Transistors, the building blocks of modern electronics, are typically made of silicon. Because it’s a semiconductor, this material can control the flow of electricity in a circuit. But silicon has fundamental physical limits that restrict how compact and energy-efficient a transistor can be.

MIT researchers have now replaced silicon with a magnetic semiconductor, creating a magnetic transistor that could enable smaller, faster, and more energy-efficient circuits. The material’s magnetism strongly influences its electronic behavior, leading to more efficient control of the flow of electricity. 

The team used a novel magnetic material and an optimization process that reduces the material’s defects, which boosts the transistor’s performance.

The material’s unique magnetic properties also allow for transistors with built-in memory, which would simplify circuit design and unlock new applications for high-performance electronics.

“People have known about magnets for thousands of years, but there are very limited ways to incorporate magnetism into electronics. We have shown a new way to efficiently utilize magnetism that opens up a lot of possibilities for future applications and research,” says Chung-Tao Chou, an MIT graduate student in the departments of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) and Physics, and co-lead author of a paper on this advance.

Chou is joined on the paper by co-lead author Eugene Park, a graduate student in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE); Julian Klein, a DMSE research scientist; Josep Ingla-Aynes, a postdoc in the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center; Jagadeesh S. Moodera, a senior research scientist in the Department of Physics; and senior authors Frances Ross, TDK Professor in DMSE; and Luqiao Liu, an associate professor in EECS, and a member of the Research Laboratory of Electronics; as well as others at the University of Chemistry and Technology in Prague. The paper appears today in Physical Review Letters.

Overcoming the limits

In an electronic device, silicon semiconductor transistors act like tiny light switches that turn a circuit on and off, or amplify weak signals in a communication system. They do this using a small input voltage.

But a fundamental physical limit of silicon semiconductors prevents a transistor from operating below a certain voltage, which hinders its energy efficiency.

To make more efficient electronics, researchers have spent decades working toward magnetic transistors that utilize electron spin to control the flow of electricity. Electron spin is a fundamental property that enables electrons to behave like tiny magnets.

So far, scientists have mostly been limited to using certain magnetic materials. These lack the favorable electronic properties of semiconductors, constraining device performance.

“In this work, we combine magnetism and semiconductor physics to realize useful spintronic devices,” Liu says.

The researchers replace the silicon in the surface layer of a transistor with chromium sulfur bromide, a two-dimensional material that acts as a magnetic semiconductor.

Due to the material’s structure, researchers can switch between two magnetic states very cleanly. This makes it ideal for use in a transistor that smoothly switches between “on” and “off.”

“One of the biggest challenges we faced was finding the right material. We tried many other materials that didn’t work,” Chou says.

They discovered that changing these magnetic states modifies the material’s electronic properties, enabling low-energy operation. And unlike many other 2D materials, chromium sulfur bromide remains stable in air.

To make a transistor, the researchers pattern electrodes onto a silicon substrate, then carefully align and transfer the 2D material on top. They use tape to pick up a tiny piece of material, only a few tens of nanometers thick, and place it onto the substrate.

“A lot of researchers will use solvents or glue to do the transfer, but transistors require a very clean surface. We eliminate all those risks by simplifying this step,” Chou says.

Leveraging magnetism

This lack of contamination enables their device to outperform existing magnetic transistors. Most others can only create a weak magnetic effect, changing the flow of current by a few percent or less. Their new transistor can switch or amplify the electric current by a factor of 10.

They use an external magnetic field to change the magnetic state of the material, switching the transistor using significantly less energy than would usually be required.

The material also allows them to control the magnetic states with electric current. This is important because engineers cannot apply magnetic fields to individual transistors in an electronic device. They need to control each one electrically.

The material’s magnetic properties could also enable transistors with built-in memory, simplifying the design of logic or memory circuits.

A typical memory device has a magnetic cell to store information and a transistor to read it out. Their method can combine both into one magnetic transistor.

“Now, not only are transistors turning on and off, they are also remembering information. And because we can switch the transistor with greater magnitude, the signal is much stronger so we can read out the information faster, and in a much more reliable way,” Liu says.

Building on this demonstration, the researchers plan to further study the use of electrical current to control the device. They are also working to make their method scalable so they can fabricate arrays of transistors.

This research was supported, in part, by the Semiconductor Research Corporation, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Army Research Office, and the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sports. The work was partially carried out at the MIT.nano facilities.

The world has been forced to bear the weight of billionaires and politicians who salivate over making tech more invasive, more controlling, and more hostile. That's why EFF’s mission for your digital rights is crucial, and why your support matters more than ever. You can fuel the fight for privacy and free speech with as little as $5 or $10 a month:

Join EFF

Become a Monthly Sustaining Donor

When you donate by December 31, your monthly support goes even further by unlocking bonus Year-End Challenge grants! With your help, EFF can receive up to seven grants that increase in size as the number of supporters grows (check our progress on the counter). Many thanks to EFF’s Board of Directors for creating the 2025 challenge fund.

The EFF team makes every dollar count. EFF members giving just $10 or less each month raised $400,000 for digital rights in the last year. That funds court motions, software development, educational campaigns, and investigations for the public good every day. EFF member support matters, and we need you.

📣 Stand Together: That’s How We Win 📣

You can help EFF hold corporations and authoritarians to account. We fight for tech users in the courts and we lobby and educate lawmakers, all while developing free privacy-enhancing tech and educational resources so people can protect themselves now. Your monthly donation will keep us going strong in this pivotal moment.

Get your choice of free gear when you join EFF!

Your privacy online and the right to express yourself are powerful—and it’s the reason authoritarians work so viciously to take them away. But together, we can make sure technology remains a tool for the people. Become a monthly Sustaining Donor or give a one-time donation of any size by December 31 and unlock additional Year-End Challenge grants!

Give Today

Unlock Year-End Challenge Grants

Already an EFF Member? Help Us Spread the Word!

EFF Members have carried the movement for privacy and free expression for decades. You can help move the mission even further! Here’s some sample language that you can share with your networks:

We need to stand together and ensure technology works for us, not against us. Donate any amount to EFF by Dec 31, and you'll help unlock challenge grants! https://eff.org/yec
Bluesky | Facebook | LinkedIn | Mastodon
(more at eff.org/social)

_________________

EFF is a member-supported U.S. 501(c)(3) organization. We’re celebrating TWELVE YEARS of top ratings from the nonprofit watchdog Charity Navigator! Your donation is tax-deductible as allowed by law.

In 2024, EFF wrote our initial blog about what could go wrong when police let AI write police reports. Since then, the technology has proliferated at a disturbing rate. Why? The most popular generative AI tool for writing police reports is Axon’s Draft One, and Axon also happens to be the largest provider of body-worn cameras to police departments in the United States. As we’ve written, companies are increasingly bundling their products to make it easier for police to buy more technology than they may need or that the public feels comfortable with. 

We have good news and bad news. 

Here’s the bad news: AI written police reports are still unproven, untransparent, and downright irresponsible–especially when the criminal justice system, informed by police reports, is deciding people’s freedom. The King County prosecuting attorney’s office in Washington state barred police from using AI to write police reports. As their memo read, “We do not fear advances in technology – but we do have legitimate concerns about some of the products on the market now... AI continues to develop and we are hopeful that we will reach a point in the near future where these reports can be relied on. For now, our office has made the decision not to accept any police narratives that were produced with the assistance of AI.” 

In July of this year, EFF published a two-part report on how Axon designed Draft One to defy transparency. Police upload their body-worn camera’s audio into the system, the system generates a report that the officer is expected to edit, and then the officer exports the report. But when they do that, Draft One erases the initial draft, and with it any evidence of what portions of the report were written by AI and what portions were written by an officer. That means that if an officer is caught lying on the stand – as shown by a contradiction between their courtroom testimony and their earlier police report – they could point to the contradictory parts of their report and say, “the AI wrote that.” Draft One is designed to make it hard to disprove that. 

In this video of a roundtable discussion about Draft One, Axon’s senior principal product manager for generative AI is asked (at the 49:47 mark) whether or not it’s possible to see after-the-fact which parts of the report were suggested by the AI and which were edited by the officer. His response (bold and definition of RMS added): 

“So we don’t store the original draft and that’s by design and that’s really because the last thing we want to do is create more disclosure headaches for our customers and our attorney’s offices—so basically the officer generates that draft, they make their edits, if they submit it into our Axon records system then that’s the only place we store it, if they copy and paste it into their third-party RMS [records management system] system as soon as they’re done with that and close their browser tab, it’s gone. It’s actually never stored in the cloud at all so you don’t have to worry about extra copies floating around.”

Yikes! 

All of this obfuscation also makes it incredibly hard for people outside police departments to figure out if their city’s officers are using AI to write reports–and even harder to use public records requests to audit just those reports. That’s why this year EFF also put out a comprehensive guide to help the public make their records requests as tailored as possible to learn about AI-generated reports. 

Ok, now here’s the good news: People who believe AI-written police reports are irresponsible and potentially harmful to the public are fighting back. 

This year, two states have passed bills that are an important first step in reigning in AI police reports. Utah’s SB 180 mandates that police reports created in whole or in part by generative AI have a disclaimer that the report contains content generated by AI. It also requires officers to certify that they checked the report for accuracy. California’s SB 524 went even further. It requires police to disclose, on the report, if it was used to fully or in part author a police report. Further, it bans vendors from selling or sharing the information a police agency provided to the AI. The bill also requires departments to retain the first draft of the report so that judges, defense attorneys, or auditors could readily see which portions of the final report were written by the officer and which portions were written by the computer.

In the coming year, anticipate many more states joining California and Utah in regulating, or perhaps even banning, police from using AI to write their reports. 

This article is part of our Year in Review series. Read other articles about the fight for digital rights in 2025.

The US legal profession was just one of the pillars of American democracy that was targeted in the early days of the second Trump administration. At EFF, we were proud to publicly and loudly support the legal profession and, most importantly, continue to do our work challenging the government’s erosion of digital rights—work that became even more critical as many law firms shied away from pro bono work.

For those that don’t know: pro bono work is work that for-profit law firms undertake for the public good. This usually means providing legal counsel to clients who desperately need but cannot afford it. It’s a vital practice, since non-profits like EFF don’t have the same capacity, resources, or expertise of a classic white shoe law firm. It’s mutually beneficial, actually, since law firms and non-profits have different experience and areas of expertise that can supplement each other’s work.

A little more than a month into the new administration, President Trump began retaliating against large law firms who supported had investigations against him or litigated against his interests, representing clients either challenging his policies during his first term or defending the outcome of the 2020 election among other cases. The retaliation quickly spread to other firms—firms lost government contracts and had security clearances stripped from their lawyers. Twenty large law firm were threatened by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission over their DEI policies. Individual lawyers were also targeted. The policy attacking the legal profession was memorialized as official policy in the March 22, 2025 presidential memo Preventing Abuses of the Legal System and the Federal Court.

Although many of the targeted firms shockingly and regrettably capitulated, a few law firms sued to undo the actions against them. EFF was eager to support them, joining amicus briefs in each case. Over 500 law firms across the country joined supportive amicus briefs as well.

We also thought it critically important to publicly state our support for the targeted law firms and to call out the administration’s actions as violating the rule of law. So we did. We actually expected numerous law firms and legal organizations to also issue statements. But no one else did. EFF was thus the very first non-targeted legal organization in the country, either law firm or nonprofit, to publicly oppose the administration’s attack on the independence of the legal profession. Fortunately, within the week, firms started to speak up as well. As did the American Bar Association.

In the meantime, EFF’s legal work has become even more critical as law firms have reportedly pulled back on their pro bono hours since the administration’s attacks. Indeed, recognizing the extraordinary need, we ramped up out litigation, including cases against the federal government, suing DOGE for stealing Americans’ data, the state department for chilling visa-holders’ speech by surveilling and threatening to surveil their social media posts, and seeking records of the administration’s demands to online platforms to remove ICE oversight apps.

And we’re going to keep on going in 2026 and beyond.

This article is part of our Year in Review series. Read other articles about the fight for digital rights in 2025.

Each December we take a moment to publish a series of blog posts that look back at the things we’ve accomplishes in fighting for your rights and privacy the past 12 months. But this year I’ve been thinking not just about the past 12 months, but also over the past 25 years I’ve spent at EFF.  As many folks know, I’ve decided to pass the leadership torch and will leave EFF in 2026, so this will be the last time I write one of these annual reviews.  It’s bittersweet, but I’m filled with pride, especially about how we stick with fights over the long run.  

EFF has come a long way since I joined in 2000.  In so many ways, the work and reputation we have built laid the groundwork for years like 2025 – when freedom, justice and innovation were under attack from many directions at once with tech unfortunately at the center of many of them.  As a result, we launched our Take Back CRTL campaign to put the focus on fighting back. 

In addition to the specific issues we address in this year-end series of blog posts, EFF brought our legal expertise to several challenges to the Trump Administration’s attacks on privacy, free speech and security, including directly bringing two cases against the government and filing multiple amicus briefs in others.  In some ways, that’s not new: we’ve worked in the courts to hold the government accountable all the way back to our founding in1990.  

In this introductory blog post, however, I want to highlight two topics that attest to our long history of advocacy.  The first is our battle against the censorship and privacy nightmares that come from requirements that internet users to submit to  age verification. We’ve long known that age verification technologies, which aim to block young people from viewing or sharing information that the government deems “harmful” or “offensive,” end up becoming  tools of censorship.  They often rely on facial recognition and other techniques that have unacceptable levels of inaccuracy and that create security risks.  Ultimately, they are surveillance systems that chill access to vital online communities and resources, and burden the expressive rights of adults and young people alike. 

The second is automated license plate readers (ALPR), which serve as a mass surveillance network of our locations as we go about our day.  We sued over this technology in 2013, demanding public access to records about their use and ultimately won at the California Supreme Court.  But 2025 is the year that the general public began to understand just how much information is being collected and used by governments and private entities alike, and to recognize the dangers that causes. Our investigations team filed another public records requests, revealing racist searches done by police. And 12 years later after our first lawsuit, our lawyers filed another case, this time directly challenging the ALPR policies of San Jose, California.  In addition, our activists have been working with people in municipalities across the country who want to stop their city’s use of ALPR in their communities.  Groups in Austin, Texas, for example, worked hard to get their city to reject a new contract for these cameras.  

These are just two issues of many that have engaged our lawyers, activists, and technologists this year. But they show how we dig in for the long run and are ready when small issues become bigger ones.   

The more than 100 people who work at EFF spent this last year proving their mettle in battles, many of which are nowhere near finished. But we will push on, and when those issues breach public consciousness, we’ll be ready.    

We can only keep doggedly working on these issues year after year because of you, our members and supporters. You engage on these issues, you tell us when something is happening in your town, and your donations power everything we do. This may be my last end-of-the-year blog post, but thanks to you, EFF is here to stay.  We’re strong, we’re ready, and we know how to stick with things for the long run. Thanks for holding us up.    

This article is part of our Year in Review series. Read other articles about the fight for digital rights in 2025.

News:

The Danish Defence Intelligence Service (DDIS) announced on Thursday that Moscow was behind a cyber-attack on a Danish water utility in 2024 and a series of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on Danish websites in the lead-up to the municipal and regional council elections in November.

The first, it said, was carried out by the pro-Russian group known as Z-Pentest and the second by NoName057(16), which has links to the Russian state.

Slashdot thread.

Investment firms have put over $100 million into developing risky technologies that could cool the planet with unknown side effects.

Republican worries about energy affordability didn’t deter the administration from halting five projects that had already begun construction.

The insurer, fighting to protect internal records, said the Illinois insurance regulator made "improper efforts" to push aside other state regulators.

The layoffs at Twelve follow the reelection of President Donald Trump and the rollback of incentives that were designed to spur the production of sustainable aviation fuel.

The EU and U.S. agreed in July to limit tariffs on most EU exports to 15 percent in a deal that included a commitment that environmental, social and governance rules don’t get in the way of trade.

Social workers say plantation laborers, already living in distressed conditions, are in an even more desperate situation after Cyclone Ditwah.

Kenya's Lakes Baringo, Nakuru, Naivasha and Turkana — all in the Rift Valley — have been steadily rising for 15 years.

The Bloomberg Green team picks eight climate and environmental books they loved despite their weighty content.

MIT researchers have developed a new method for designing 3D structures that can be transformed from a flat configuration into their curved, fully formed shape with only a single pull of a string.

This technique could enable the rapid deployment of a temporary field hospital at the site of a disaster such as a devastating tsunami — a situation where quick medical action is essential to save lives.

The researchers’ approach converts a user-specified 3D structure into a flat shape composed of interconnected tiles. The algorithm uses a two-step method to find the path with minimal friction for a string that can be tightened to smoothly actuate the structure.

The actuation mechanism is easily reversible, and if the string is released, the structure quickly returns to its flat configuration. This could enable complex, 3D structures to be stored and transported more efficiently and with less cost.

In addition, the designs generated by their system are agnostic to the fabrication method, so complete structures can be produced using 3D printing, CNC milling, molding, or other techniques.

This method could enable the creation of transportable medical devices, foldable robots that can flatten to enter hard-to-reach spaces, or even modular space habitats that can be actuated by robots working on the surface of Mars.

“The simplicity of the whole actuation mechanism is a real benefit of our approach. The user just needs to provide their intended design, and then our method optimizes it in such a way that it holds the shape after just one pull on the string, so the structure can be deployed very easily. I hope people will be able to use this method to create a wide variety of different, deployable structures,” says Akib Zaman, an electrical engineering and computer science (EECS) graduate student and lead author of a paper on this new method.

He is joined on the paper by MIT graduate student Jacqueline Aslarus; postdoc Jiaji Li; Associate Professor Stefanie Mueller, leader of the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) Engineering Group in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL); and senior author Mina Konaković Luković, an assistant professor and leader of the Algorithmic Design Group in CSAIL. The research was presented at the Association for Computing Machinery’s SIGGRAPH Conference and Exhibition on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques in Asia.

From ancient art to an algorithm

Creating deployable structures from flat pieces simplifies on-site assembly and could be especially useful in constructing emergency shelters after natural disasters. On a smaller scale, items like foldable bike helmets could improve the safety of riders who would otherwise be unable to carry a bulky helmet.

But converting flat, deployable objects into their 3D shape often requires specialized equipment or multiple steps, and the actuation mechanism is typically difficult to reverse.

“Because of these challenges, deployable structures tend to be manually designed and quite simple, geometrically. But if we can create more complex geometries, while simplifying the actuation mechanism, we could enhance the capabilities of these deployables,” Zaman says.

To do this, the researchers created a method that automatically converts a user’s 3D design into a flat structure comprised of tiles, connected by rotating hinges at the corners, which can be fully actuated by pulling a single string one time.

Their method breaks a user design into a grid of quadrilateral tiles inspired by kirigami, the ancient Japanese art of paper cutting. With kirigami, by cutting a material in certain ways, they can encode it with unique properties. In this case, they use kirigami to create an auxetic mechanism, which is a structure that gets thicker when stretched and thinner when compressed.

After encoding the 3D geometry into a flat set of auxetic tiles, the algorithm computes the minimum number of points that the tightening string must lift to fully deploy the 3D structure. Then, it finds the shortest path that connects those lift points, while including all areas of the object’s boundary that must be connected to guide the structure into its 3D configuration. It does these calculations in such a way that the optimal string path minimizes friction, enabling the structure to be smoothly actuated with just one pull.

“Our method makes it easy for the user. All they have to do is input their design, and our algorithm automatically takes care of the rest. Then all the user needs to do is to fabricate the tiles exactly the way it has been computed by the algorithm,” Zaman says.

For instance, one could fabricate a structure using a multi-material 3D printer that prints the hinges of the tiles with a flexible material and the other surfaces with a hard material.

A scale independent method

One of the biggest challenges the researchers faced was figuring out how the string route and the friction within the string channel can be effectively modeled as close to physical reality.

“While playing with a few fabricated models, we observed that closing boundary tiles is a must to enable a successful deployment and the string must be routed through them. Later, we proved this observation mathematically. Then, we looked back at an age-old physics equation and used it to formulate the optimization problem for friction minimization,” he says.

They built their automatic algorithm into an interactive user interface that allows one to design and optimize configurations to generate manufacturable objects.

The researchers used their method to design several objects of different sizes, from personalized medical items including a splint and a posture corrector to an igloo-like portable structure. They also fabricated a deployable, human-scale chair they designed using their method.

This method is scale independent, so it could be used to create tiny deployable objects that are injected and actuated inside the body, or architectural structures, like the frame of a building, that are deployed and actuated on-site using cranes.

In the future, the researchers want to further explore the design of tiny structures, while also tackling the engineering challenges involved in creating architectural installations, such as determining the ideal cable thickness and the necessary strength of the hinges. In addition, they want to create a self-deploying mechanism, so the structures do not need to be actuated by a human or robot.

This research is funded, in part, by an MIT Research Support Committee Award.

“At MIT, innovation ranges from awe-inspiring technology to down-to-Earth creativity,” noted Chronicle, during a campus visit this year for an episode of the program. In 2025, MIT researchers made headlines across print publications, podcasts, and video platforms for key scientific advances, from breakthroughs in quantum and artificial intelligence to new efforts aimed at improving pediatric health care and cancer diagnosis.

MIT faculty, researchers, students, alumni and staff helped demystify new technologies, highlighted the practical hands-on learning the Institute is known for, and shared what inspires their research with viewers, readers and listeners around the world. Below is a sampling of news moments to revisit.

Let’s take a closer look at MIT: It’s alarming to see such a complex, important institution subject to the whims of today’s politics
Washington Post columnist George F. Will reflects on MIT and his view of “the damage that can be done to America’s meritocracy by policies motivated by hostility toward institutions vital to it.” Will notes that MIT has an “astonishing economic multiplier effect: MIT graduates have founded companies that have generated almost $1.9 trillion in annual revenue (a sum almost equal to Russia’s GDP) and 4.6 million jobs.”
Full story via The Washington Post

At MIT, groundbreaking ideas blend science and breast cancer detection innovation
Chronicle visited MIT this spring to learn more about how the Institute “nurtures groundbreaking efforts, reminding us that creativity and science thrive together, inspiring future advancements in engineering, medicine, and beyond.”
Full story via Chronicle

New MIT provost looks to build more bridges with CEOs
Provost Anantha Chandrakasan shares his energy and enthusiasm for MIT, and his goals for the Institute.
Full story via The Boston Globe

Five things New England researchers helped develop with federal funding
Professors John Guttag and David Mindell discuss MIT’s long history of developing foundational technologies — including the internet and the first widely used electronic navigation system — with the support of federal funding.
Full story via The Boston Globe

Bostonians of the Year 2025: First responders, university presidents, and others who exemplified courage
President Sally Kornbluth is honored by The Boston Globe as one of the Bostonians of the Year, a list that spotlights individuals across the region who, in choosing the difficult path, “showed us what strength looks like.” Kornbluth was recognized for her work being of the “most prominent voices rallying to protect academic freedom.”
Full story via The Boston Globe

Practical education and workforce preparation

College students flock to a new major: AI
MIT’s new Artificial Intelligence and Decision Making major is aimed at teaching students to “develop AI systems and study how technologies like robots interact with humans and the environment.”
Full story via New York Times

50 colleges with the best ROI
MIT has been named among the top colleges in the country for return on investment. MIT “is need-blind and full-need for undergraduate students. Six out of 10 students receive financial aid, and almost 88% of the Class of 2025 graduated debt-free.”
Full story via Boston 25

Desirée Plata: Chemist, oceanographer, engineer, entrepreneur
Professor Desirée Plata explains that she is most proud of her work as an educator. “The faculty of the world are training the next generation of researchers,” says Plata. “We need a trained workforce. We need patient chemists who want to solve important problems.”
Full story via Chemical & Engineering News

Taking a quantum leap

MIT launches quantum initiative to tackle challenges in science, health care, national security
MIT is “taking a quantum leap with the launch of the new MIT Quantum Initiative (QMIT). “There isn't a more important technological field right now than quantum with its enormous potential for impact on both fundamental research and practical problems,” said President Sally Kornbluth.
Full story via State House News Service

Peter Shor on how quantum tech can help climate
Professor Peter Shor helps disentangle quantum technologies.
Full story via The Quantum Kid

MIT researchers develop device to enable direct communication between multiple quantum processors
MIT researchers made a key advance in the creation of a practical quantum computer.
Full story via Military & Aerospace Electronics

Fortifying national security and aiding disaster response

Nano-material breakthrough could revolutionize night vision
MIT researchers developed “a new way to make large ultrathin infrared sensors that don’t need cryogenic cooling and could radically change night vision for the military.”
Full story via Defense One

MIT researchers develop robot designed to help first-responders in disaster situations
Researchers at MIT engineered SPROUT (Soft Pathfinding Robotic Observation Unit), a robot aimed at assisting first-responders.
Full story via WHDH

MIT scientists make “smart” clothes that warn you when you’re sick
As part of an effort to help keep service members safe, MIT scientists created a programmable fiber that can be stitched into clothing to help monitor the wearer’s health.
Full story via FOX 28

MIT Lincoln Lab develops ocean-mapping technology
MIT Lincoln Laboratory researchers are developing “automated electric vessels to map the ocean floor and improve search and rescue missions.”
Full story via Chronicle

Transformative tech

This MIT scientist is rewiring robots to keep the humanity in tech
Professor Daniela Rus, director of the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab, discusses her work revolutionizing the field of robotics by bringing “empathy into engineering and proving that responsibility is as radical and as commercially attractive as unguarded innovation.”
Full story via Forbes

Watch this tiny robot somersault through the air like an insect
Professor Kevin Chen designed a tiny, insect-sized aerial microrobot.
Full story via Science

It's actually really hard to make a robot, guys
Professor Pulkit Agrawal delves into his work engineering a simulator that can be used to train robots.
Full story via NPR

Shape-shifting fabrics and programmable materials redefine design at MIT
Associate Professor Skylar Tibbits is embedding intelligence into the materials around us, while Professor Caitlin Mueller and Sandy Curth PhD ’25 are digging into eco-friendly construction.
Full story via Chronicle

Building a healthier future

MIT launches pediatric research hub to address access gaps
The Hood Pediatric Innovation Hub is addressing “underinvestment in pediatric healthcare innovations.”
Full story via Boston Business Journal

Bionic knee helps amputees walk naturally again
Professor Hugh Herr developed a prosthetic that could increase mobility for above-the-knee amputees. “The bionic knee developed by MIT doesn’t just restore function, it redefines it.”
Full story via Fox News

MIT drug hunters are using AI to design completely new antibiotics
Professor James Collins is using AI to develop new compounds to combat antibiotic resistance.
Full story via Fast Company

Innovative once-weekly capsule helps quell schizophrenia symptoms
A new pill from the lab of Associate Professor Giovanni Traverso “can greatly simplify the drug schedule faced by schizophrenia patients.”
Full story via Newsmax

Renewing American manufacturing

US manufacturing is in “pretty bad shape.” MIT hopes to change that.
MIT launched the Initiative for New Manufacturing to help “build the tools and talent to shape a more productive and sustainable future for manufacturing.”
Full story via Manufacturing Dive

Giving US manufacturing a boost
Ben Armstrong of the MIT Industrial Performance Center discusses how to reinvigorate manufacturing in America.
Full story via Marketplace

New England companies are sparking an industrial revolution. Here’s how to harness it.
Professor David Mindell spotlights how “a new wave of industrial companies, many in New England, are leveraging new technologies to create jobs and empower workers.”
Full story via The Boston Globe 

Improving aging

My day as an 80-year-old. What an age-simulation suit taught me.
To get a better sense of the experience of aging, Wall Street Journal reporter Amy Dockser Marcus donned the MIT AgeLab’s age-simulation suit and embarked on multiple activities.
Full story via The Wall Street Journal

New mobile robot helps seniors walk safely and prevent falls
A mobile robot created by MIT engineers is designed to help prevent falls. “It's easy to see how something like this could make a big difference for seniors wanting to stay independent.”
Full story via Fox News

The senior population is booming. Caregiving is struggling to keep up
Professor Jonathan Gruber discusses the labor shortages impacting senior care.
Full story via CNBC

Upping our energy resilience

New MIT collaboration with GE Vernova aims to accelerate energy transition
“A great amount of innovation happens in academia. We have a longer view into the future,” says Provost Anantha Chandrakasan of the MIT-GE Vernova Energy and Climate Alliance.
Full story via The Boston Globe

The environmental impacts of generative AI
Noman Bashir, a fellow with MIT’s Climate and Sustainability Consortium, explores the environmental impacts of generative AI.
Full story via Fox 13

Is the clean energy economy doomed?
Professor Christopher Knittel discusses how the U.S. can be in the best position for global energy dominance.
Full story via Marketplace

Advancing American workers

WTH can we do to prevent a second China shock? Professor David Autor explains
Professor David Autor shares his research examining the long-term impact of China entering the World Trade Organization, how the U.S. can protect vital industries from unfair trade practices, and the potential impacts of AI on workers.
Full story via American Enterprise Institute

The fight over robots threatening American jobs
Professor Daron Acemoglu highlights the economic and societal implications of integrating automation in the workforce, advocating for policies aimed at assisting workers.
Full story via Financial Times

Moving toward automation
Research Scientist Eva Ponce of the MIT Center for Transportation and Logistics notes that robotics and AI technologies are “replacing some jobs — particularly more manual tasks including heavy lifting — but have also offered new opportunities within warehouse operations.”
Full story via Financial Times

Planetary defense and out-of-this world exploration

MIT researchers create new asteroid detection methods to help protect Earth
Associate Professor Julien de Wit and Research Scientist Artem Burdanov discuss their work developing a new method to track asteroids that could impact Earth.
Full story via WBZ Radio

What happens to the bodies of NASA astronauts returning to Earth?
Professor Dava Newman speaks about how long-duration stays in space can affect the human body.
Full story via News Nation

Lunar lander Athena is packed and ready to explore the moon. Here’s what on board
MIT engineers sent three payloads into space on a course set for the moon’s south polar region.
Full story via USA Today

Scanning the heavens at the Vatican Observatory
Br. Guy Consolmagno '74, SM '75, director of the Vatican Observatory, and graduate student Isabella Macias share their experiences studying astronomy and planetary formation at the Vatican Observatory. “The Vatican has such a deep, rich history of working with astronomers,” says Macias. “It shows that science is not only for global superpowers around the world, but it's for students, it's for humanity.”
Full story via CBS News Sunday Morning

The story of real-life rocket scientists
Professor Kerri Cahoy takes viewers on an out-of-this-world journey into how a college internship inspired her research on space and satellites.
Full story via Bloomberg Television 

On the air 

While digital currency initiatives expand, we ask: What’s the future of cash?
Neha Narula, director of the MIT Digital Currency Initiative, examines the future of cash as the use of digital currencies expands.
Full story via USA Today

The high stakes of the AI economy
Professor Asu Ozdaglar, head of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and deputy dean of the MIT Schwarzman College of Computing, explores AI’s opportunities and risks — and whether it can be regulated without stifling progress.
Full story via Is Business Broken? 

The LIGO Lab is pushing the boundaries of gravitational-wave research
Associate Professor Matt Evans explores the future of gravitational wave research and how Cosmic Explorer, the next-generation gravitational wave observatory, will help unearth secrets of the early universe.
Full story via Scientific American

Space junk: The impact of global warming on satellites
Graduate student Will Parker discusses his research examining the impact of climate change on satellites.
Full story via USA Today

Endometriosis is common. Why is getting diagnosed so hard?
Professor Linda Griffith shares her work studying endometriosis and her efforts to improve healthcare for women.
Full story via Science Friday

There’s nothing small about this nanoscale research
Professor Vladimir Bulović takes listeners on a tour of MIT.nano, MIT’s “clean laboratory facility that is critical to nanoscale research, from microelectronics to medical nanotechnology.”
Full story via Scientific American

Marrying science and athletics

The MIT scientist behind the “torpedo bats” that are blowing up baseball
Aaron Leanhardt PhD ’03 went from an MIT graduate student who was part of a research team that “cooled sodium gas to the lowest temperature ever recorded in human history” to inventor of the torpedo baseball bat, “perhaps the most significant development in bat technology in decades.”
Full story via The Wall Street Journal

Engineering athletes redefine routine
After suffering a concussion during her sophomore year, Emiko Pope ’25 was inspired to explore the effectiveness of concussion headbands.
Full story via American Society of Mechanical Engineers

“I missed talking math with people”: why John Urschel left the NFL for MIT
Assistant Professor John Urschel shares his decision to call an audible and leave his NFL career to focus on his love for math at MIT.
Full story via The Guardian

Making a statement, MIT’s football team dons extra head padding for safety
It’s a piece of equipment that may become more widely used as research continues into its effectiveness — including from at least one of the players on the current team.
Full story via GBH Morning Edition

Agricultural efficiency

New MIT breakthrough could save farmers billions on pesticides
MIT engineers developed a system that helps pesticides adhere more effectively to plant leaves, allowing farmers to use fewer chemicals.
Full story via Michigan Farm News

Bug-sized robots could help pollination on future farms
Insect-sized robots crafted by MIT researchers could one day be used to help with farming practices like artificial pollination.
Full story via Reuters

See how MIT researchers harvest water from the air
An ultrasonic device created by MIT engineers can extract clean drinking water from atmospheric moisture.
Full story via CNN

Appreciating art

Meet the engineer using deep learning to restore Renaissance art
Graduate student Alex Kachkine talks about his work applying AI to develop a restoration method for damaged artwork.
Full story via Nature

MIT’s Linde Music Building opens with a free festival
“The extent of art-making on the MIT campus is equal to that of a major city,” says Institute Professor Marcus Thompson. “It’s a miracle that it’s all right here, by people in science and technology who are absorbed in creating a new world and who also value the past, present and future of music and the arts.”
Full story via Cambridge Day

“Remembering the Future” on display at the MIT Museum
The “Remembering the Future” exhibit at the MIT Museum features a sculptural installation that uses “climate data from the last ice age to the present, as well as projected future environments, to create a geometric design.”
Full story via The New York Times 

In 2025, MIT maintained its standard of community and research excellence amidst a shift in national priorities regarding the federal funding of higher education. Notably, QS ranked MIT No. 1 in the world for the 14th straight year, while U.S. News ranked MIT No. 2 in the nation for the 5th straight year.

This year, President Sally Kornbluth also added to the Institute’s slate of community-wide strategic initiatives, with new collaborative efforts focused on manufacturing, generative artificial intelligence, and quantum science and engineering. In addition, MIT opened several new buildings and spaces, hosted a campuswide art festival, and continued its tradition of bringing the latest in science and technology to the local community and to the world. Here are some of the top stories from around MIT over the past 12 months.

MIT collaboratives

President Kornbluth announced three new Institute-wide collaborative efforts designed to foster and support alliances that will take on global problems. The Initiative for New Manufacturing (INM) will work toward bolstering industry and creating jobs by driving innovation across vital manufacturing sectors. The MIT Generative AI Impact Consortium (MGAIC), a group of industry leaders and MIT researchers, aims to harness the power of generative artificial intelligence for the good of society. And the MIT Quantum Initiative (QMIT) will leverage quantum breakthroughs to drive the future of scientific and technological progress.

These missions join three announced last year — the Climate Project at MIT, the MIT Human Insight Collaborative (MITHIC), and the MIT Health and Life Sciences Collaborative (MIT HEALS).

Sharing the wonders of science and technology

This year saw the launch of MIT Learn, a dynamic AI-enabled website that hosts nearly 13,000 non-degree learning opportunities, making it easier for learners around the world to discover the courses and resources available on MIT’s various learning platforms.

The Institute also hosted the Cambridge Science Carnival, a hands-on event managed by the MIT Museum that drew approximately 20,000 attendees and featured more than 140 activities, demonstrations, and installations tied to the topics of science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM).

Commencement

At Commencement, Hank Green urged MIT’s newest graduates to focus their work on the “everyday solvable problems of normal people,” even if it is not always the easiest or most obvious course of action. Green is a popular content creator and YouTuber whose work often focuses on science and STEAM issues, and who co-created the educational media company Complexly.

President Kornbluth challenged graduates to be “ambassadors” for the open-minded inquiry and collaborative work that marks everyday life at MIT.

Top accolades

In January, the White House bestowed national medals of science and technology — the country’s highest awards for scientists and engineers — on four MIT professors and an additional alumnus. Moderna, with deep MIT roots, was also recognized.

As in past years, MIT faculty, staff, and alumni were honored with election to the various national academies: the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Medicine, and the National Academy of Inventors.

Faculty member Carlo Ratti served as curator of the Venice Biennale’s 19th International Architecture Exhibition.

Members of MIT Video Productions won a New England Emmy Award for their short film on the art and science of hand-forged knives with master bladesmith Bob Kramer.

And at MIT, Dimitris Bertsimas, vice provost for open learning and a professor of operations research, won this year’s Killian Award, the Institute’s highest faculty honor.

New and refreshed spaces

In the heart of campus, the Edward and Joyce Linde Music Building became fully operational to start off the year. In celebration, the Institute hosted Artfinity, a vibrant multiweek exploration of art and ideas, with more than 80 free performing and visual arts events including a film festival, interactive augmented-reality art installations, a simulated lunar landing, and concerts by both student groups and internationally renowned musicians.

Over the summer, the “Outfinite” — the open space connecting Hockfield Court with Massachusetts Avenue — was officially named the L. Rafael Reif Innovation Corridor in honor of President Emeritus L. Rafael Reif, MIT’s 17th president.

And in October, the Undergraduate Advising Center’s bright new home opened in Building 11 along the Infinite Corridor, bringing a welcoming and functional destination for MIT undergraduate students within the Institute’s Main Group.

Student honors and awards

MIT undergraduates earned an impressive number of prestigious awards in 2025. Exceptional students were honored with Rhodes, Gates Cambridge, and Schwarzman scholarships, among others.

A number of MIT student-athletes also helped to secure their team’s first NCAA national championship in Institute history: Women’s track and field won both the indoor national championship and outdoor national championship, while women’s swimming and diving won their national title as well.

Also for the fifth year in a row, MIT students earned all five top spots at the Putnam Mathematical Competition.

Leadership transitions

Several senior administrative leaders took on new roles in 2025. Anantha Chandrakasan was named provost; Paula Hammond was named dean of the School of Engineering; Richard Locke was named dean of the MIT Sloan School of Management; Gaspare LoDuca was named vice president for information systems and technology and CIO; Evelyn Wang was named vice president for energy and climate; and David Darmofal was named vice chancellor for undergraduate and graduate education.

Additional new leadership transitions include: Ana Bakshi was named executive director of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship; Fikile Brushett was named director of the David H. Koch School of Chemical Engineering Practice; Laurent Demanet was named co-director of the Center for Computational Science and Engineering; Rohit Karnik was named director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Water and Food Systems Lab; Usha Lee McFarling was named director of the Knight Science Journalism Program; C. Cem Tasan was named director of the Materials Research Laboratory; and Jessika Trancik was named director of the Sociotechnical Systems Research Center.

Remembering those we lost

Among MIT community members who died this year were David Baltimore, Juanita Battle, Harvey Kent Bowen, Stanley Fischer, Frederick Greene, Lee Grodzins, John Joannopoulos, Keith Johnson, Daniel Kleppner, Earle Lomon, Nuno Loureiro, Victor K. McElheny, David Schmittlein, Anthony Sinskey, Peter Temin, Barry Vercoe, Rainer Weiss, Alan Whitney, and Ioannis Yannas.

In case you missed it…

Additional top stories from around the Institute in 2025 include a description of the environmental and sustainability implications of generative AI tech and applications; the story of how an MIT professor introduced hundreds of thousands of students to neuroscience with his classic textbook; a look at how MIT entrepreneurs are using AI; a roundup of new books by MIT faculty and staff; and behind the scenes with MIT students who cracked a longstanding egg dilemma. 

In 2025, MIT’s research community had another prolific year filled with exciting scientific and technological advances. To celebrate the achievements of the past 12 months, MIT News highlights some of our most-read stories from this year.

• More powerful concrete “batteries”: MIT researchers combined cement, water, ultra-fine carbon black, and electrolytes to create electron-conducting carbon concrete. The researchers say the material could enable everyday structures like walls, sidewalks, and bridges to store and release electrical energy.
   
• Confirming the famous double-slit experiment: Physicists performed an idealized version of one of the most famous experiments in quantum physics, demonstrating with atomic-level precision the dual nature of light. The experiment confirmed that light exists as both a particle and a wave, though that duality cannot be simultaneously observed.
   
• Periodic table of machine learning: Researchers created a table that reveals connections among more than 20 classical machine-learning algorithms. The table stems from the idea that all algorithms learn a specific kind of relationship between data points. The framework could help scientists fuse different methods to improve existing AI models or come up with new ones.
   
• Photographing “free range” atoms: Physicists captured the first images of individual atoms freely interacting in space. The experiment used single-atom microscopy and ultracold quantum gases to reveal correlations between the particles that had been predicted but never before observed.
   
• Pulling drinking water from air: Engineers developed a window-sized device that acts as an atmospheric water harvester to produce fresh water anywhere. The origami-inspired device uses a hydrogel material that swells to absorb water — it even works in Death Valley, California.
   
• Generative AI versus drug-resistant bacteria: With help from artificial intelligence, researchers designed novel antibiotics that can combat two drug-resistant infections. First, a generative AI algorithm designed more than 35 million compounds. Then, the researchers screened them for antimicrobial properties, discovering drug candidates that are structurally distinct from any existing antibiotics.
   
• Tracking the ozone recovery: A study confirms the Antarctic ozone layer is healing as a direct result of global efforts to reduce ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons — chemicals that were used in refrigeration, air conditioning, insulation, and aerosol propellants.
   
• First evidence of “proto Earth”: Scientists discovered extremely rare remnants of an early version of our planet that formed about 4.5 billion years ago, before a colossal collision irreversibly altered its composition and produced the Earth as we know today. The findings will help scientists piece together the primordial starting ingredients that forged early Earth and the rest of the solar system.
   
• Restoring movement with a bionic knee: Researchers developed a bionic knee that can help people with above-the-knee amputations walk faster, climb stairs, and avoid obstacles. In a small study, users navigated more easily and said the limb felt more like a part of their body compared to traditional prostheses.
   
• How people walk in crowds: Mathematicians studied the flow of human crowds and developed a first-of-its-kind way to predict when pedestrian paths will transition from orderly to entangled. The findings could help inform the design of public spaces and promote safe and efficient thoroughfares.

In 2013, Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship Managing Director Bill Aulet published “Disciplined Entrepreneurship: 24 Steps to a Successful Startup,” which has since sold hundreds of thousands of copies and been used to teach entrepreneurship at universities around the world. One MIT course where it’s used is 15.366 (Climate and Energy Ventures), where instructors have tweaked the framework over the years. In a new book, “Disciplined Entrepreneurship for Climate and Energy Ventures,” they codify those changes and provide a new blueprint for entrepreneurs working in the climate and energy spaces.

MIT News spoke with lead author and Trust Center Entrepreneur-in-Residence Ben Soltoff, who wrote the book with Aulet, Senior Lecturer Tod Hynes, Senior Lecturer Francis O’Sullivan, and Lecturer Libby Wayman. Soltoff explains why climate and energy entrepreneurship is so challenging and talks about some of the new steps in the book.

Q: What are climate and energy ventures?

A: It’s a broad umbrella. These ventures aren’t all in a specific industry or structured in the same way. They could be software, they could be hardware, or they could be deep tech coming out of labs. This book is also written for people working in government, large corporations, or nonprofits. Each of those folks can benefit from the entrepreneurial framework in this book. We very intentionally refer to them as climate and energy ventures in the book, not just climate and energy startups.

One common theme is meeting the challenge of providing enough energy for current and future needs without exacerbating, or even while reducing, the impact we have on our planet. Generally, climate and energy ventures are less likely to be only software. Many of the solutions we need are around molecules, not bits. A lot of it is breakthrough technology and science from research labs. You could be making a useful fuel, removing CO2 from the atmosphere, or delivering something in a novel way. Your venture might produce a chemical or molecule that’s already being provided and is a commodity. It needs to be not only more sustainable, but better for your customers — either cheaper, more reliable, or more securely delivered. Ultimately, all of these ventures have to provide value. They also often involve physical infrastructure that you have to scale up — not just 10 times or 100 times, but 1,000 times or more — from original lab demonstrations.

Q: How should climate and energy entrepreneurs be thinking about navigating financing and working with the government?

A: One of the major themes of the book is the importance of figuring out if policy is in your favor and constantly applying a policy lens to what you’re building. Finance is another major theme. In climate and energy, these things are fundamental, and we need to consider them from the beginning. We talk about different “valleys of death” — the idea that going from one stage to the next stage requires this jump in time and resources that presents a big challenge. That also relates to the jump in scale of the technology, from a lab scale to something you can produce and sell in a quantity and at a cost the market is interested in. All of that requires financing.

At an early stage, a lot of these ventures are funded through grants and research funding. Later, they start getting early-stage capital — often venture capital. Eventually, as folks are scaling, they move to debt and project financing. Companies need to be very intentional about the type of financing they’re going to pursue and at what stage. We have an entire step on creating a long-term capital plan. Entrepreneurs need to be very clear about the story they’re going to tell investors at different stages. Otherwise, they can paint themselves into a corner and fail to build a company for the next stage of capital they need.

In terms of policy, entrepreneurs should use the policy environment as a filter for selecting a market. We have a story in the book about a startup that switched from working in sub-Saharan Africa to the U.S. after the Inflation Reduction Act passed. As those incentives began disappearing, they still had the option to return to their original market. It’s not ideal for them, but they are still able to build profitable projects. You shouldn’t build a company based on the incentives alone, but you should understand which way the wind is blowing and take advantage of policy when it’s in your favor. That said, policy can always change.

Q: How should climate and energy entrepreneurs select the right market “stepping stones”?

A: Each of the “Disciplined Entrepreneurship” books talks about the importance of selecting customers and listening to your customers. When thinking about their beachhead market, or where to initially focus, climate and energy entrepreneurs need to look for the easiest near-term opportunity to plug in their technology. Subsequent market selection is also driven by technology. Instead of just picking a beachhead market and figuring everything else out later, there often needs to be an intentional choice of what we call market stepping stones. You start by focusing on an initial market in the early days — land and expand — but there needs to be a long-term strategy, so you don’t go down a dead end. These ventures don’t have a lot of flexibility as they build out potentially expensive technologies. Being intentional means having a pathway planned from the beachhead market up to the big prize that makes the entire enterprise worthwhile. The prize means having a big impact but also targeting a big market opportunity.

We have an example in the book of a company that can turn CO2 into useful products. They knew the big prize was turning it into fuel, most likely aviation fuel, but they couldn’t produce at the right volume or cost early on, so they looked at other applications. They started with making vodka from CO2 because it was low-volume and high-margin. Then the pandemic happened, so they made hand sanitizer. Then they made perfume, which had the highest margins of all. By that point, they were ready to start moving into the fuel market. The stepping stones are about figuring out who is willing to buy the simple version of your technology or product and pay a premium. Initially, looking at that company, you might say, “They’re not going to save the planet by selling vodka.” But it was a critical stepping stone to get to the big prize. Long-term thinking is essential for ventures in this space.

After twenty-six years, Microsoft is finally upgrading the last remaining instance of the encryption algorithm RC4 in Windows.

of the most visible holdouts in supporting RC4 has been Microsoft. Eventually, Microsoft upgraded Active Directory to support the much more secure AES encryption standard. But by default, Windows servers have continued to respond to RC4-based authentication requests and return an RC4-based response. The RC4 fallback has been a favorite weakness hackers have exploited to compromise enterprise networks. Use of RC4 played a ...