[Editors] MIT Research Digest, February 2009

[Elizabeth Thomson]

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MIT Research Digest, February 2009
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For Immediate Release
MONDAY, FEB. 2, 2009

Contact: Elizabeth A. Thomson, MIT News Office
E: thomson at mit.edu, T: 617-258-5402


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: Robo-Forklift * Collective Intelligence * Aging Brains  
* Seeing Machine * American Teens & Science * Politics: Role Of Race *  
Do-It-Yourself Biology * Superconducting Surprise * Neurotechnology *  
Pinpointing Oil Reserves * Colon Cancer * Periwinkle Engineering *  
Insights Into Schizophrenia * Lunar Mystery * Retinal Degeneration *  
Celestial Reconstruction * Parkinson’s Complications * Toward Better  
Stents

ROBO-FORKLIFT
Researchers in MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence  
Laboratory (CSAIL) are working on a better way to handle supplies in a  
war zone: a semi-autonomous forklift that can be directed by people  
safely away from the dangers of the site. Currently, when supplies  
arrive at military outposts in war zones such as Iraq, people driving  
forklifts unload the pallets and put them into storage, and later load  
them onto trucks to take the material to where it’s needed. These  
forklift operators must often scramble for cover, slowing the work and  
putting them at risk. When completed, the new robotic device will  
provide a safer way to handle pallet-loaded supplies of everything  
from truck tires to water containers and construction materials, says  
Matt Walter, a CSAIL postdoctoral researcher with a lead role in the  
project. The device is designed to operate outdoors on uneven terrain  
such as gravel or packed earth. In Iraq, it has not been uncommon for  
workers to “have to abandon the forklift three or four times a day  
because they come under fire,” Walter says. “A lot of the work could  
be automated,” thus alleviating people’s exposure to danger, “but it’s  
a very difficult task.” Seth Teller, professor of computer science and  
engineering, is project lead. The forklift project has involved about  
30 faculty, staff and students from MIT as well as from Lincoln  
Laboratory, Draper Laboratory and BAE Systems. It has been funded by  
the U.S. Army Logistics Innovation Agency.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/forklift-0121.html
PHOTO AVAILABLE

COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE
Imagine if the planet's collective brainpower and computing power  
could be brought together to tackle some of the world's toughest  
problems, including global climate change and cancer. It may sound  
like science fiction, but researchers at MIT's Center for Collective  
Intelligence (CCI) are trying to make it reality. Popular applications  
such as Wikipedia, Linux and YouTube already take advantage of  
collective intelligence -- the harnessing of human knowledge and  
intelligence that allows groups of people to act together in ways that  
seem to be intelligent. But those applications only scratch the  
surface of what is possible with collective intelligence, says Thomas  
Malone, director of the CCI and professor at the MIT Sloan School of  
Management. He envisions that pooled brainpower, enabled by computing  
advances, could allow doctors to make better cancer diagnoses and help  
experts and others brainstorm solutions to climate change. The CCI's  
goal is nothing less than figuring out "how can people and computers  
be connected so that collectively they act more intelligently than any  
person, group or computer has ever done before," says Malone. "That's  
a kind of intelligence that's never existed on the planet before."
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/cci-0113.html

AGING BRAINS
As people age, memory and the ability to carry out tasks often  
decline. Scientists looking for ways to lessen that decline often have  
focused on the “gray matter” — the cortical regions where high-level  
functions such as memory are located. But there are signs that the  
search may need to be expanded: A new study by MIT neuroscientists has  
found that memory and cognitive impairments were more associated with  
loss of brain “white matter,” which forms connections within and  
between brain regions. “Historically a lot of people have put their  
eggs in the gray matter basket. This study suggests that what might  
really be important are the connections and the integrity of the  
connections,” said David Ziegler, a graduate student in the Department  
of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and lead author of a paper on the work  
that appeared in the online edition of Neurobiology of Aging.  
Enhancing white matter in older people through drug intervention or  
changes in diet or cardiovascular fitness could offer a new approach  
to countering some of the cognitive declines that are typical of  
advanced age, said Ziegler, who works in the laboratory of Suzanne  
Corkin, professor of behavioral neuroscience. The study is the first  
to examine changes in both white and gray matter and correlate those  
changes with declines in memory and cognition, said Ziegler. The  
research was funded by the National Institute on Aging.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/aging-brain-0107.html

SEEING MACHINE
Elizabeth Goldring smiles as she shows a visitor photos she’s taken —  
and can see — with her blind eye. The demonstration comes more than 20  
years after Goldring, a senior fellow at MIT’s Center for Advanced  
Visual Studies, and colleagues began work on a “seeing machine” that  
can allow some people who are blind or visually challenged to access  
the Internet, view the face of a friend and much more. The team has  
moved from Goldring’s inspiration, a large diagnostic device costing  
some $100,000, to a $4,000 desktop version, to the current seeing  
machine, which is portable and inexpensive. “We can make one for under  
$500,” Goldring said. Although the device can be connected to any  
visual source, such as a video camera or desktop computer, Goldring  
especially enjoys using it with a photo camera. “When someone has a  
diminished sense, the inability to express yourself with that sense  
can be frustrating,” she said. By taking photos, “I feel I’m able to  
express myself visually with my blind eye, and there’s value in that,  
I think.” Further, “it’s light enough that I really want to take it  
with me when I go for a walk.” (Goldring, who is visually challenged,  
has enough sight in one eye to permit mobility.) This work was  
supported by NASA and by MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning,  
Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Undergraduate Research  
Opportunities Program, and Council for the Arts.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/camera-blind-0113.html
PHOTO AVAILABLE

AMERICAN TEENS & SCIENCE
American teens are embracing the subjects of science, technology,  
engineering and mathematics (STEM) with increasingly positive  
attitudes; yet many lack the necessary encouragement from mentors and  
role models in these fields, according to this year's Lemelson-MIT  
Invention Index. The annual survey, which gauges Americans'  
perceptions about invention and innovation, also reveals teens'  
altruistic intentions and feelings of preparedness to pursue careers  
in STEM fields. The 2009 Lemelson-MIT Invention Index found an  
overwhelming majority of teens surveyed (85 percent) expressed  
interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, with  
"curiosity about the way things work" as the driving factor for their  
interest (44 percent). Of those teens expressing interest in these  
areas of study, most would be motivated to work in related fields out  
of altruistic versus materialistic motives: more than half of teens  
(56 percent) selected "protecting the environment" or "improving our  
society" as their inspiration. Less than one-fifth (18 percent) said  
they were motivated to pursue science, technology, engineering or  
mathematics for the purposes of becoming rich or famous. Not only did  
the majority of teens convey interest in STEM, but 80 percent also  
feel their schools have prepared them to pursue a career in these  
fields, should they choose.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/lemelson-teens-0107.html

POLITICS: ROLE OF RACE
Some political observers have declared that the election of the first  
black president signals a new era of post-racial politics in the  
United States -- but the data show otherwise, two MIT researchers say.  
Through careful analysis of 2008 exit-poll data, the researchers found  
that Barack Obama won the election precisely because of his race, most  
significantly because of his appeal among black voters who turned out  
in record numbers. "Ironically, the candidate whom commentators  
lionized for ending America's debilitating racial divisions won the  
election on the basis of increasingly distinct white and nonwhite  
voting patterns," wrote the two researchers -- Charles H. Stewart III,  
the Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor and head of the Department of  
Political Science at MIT; and Stephen Ansolabehere, professor of  
political science at MIT -- in the current issue of Boston Review.  
"Racial polarization in American voting patterns was the highest it  
has been since the 1984 election." Despite many predictions, Obama did  
not "provoke a backlash among white voters," according to research  
compiled by Stewart and Ansolabehere. However, the percentage of  
blacks voting Democratic rose from 88 percent in 2004 to 95 percent in  
2008.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/racialpolarization-0120.html

DO-IT-YOURSELF BIOLOGY
Building a cell from scratch is a lot more complicated than building a  
computer. But that's just what synthetic biologists, including many at  
MIT, are trying to figure out how to do. Using engineering principles,  
researchers and students in MIT's Department of Biological Engineering  
are building a set of "off-the shelf parts" for cells, cataloging and  
assembling bacterial DNA sequences to produce microbes tailored for a  
specific task. Such bacteria could have numerous applications in  
medicine, energy and environmental cleanup. MIT biological engineering  
instructor Natalie Kuldell and recent PhD recipient Reshma Shetty  
discussed the possibilities of and obstacles facing synthetic biology  
at a January talk at the MIT Museum. "If you could really program a  
cell to do your bidding, you could have it spit out drugs really  
quickly, or spit out biofuels," Kuldell said. "It would be wonderful  
to replace refineries with small microbial factories." Before that can  
happen, biologists and biological engineers need to figure out whether  
engineering approaches can be practically transferred to the life  
sciences, which tend to be much more unpredictable, Kuldell said.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/diy-bio-0113.html

SUPERCONDUCTING SURPRISE
MIT physicists have discovered that several high-temperature  
superconductors display patchwork quilt-like variations at the atomic  
scale, a surprising finding that could help scientists understand a  
new class of unconventional materials. The researchers said the  
variation in a property known as the Fermi surface, which has never  
been seen before in any kind of material, could just be an oddity. But  
it could also serve as an important clue for physicists working to  
unravel the mystery of why a broad new class of materials exhibits  
exotic properties from high-temperature superconductivity (the ability  
to carry electricity with no resistance) to colossal magneto- 
resistance (the ability to dramatically change electrical resistance  
when a magnetic field is applied). In such materials, known as  
strongly correlated electronic materials, interactions between  
electrons, normally weak enough that they can essentially be ignored,  
dominate the physics of the material, leading to a host of unexplained  
phenomena. "These materials are so unusual that we decided to check  
for variations that would normally be impossible -- and there they  
were," said Eric Hudson, associate professor of physics and senior  
author of a paper on the work that appeared online in Nature Physics  
Jan. 25. This research was funded by the Research Corporation, the  
Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, the NSF and the DOE.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/superconduct-0127.html

NEUROTECHNOLOGY
The rapidly growing field of neurotechnology -- which draws upon  
biology, medical imaging, computer science and other areas of research  
-- is becoming a boon for existing businesses while generating startup  
ventures. With the aim of grooming the sector's future leaders, MIT  
has created a research program and is offering numerous classes --  
including one on how to launch businesses in the industry. The  
multidisciplinary, interdepartmental work in neurotechnology now being  
done across MIT has been spurred on by the creation of a series of new  
classes, as well as the McGovern Institute Neurotechnology (MINT)  
program that began in 2006. Neurotechnology is an umbrella term used  
to describe a wide range of technologies: diagnostic imaging of the  
brain through methods such as functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging  
(fMRI); neuropharmacology (drugs, including painkillers and  
antidepressants, that affect brain and nervous system functioning);  
enhancements or replacements for sensory or motor systems (cochlear or  
retinal implants, "smart" prosthetics) and neurostimulation through  
implanted electrodes to treat diseases such as Parkinson's or to  
restore mobility to paralyzed patients.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/neurotechnology-0129.html

PINPOINTING OIL RESERVES
Picture this: an accurate map of a large underground oil reservoir  
that can guide engineers’ efforts to coax the oil from the vast rocky  
subsurface into wells where it can be pumped out for storage or  
transport. Researchers in MIT’s Department of Civil and Environmental  
Engineering have developed technology that can generate such a map,  
which has the potential to significantly increase the amount of oil  
extracted from reservoirs. The new technology uses the digital image  
compression technique of JPEG to create realistic-looking,  
comprehensive maps of underground oil reservoirs using measurements  
from scattered oil wells. These maps would be the first to provide  
enough detail about an oil reservoir to guide oil recovery in the  
field in real time. “Our simulation studies indicate that this  
innovative approach has the potential to improve current reservoir  
characterization techniques and to provide better predictions of oil- 
reservoir production. The hope is that better predictions ultimately  
lead to more efficient operations and increased oil production,” said  
Behnam Jafarpour, a recent MIT graduate who is now an assistant  
professor at Texas A&M University. Jafarpour and Dennis McLaughlin,  
the H.M. King Bhumibol Professor of Water Resource Management at MIT,  
published a pair of papers describing the technique that will appear  
in an upcoming issue of the Society of Petroleum Engineering Journal,  
as well as a third paper that appeared in Computational Geosciences.  
This research was funded by the Shell International Petroleum Co.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/oil-recovery-0116.html
PHOTO AND GRAPHIC AVAILABLE

COLON CANCER
Researchers long ago established a link between inflammation, cancer  
and the compound nitric oxide, which may be produced when the immune  
system responds to bacterial infections, including those of the colon.  
However, the exact nature of the relationship was unknown — until now.  
Scientists from MIT’s Division of Comparative Medicine (DCM) and  
Department of Biological Engineering have found that nitric oxide  
produced by inflammatory cells during bacterial infection can cause  
colon cells to become cancerous. The finding suggests that blocking  
the compound may help prevent or treat colon cancer, the third most  
common form of cancer in the United States. The researchers, led by  
James Fox, director of DCM, report their findings in an online edition  
of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The work was  
supported by the NIH.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/colon-cancer-0119.html

PERIWINKLE ENGINEERING
In work that could expand the frontiers of genetic engineering, MIT  
chemists have, for the first time, genetically altered a plant to  
produce entirely new compounds, some of which could be used as drugs  
against cancer and other diseases. The researchers, led by Professor  
Sarah O’Connor of the Department of Chemistry, produced the new  
compounds by manipulating the complex biosynthetic pathways of the  
periwinkle plant. This sort of manipulation, which O’Connor and her  
graduate student, Weerawat Runguphan, report in a Jan. issue of Nature  
Chemical Biology, offers a new way to tweak potential drugs to make  
them less toxic (and/or more effective). The research was funded by  
the NSF, the NIH and the American Cancer Society.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/plant-drug-0118.html
PHOTO AVAILABLE

INSIGHTS INTO SCHIZOPHRENIA
Schizophrenia may blur the boundary between internal and external  
realities by overactivating a brain system that is involved in self- 
reflection, and thus causing an exaggerated focus on self, a new MIT  
and Harvard brain imaging study has found. The traditional view of  
schizophrenia is that the disturbed thoughts, perceptions and emotions  
that characterize the disease are caused by disconnections among the  
brain regions that control these different functions. But this study,  
which appeared in the advance online issue of the Proceedings of the  
National Academy of Sciences, found that schizophrenia also involves  
an excess of connectivity between the so-called default brain regions,  
which are involved in self-reflection and become active when we are  
thinking about nothing in particular, or thinking about ourselves.  
“People normally suppress this default system when they perform  
challenging tasks, but we found that patients with schizophrenia don’t  
do this,” said John D. Gabrieli, a professor in the McGovern Institute  
for Brain Research at MIT and the Department of Brain and Cognitive  
Sciences. “We think this could help to explain the cognitive and  
psychological symptoms of schizophrenia.” This study was supported by  
the Mental Illness and Neuroscience Discovery Institute, National  
Association of Research in Schizophrenia and Depression Stone Award,  
National Institute of Mental Health, Massachusetts Department of  
Mental Health’s Commonwealth Research Center, the Poitras Center for  
Affective Disorders at the McGovern Institute/MIT and the National  
Center for Research Resources.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/schizophrenia-0119.html
GRAPHIC AVAILABLE

LUNAR MYSTERY
The collection of rocks that the Apollo astronauts brought back from  
the moon carried with it a riddle that has puzzled scientists since  
the early 1970s: What produced the magnetization found in many of  
those rocks? The longstanding puzzle has now been solved by  
researchers at MIT, who carried out the most detailed analysis ever of  
the oldest pristine rock from the Apollo collection. Magnetic traces  
recorded in the rock provide strong evidence that 4.2 billion years  
ago the moon had a liquid core with a dynamo, like Earth’s core today,  
that produced a strong magnetic field. The particular moon rock that  
produced the new evidence was long known to be a very special one. It  
is the oldest of all the moon rocks that have not been subjected to  
major shocks from later impacts — something that tends to erase all  
evidence of earlier magnetic fields. In fact, it’s older than any  
known rocks from Mars or even from the Earth itself. “Many people  
think that it’s the most interesting lunar rock,” said Ben Weiss, the  
Victor P. Starr Assistant Professor of Planetary Sciences in MIT’s  
Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences and senior  
author of a paper on the new finding published in Science. The  
research was funded by NASA, the Charles E. Reed Faculty Initiatives  
Fund, the Victor P. Starr Career Development Professorship, and the  
Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/moonrock-0115.html

RETINAL DEGENERATION
A naturally occurring DNA repair system that normally protects cells  
from damage can cause retinal degeneration and blindness when  
overstimulated, according to a new study by MIT researchers. The  
research team found that relatively low-level exposure to an  
environmental toxic agent provoked very active DNA repair that led to  
surprisingly high rates of retinal degeneration in mice -- much higher  
than in mice lacking the same DNA repair pathway. The work raises the  
possibility of developing treatments for retinal degeneration by  
blocking a particular DNA repair pathway. "Under some circumstances,  
too much DNA repair is not a good thing and could actually be a bad  
thing," said Leona Samson, co-director of MIT's Center for  
Environmental Health Sciences, professor of biology and biological  
engineering, and senior author of a paper on the work that appeared  
online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The  
research was funded by the NIH, and Samson is an American Cancer  
Society Professor.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/macular-0109.html

CELESTIAL RECONSTRUCTION
Using views captured by several orbiting and ground-based telescopes,  
an MIT researcher and her colleagues have produced the first fully  
three-dimensional reconstruction of the remains of a star that  
exploded in a cosmic cataclysm called a supernova. The complex  
supernova remnant, called Cassiopeia A (or Cas A for short), consists  
of a set of intertwined bubble-like shells of debris that were spewed  
out by a star undergoing its death throes 330 years ago. Tracey  
DeLaney, a postdoctoral researcher in MIT's Kavli Institute for  
Astrophysics & Space Research, and her colleagues used data from the  
Chandra orbiting X-ray telescope, along with NASA's Spitzer Space  
Telescope that detects infrared light, and ground-based optical  
telescopes, to produce the first three-dimensional fly-through of a  
supernova remnant. The computer reconstruction was unveiled at the  
American Astronomical Society meeting. "We have always wanted to know  
how the pieces we see in two dimensions fit together with each other  
in real life," said DeLaney. "Now we can see for ourselves with this  
'hologram' of supernova debris." This ground-breaking visualization of  
Cas A was made possible through a collaboration with the Astronomical  
Medicine project based at Harvard.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/cassiopeiaa-mit-0108.html

PARKINSON’S COMPLICATIONS
People with Parkinson's disease commonly suffer a slowing or freezing  
of movement caused by the death of neurons that make dopamine, a key  
chemical that allows brain cells to send and receive messages  
essential to voluntary movements. Patients regain the ability to move,  
seemingly miraculously, by taking L-DOPA or related drugs that mimic  
the missing dopamine. After a few years on L-DOPA, however, most  
patients again lose motor control — but in an opposite way. Instead of  
too little, there is too much movement, like involuntary nodding and  
rocking — side effects known as L-DOPA-induced dyskinesias. “L-DOPA- 
induced dyskinesias are a major problem for patients, and there is a  
great need to help with these drug side effects,” said MIT Institute  
Professor Ann Graybiel, a prominent Parkinson’s researcher at the  
McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT. Graybiel and her  
colleagues have identified two molecules whose expression in the brain  
is altered in the brains of animals with L-DOPA-induced dyskinesias.  
The results may lead to new approaches to the treatment of dyskinesias  
in Parkinson’s patients, of which there are more than 1 million in the  
United States alone. This research was published in the advance online  
issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It was  
funded by the Stanley H. and Sheila G. Sydney Fund, the NIH, National  
Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National  
Parkinson Foundation.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/l-dopa-0129.html
GRAPHIC AVAILABLE

TOWARD BETTER STENTS
Researchers have been puzzled in recent years by observations that  
drug-releasing stents (mesh-like tubes implanted to hold patients’  
coronary arteries open) can increase the likelihood of blood clots and  
heart attacks. Now, a mathematical model developed by MIT engineers  
can predict whether particular types of stents are likely to cause  
life-threatening side effects. The model “helps explain why some  
stents are better than others, and could predict which stents are  
predisposed to cause clotting,” said Elazer Edelman, the Thomas D. and  
Virginia W. Cabot Professor of Health Science and Technology (HST) and  
senior author of a paper on the work appearing as the cover story of a  
Jan. issue of the Journal of Controlled Release. Edelman and HST  
postdoctoral associates Vijaya Kolachalama and Abraham Tzafriri  
designed the model to predict how the size and shape of a stent  
affects blood flow and drug distribution. This research was funded by  
the NIH.
MORE: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/better-stents-0105.html

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