of microchips that manipulate light instead of
electricity. In their new theory, the MIT team has shown how such
chips could feature tiny machines with moving parts powered and
controlled by the very light they manipulate. “There are thousands of
complex functions we could make happen by tinkering with this idea,”
said Peter Rakich, an MIT postdoctoral associate who invented the
theoretical concept along with postdoc Milos Popovic. For example,
such chips could one day be used to remotely adjust the amount of
bandwidth available in an optical network, or to automatically
process signals flowing through fiber-optic networks, without using
any electrical power. The work was described in the cover story of
the November issue of Nature Photonics. Coauthors on the paper were
Professors Marin Soljacic and Erich Ippen of physics. The research
was funded in part by the Army Research Office through MIT's
Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies.
PHOTO, GRAPHIC AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/optical-control-1101.html
DEMENTIA & DRIVING
The MIT AgeLab, in collaboration with The Hartford Financial Services
Group, have developed new materials to help families and caregivers
determine when it is time for people suffering from dementia to stop
driving. The materials, including an updated edition of the booklet
"At the Crossroads: Family Conversations about Alzheimer's Disease,
Dementia & Driving," were released at a major conference held Nov. 1
at MIT, in conjunction with the start of National Alzheimer's
Awareness Month. "Decisions about driving are intensely personal, yet
they have profound public implications," said Joseph Coughlin,
founder and director of the MIT AgeLab. "Our goal is to help families
and caregivers manage the transition from driver to passenger." The
materials being released are the result of a two-year study by the
MIT AgeLab, The Hartford Financial Services Group, and the Boston
University Alzheimer's Disease Center. Researchers found that people
suffering from Alzheimer's disease or other causes of dementia--more
than 5 million people in the United States--are driving an average of
nine months longer than their caregivers think is safe.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/agelab-1101.html
INSIGHTS ON CANCER
Everyone knows that tumors are packed with cancer cells, but many
normal cells live among these deviants. The normal cells form a
structural framework called the stroma, which was once thought to
resemble passive scaffolding. But a growing body of research suggests
that cancer cells actively recruit normal cells from local and
distant sites to the scaffolding, where they release signals that
help the tumor thrive. Beginning in 1999, several labs increased
primary tumor growth by mixing fibroblasts (cells that contribute to
the formation of connective tissue and the stroma of tumors) with
cancer cells. Working with a different type of normal stromal cell,
MIT researchers have now managed to facilitate metastasis--the spread
of cancer cells from the primary tumor to distant sites. The team,
led by MIT biology professor and Whitehead Institute member Robert
Weinberg, reports the work in Nature. This research is funded by the
Breast Cancer Research Foundation, the Ludwig Trust, the Susan G.
Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center
Specialized Program of Research Excellence in Breast Cancer and the NIH.
IMAGE AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/metastasis-tt1031.html
CORNUCOPIA OF PLANETS
In the Star Wars movies, fictional planets are covered with forests,
oceans, deserts and volcanoes. But new models from a team of MIT,
NASA and Carnegie Institution scientists begin to describe an even
wider range of Earth-size planets that astronomers might actually be
able to find in the near future. Sara Seager, a professor in the
Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, and
colleagues have created models for 14 different types of solid
planets that might exist in our galaxy. The 14 types have various
compositions, and the team calculated how large each planet would be
for a given mass. Some are pure water ice, carbon, iron, silicate,
carbon monoxide and silicon carbide; others are mixtures of these
various compounds. A paper on the work appeared in the Astrophysical
Journal.
PHOTO AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/exoplanet-tt1031.html
REGULATING STEM CELLS
The protein Oct4 plays a major role in embryonic stem cells, acting
as a master regulator of the genes that keep the cells in an
undifferentiated state. Unsurprisingly, researchers studying adult
stem cells have long suspected that Oct4 also is critical in allowing
these cells to remain undifferentiated. Indeed, more than 50 studies
have reported finding Oct4 activity in adult stem cells. But those
findings are misleading, according to research in the lab of
Whitehead Institute member and MIT biology professor Rudolf Jaenisch.
In a paper published in Cell Stem Cells, postdoctoral fellow
Christopher Lengner has shown that Oct4 is not required to maintain
mouse adult stem cells in their undifferentiated state, and that
adult tissues function normally in the absence of Oct4. IMAGE AVAILABLE
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/stemcells-1023.html
EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE
Verbs evolve and homogenize at a rate inversely proportional to their
prevalence in the English language, according to a formula developed
by MIT and Harvard University mathematicians who've invoked
evolutionary principles to study our language over the past 1,200
years. The team, which reported their findings in Nature, conceives
of linguistic development as an essentially evolutionary scheme. Just
as genes and organisms undergo natural selection, words--
specifically, irregular verbs that do not take an "-ed" ending in the
past tense--are subject to powerful pressure to "regularize" as the
language develops. "Mathematical analysis of this linguistic
evolution reveals that irregular verb conjugations behave in an
extremely regular way - one that can yield predictions and insights
into the future stages of a verb's evolutionary trajectory," says
Erez Lieberman, a graduate student in the Harvard-MIT Division of
Health Sciences and Technology and in Harvard's School of Engineering
and Applied Sciences. "We measured something no one really thought
could be measured, and got a striking and beautiful result." The work
was sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation, the NSF, and the NIH.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/language-1015.html
BIOFUELS & WATER
Boosting ethanol production by growing more corn in the United States
without considering the quality and availability of water by region
could put a significant strain on water resources in some parts of
the country, a committee of the National Research Council said in a
report released in Oct. The report's authors, who include Professor
Dara Entekhabi of MIT's Department of Civil and Environmental
Engineering, recommend that conversion of U.S. agriculture to biofuel
cultivation should only be undertaken in tandem with regional water
assessments, the adoption of environmentally sound farming practices,
and consideration of the full life cycle of biofuel production.
"Agricultural shifts to growing corn and expanding biofuel crops into
regions with little agriculture, especially dry areas, could change
current irrigation practices and greatly increase pressure on water
resources in many parts of the United States," the committee said in
its report. "The amount of rainfall and other hydroclimate conditions
from region to region causes significant variations in the water
requirement for the same crop."
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/biofuels-1011.html
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