Under a microscope, a bouquet of lollipop-like structures, each smaller than a grain of sand, waves gently in a petri dish of liquid. Suddenly, they snap together, like the jaws of a Venus flytrap, as a scientist waves a small magnet over the dish. What was previously an assemblage of tiny passive structures has transformed instantly into an active robotic gripper.

The lollipop gripper is one demonstration of a new type of soft magnetic hydrogel developed by engineers at MIT and their collaborators at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland and the University of Cincinnati. In a study appearing today in the journal Matter, the MIT team reports on a new method to print and fabricate the gel, which can be made into complex, magnetically activated three-dimensional structures.

The new gel could be the basis for soft, microscopic, magnetically responsive robots and materials. Such magno-bots could be used in medicine, for instance to release drugs or grab biopsies when directed by an external magnet.

Making objects move with magnets is nothing new, at least at the macroscale. We can, for example, wave a refrigerator magnet over a pile of paper clips that will trail the magnet in response. And at the microscale, scientists have designed a variety of magnetic “micro-swimmers” — components that are smaller than a millimeter and can be directed remotely by a magnet to squeeze through small spaces. For the most part, these designs work by mixing magnetic particles into a printable resin and pulling the entire swimmer in the direction of an external magnet.

In contrast, the MIT team’s new material can be made into even more complex and deformable structures with micron-scale precision. These features could enable a magnetic millibot to move individual features and perform more complex maneuvers.

“We can now make a soft, intricate 3D architecture with components that can move and deform in complex ways within the same microscopic structure,” says study author Carlos Portela, the Robert N. Noyce Career Development Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT. “For soft microscopic robotics, or stimuli-responsive matter, that could be a game-changing capability.”

The study’s MIT co-authors include graduate students Rachel Sun and Andrew Chen, along with Yiming Ji and Daryl Yee of EPFL and Eric Stewart of the University of Cincinnati.

In a flash

At MIT, Portela’s group develops new metamaterials — materials engineered with unique, microscopic architectures that give rise to beyond-normal material properties. Portela has fabricated a variety of such metamaterials, including extremely tough and stretchy architectures and designs that can manipulate sound and withstand violent impacts.

Most recently, he’s expanded his research to “programmable” materials, which can be engineered to change their properties in response to stimuli, such as certain chemicals, light, and electric and magnetic fields.

From the team’s perspective, magnetic stimuli stand out from the rest.

“With a magnetically responsive material, we have control at a distance and the response is instantaneous,” says co-lead author Andrew Chen. “We don’t have to wait for a slow chemical reaction or physical process, and we can manipulate the material without touching it.”

For the new study, the team aimed to create a magnetically responsive metamaterial that can be made into structures smaller than a millimeter. Researchers typically fabricate microstructures by using two-photon lithography — a high-resolution 3D printing technique that flashes a laser into a small pool of resin. With repeated flashes, the laser traces a microscopic pattern into the resin, which solidifies into the same pattern, ultimately creating a tiny, three-dimensional structure, layer by layer.

While 3D resin printing produces intricate microstructures, using the same process to print magnetic structures has been a challenge. Researchers have tried to combine the resin with magnetic nanoparticles before printing the mixture. But magnetic particles are essentially bits of metal that inherently scatter light away or agglomerate and sediment unintentionally. Scientists have found that any magnetic particles in the resin can reduce the laser’s power at a given spot and weaken the resulting structure or prevent its printing altogether.

“Directly 3D printing deformable micron-scale structures with a high fraction of magnetic particles is extremely difficult, often involving a tradeoff between magnetic functionality and structural integrity,” says Sun, a co-lead author on the work.

A printed double-dip

The researchers created a new way to fabricate magnetic microstructures, by combining 3D resin printing with a double-dip process. The researchers first applied conventional resin printing to create a microstructure using a typical polymer gel, with no added magnetic particles. Then they dipped the printed gel into a solution containing iron ions, which the gel can absorb. The iron-soaked structure is then dipped again in a second solution of hydroxide ions. The iron ions in the gel bond with the hydroxide ions, creating iron-oxide nanoparticles that are inherently magnetic.

With this new process, the team can print intricate structures smaller than a millimeter, and add magnetic properties to the structures after printing. What’s more, they are able to control how magnetic a structure’s individual features can be. They found that, by tuning the laser’s power as they print certain features, they can set how cross-linked, or “tight” the gel is when printed. The tighter the gel, the fewer magnetic particles it can form. In this way, the researchers can determine how magnetic each tiny feature can be.

“This provides unprecedented design freedom to print multifunctional structures and materials at the microscale,” Sun says.

As a demonstration, the team fabricated ball-and-stick structures resembling tiny lollipops. The structures were less than a millimeter in height, with balls that were smaller than a grain of sand. The researchers printed the lollipops out of polymer gel and infused each ball with different amounts of magnetic particles, giving them various degrees of magnetism. Under a microscope, they observed that when they passed an ordinary refrigerator magnet over the structures, the lollipops pulled toward the magnet in various degrees, in a configuration that mimicked gripping fingers.

“You could imagine a magnetic architecture like this could act as a small robot that you could guide through the body with an external magnet, and it could latch onto something, for instance to take a biopsy,” Portela says. “That is a vision that others can take from this work.”

The team also fabricated a magnetically responsive, “bistable” switch. They first printed a small millimeter-long rectangle of polymer gel and attached to either side four tiny, oar-like magnetic structures. Each oar measured about 8 microns thick — about the size of a red blood cell. When the team applied a magnet on one end of the rectangle, the oars flipped toward the magnet, pulling the rectangle in the same direction and locking it in that position. When the magnet was applied to the other side, the oars flipped again, pulling the rectangle, like a switch, in the opposite direction.

“We think this is a new kind of bistable mechanism that could be used, for instance, in a microfluidic device, as a magnetic valve to open or shut some flow,” Portela says. “For now, we’ve figured out how to fabricate magnetic complex architectures at the microscale and also spatially tune their properties. That opens up a lot of interesting ideas for soft miniature robots going forward.”

This research was supported, in part, by the National Science Foundation and the MathWorks seed grant program.

This work was performed, in part, in the MIT.nano fabrication and characterization facilities.

Two weeks ago, Anthropic announced that its new model, Claude Mythos Preview, can autonomously find and weaponize software vulnerabilities, turning them into working exploits without expert guidance. These were vulnerabilities in key software like operating systems and internet infrastructure that thousands of software developers working on those systems failed to find. This capability will have major security implications, compromising the devices and services we use every day. As a result, Anthropic is not releasing the model to the general public, but instead to a ...

President Donald Trump's jawboning of the markets is sending the wrong signals to oil producers by keeping crude prices artificially low.

Colombia's environment minister opens up about the country's effort to sidestep the U.N.'s slow-moving climate process.

A state judge found that the courts can't dictate energy policy.

The EPA administrator was quick to spar on a variety of fronts, including chemicals, climate change and the administration’s drive to deregulate.

The state activated a pair of 20-year power contracts for the country's first major offshore wind farm.

The Legislature last year eliminated a 2030 deadline to cut emissions. Environmentalists say the move opened the door for the state to soft-pedal its clean energy ambitions.

Gov. Kathy Hochul and legislative leaders continue to discuss weakening deadlines in the state’s 2019 climate law.

Behind the headline growth is a big shift, with investors moving away from riskier early-stage bets toward infrastructure supporting commercially viable technologies.

A new investigation claims Italian tanneries owned by LVMH are seeking exemptions to EU deforestation law while importing hides linked to Paraguayan forest loss.

Chad’s deputy prime minister said another 10 people were wounded in Saturday’s clashes in Igote village in Wadi Fira province near the Sudan border.

Climate change is widely believed to be having an effect on tick numbers: Ticks like warm, humid weather, and more can be seen after a mild winter.

Nature Climate Change, Published online: 28 April 2026; doi:10.1038/s41558-026-02624-x

Integrating knowledge across climate risks, societal responses and their interactions is a critical yet persistently challenging goal. We argue that advanced artificial intelligence frameworks, specifically foundation models, offer a new opportunity to unify these domains and support climate decision-making.

Robotically assembled building blocks could be a more environmentally friendly method for erecting large-scale structures than some existing construction techniques, according to a new study by MIT researchers.

The team conducted a feasibility study to evaluate the efficiency of constructing a simple building using “voxels,” which are modular 3D subunits that assemble into complex, durable structures.

After studying the performance of multiple voxels, the researchers developed three new designs intended to streamline building construction. They also produced a robotic assembler and a user-friendly interface for generating voxel-based building layouts and feeding instructions to the robots.

Their results indicate this voxel-based robotic assembly system could reduce embodied carbon — all of the carbon emitted during the lifecycle of building materials — by as much as 82 percent, compared with popular techniques like 3D concrete printing, precast modular concrete, and steel framing. The system would also be competitive in terms of cost and construction time. However, the choice of materials used to manufacture the voxels does play a major role in their carbon footprint and cost.

While scalability, durability, long-term robustness, and important considerations like fire resistance remain to be explored before such a system could be widely deployed, the researchers say these initial results highlight the potential of this approach for automated, on-site construction.

“I’m particularly excited about how the robotic assembly of discrete lattices can enable a practical way to apply digital fabrication to the built environment in a way that can let us build much more efficiently and sustainably,” says Miana Smith, a graduate student in the Center for Bits and Atoms (CBA) at MIT and lead author the study.

She is joined on the paper by Paul Richard, a graduate student at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland and former visiting researcher at MIT; Alfonso Parra Rubio, a CBA graduate student; and senior author Neil Gershenfeld, an MIT professor and the director of the CBA. The research appears in Automation in Construction.

Designing better building blocks

Over the past several years, researchers in the Center for Bits and Atoms have been developing voxels, which are lattice-structured building blocks that can be assembled into objects with high strength and stiffness, like airplane wings, wind turbine blades, and space structures.

“Here, we are taking aerospace principles and applying them to buildings. Why don’t we make buildings as efficiently as we make airplanes?” Gershenfeld says, based on prior work his lab has done on voxel assembly with NASA, Airbus, and Boeing.

To explore the feasibility of voxel-based assembly strategies for buildings, the researchers first evaluated the mechanical performance and sustainability of eight existing voxel designs, including a cuboctahedron made from glass-reinforced nylon and a Kelvin lattice made from steel.

Based on those evaluations, they developed a set of three voxels using a new geometry that could be more easily assembled robotically into a larger structure. The new design, based on a high-strength and high-stiffness octet lattice, mechanically self-aligns into rigid structures.

“The interlocking nature of these voxels means we can get nice mechanical properties without needing to have a lot of connectors in the system, so the construction process can run a lot faster,” Smith says.

To accelerate construction, they designed a robotic assembly system based on inchworm-like robots that crawl across a voxel structure by anchoring and extending their bodies. These Modular Inchworm Lattice Assembler robots, or MILAbots, use grippers on each end to place voxel building blocks and engage the snap-fit connections.

“The robots can assemble the voxels by dropping them into place and then stepping on them to have the pieces interlock. We can do precise maneuvers based on the mechanical relationship between the robots and the voxels,” Smith explains.

The team studied the embodied carbon needed to fabricate their new voxel designs using three materials: plastic, plywood, and steel. Then they evaluated the throughput and cost of using the robotic assembly system to build a simple, one-story building. The researchers compared these estimates with the performance of other construction methods.

Potential environmental benefits

They found that most existing voxels, and especially those made from plastics, performed poorly compared to existing methods in terms of sustainability, but the steel and wood voxels they designed offered significant environmental benefits.

For instance, utilizing their steel voxels would generate only 36 percent of the embodied carbon required for 3D concrete printing and 52 percent of the embodied carbon of precast concrete. The plywood voxels had the lowest carbon footprint, requiring about 17 percent and 24 percent of the embodied carbon needed, respectively.

“There is still a potential viable option for a plastics-based voxel approach, we just have to be a bit more strategic about which types of plastics, infills, and geometries we use,” Smith says.

In addition, projected on-site assembly time for the steel and wood voxel approaches averaged 99 hours, whereas existing construction methods averaged 155 hours.

These speed benefits rely on the distributed nature of voxel-based assembly. While one MILAbot working alone is far slower than existing techniques, with a team of 20 robots working in parallel, the system catches up to or surpasses existing automation methods at a lower cost.

“One benefit of this method is how incremental it is. You can start building, and if it turns out you need a new room, you can just add onto the structure. It is also reversible, so if your use changes, you can dissemble the voxels and change the structure,” Gershenfeld says.

The researchers also developed an interface that enables users to input or hand-design a voxelized structure. The automatic system determines the paths the MILAbots should follow for construction and sends commands to the assemblers.

The next step in this project will be a larger testbed in Bhutan, using the “super fab lab” that CBA helped set up there to replicate the robots to test construction for a planned sustainable city, Gershenfeld says.

Additional areas of future work include studying the stability of voxel structures under lateral loads, improving the design tool to account for the physics of the system, enhancing the MILAbots, and evaluating voxels that have integrated sheeting, insulation, or electrical and plumbing routing.

“Our work helps support why doing this type of distributed robot assembly might be a practical way to bring digital fabrication into building construction,” Smith says.

“This is yet another visionary example from Neil Gershenfeld and his team, of finding ways for buildings to build themselves with the help of tiny robotic machines. I’m now fascinated by how we can harness an idea like this to make it more affordable to make the outsides of buildings more engaging and joyful,” says Thomas Heatherwick, founder of the design and architecture firm Heatherwick Studio, who was not involved with this research.

This work was funded, in part, by the MIT Center for Bits and Atoms Consortia.

Patterns of molecular activity in the blood may hold clues not only to how fit someone is, but also to the biological processes that support physical performance. Researchers at MIT, GE HealthCare, and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point have developed a computational model that links thousands of these molecular signals to fitness levels, revealing pathways that could inform future studies to improve fitness training and speed injury or disease recovery.

To develop their model, the researchers analyzed more than 50,000 biomarkers in 86 cadets at the U.S. Military Academy who were training for a military competition. Using these data, the researchers were able to identify molecular pathways that appear to contribute to higher levels of physical fitness.

“We had 50,000 measurements, and we wanted to get it down to about 100 where there’s some likelihood that the markers that we’re measuring are mechanistically linked to physical fitness. So, not just a statistical correlation, of which there will be many, but markers where there’s a likelihood that there is a causal relationship,” says Ernest Fraenkel, the Grover M. Hermann Professor in Health Sciences and Technology in MIT’s Department of Biological Engineering.

These biomarkers can be measured by analyzing blood samples, which could offer a simple way to provide an athlete, for example, or perhaps someone with chronic illness or a long-term injury, with additional information about potential areas to focus their efforts to reduce risk of injury, accelerate recovery, or improve their performance ceiling beyond what conventional measures show.

Azar Alizadeh, a principal scientist with GE HealthCare’s Healthcare Technology and Innovation Center, is the paper’s lead author. Fraenkel and Luca Marinelli, a senior principal scientist with GE HealthCare, are the senior authors of the new study, which appears in the journal Communications Biology.

Mapping fitness

To find the genetic basis of a simple trait such as height, scientists can perform large-scale studies known as genome-wide association studies (GWAS), in which genetic markers from thousands of people can be linked with height. However, the picture becomes much more complicated for traits such as physical fitness, which is determined by the interplay of many different genetic, physiological, and environmental factors.

The researchers set out to try to identify some of those factors, working with a group of 86 volunteers at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point who were training for the Sandhurst Military Skills Competition. Alizadeh led the experimental study design and execution, in collaboration with GE HealthCare, GE Research, West Point, and MIT scientists. During the three-month study period, volunteers participated in up to five sessions. At each session, blood samples were taken before and after intense exercise. The researchers also measured other traits such as lean muscle mass and VO2 max (the maximum rate of oxygen consumption during exercise).

From the blood samples, the researchers were able to measure more than 50,000 biomarkers, which they obtained by analyzing DNA methylation patterns, sequencing messenger RNA transcripts, and analyzing thousands of the proteins and small molecules found in the samples.

From their set of 50,000 biomarkers, the researchers hoped to identify a smaller number that could predict overall physical fitness, as measured by performance on the Army Combat Fitness Test (ACFT). This test includes a 2-mile run, maximum deadlift (the heaviest weight a person can lift for a single repetition up to 340 pounds), and sprint-drag-carry, a test that involves sprinting, dragging a sled, and carrying kettlebells.

One way to do this would be to simply train a computational model to identify correlations between fitness and biomarkers. However, with only 86 subjects in the study, that approach would likely yield correlations that were random and did not actually contribute to physical fitness, Fraenkel says.

To take a more targeted approach, the researchers first created a network model that represents the interactions between the markers, based on existing databases that catalog those interactions. These connections might represent proteins that interact with each other in a signaling pathway, or a transcription factor that turns on a set of genes.

“We built a network that you can think of as a city map. You want to find the places in the city map that are lighting up — not just one light going on, but a whole bunch of houses or street lamps going on in the same neighborhood,” Fraenkel says. “We can find neighborhoods on this enormous molecular map that are active at the same time, in a way that correlates with the phenotype that we measure.”

“We built upon the network bioinformatics from the Fraenkel lab to create an end-to-end predictive modeling framework to discover biological expression circuits that drive groups of physical characteristics predictive of ACFT scores, for example, body composition or exercise physiology metrics like VO2 max,” Marinelli says.

After feeding the measurements from the study participants into this predictive model, known as PhenoMol, the researchers were able to identify more than 100 biomarkers linked to performance on the ACFT. Fitness predictions based on these biomarkers were much more accurate than those of a model that correlated biomarkers with performance on the ACFT without taking network connections into account. Additionally, PhenoMol performed similarly to a model that predicted participants’ fitness based on measurements of their VO2 and lean muscle mass.

Cellular pathways

The researchers found that the biomarkers identified by PhenoMol clustered into several different cellular pathways. Those include pathways involved in blood coagulation and the complement cascade — a part of the immune system involved in clearing damaged cells. Those systems likely help with recovery from tissue injury and stress response during exercise, Fraenkel says.

Another prominent cluster involves molecules related to the urea cycle, which is responsible for eliminating the ammonia that results from the breakdown of proteins. The model also identified biomarkers that are linked with the function of mitochondria (the organelles that generate energy within cells).

Fraenkel now hopes to dig deeper into which markers show someone’s current fitness, and which might reveal what their potential fitness levels could be. This could help to reveal potential strengths that might not show up in traditional fitness tests, he says.

That kind of prediction could be useful not only for athletic training, but also for other people who are recovering from an injury or disease, or people experiencing the effects of aging. For example, using this approach in different populations might provide useful information for an elderly person after a stroke, since such events often require months of therapy to regain significant mobility.

“This has relevance for the military and for sports teams, but also in a lot of normal life situations where maybe someone is going through rehabilitation for some injury or disease and they’ve hit a wall,” Fraenkel says. “Or during aging, you may be able to see when somebody’s losing capacity or when they have more capacity than they’ve been able to actualize.”

Molecular markers of fitness could also be used in clinical trials to rigorously test the potential benefits of popular food supplements and fitness programs, he adds.

To make the testing process simpler, the researchers would like to narrow down their pool of biomarkers to a handful that could be easily measured from a blood sample using a single method suitable for widespread use.

The research was developed with funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which states that the views, opinions, or findings expressed are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the official views or policies of the U.S. government.

Six MIT affiliates — Denisse Córdova Carrizales SM ’26; Ria Das ’21, MNG ’22; Ronak Desai; Stacy Godfreey-Igwe ’22; Arya Rao; and Ananthan Sadagopan ’24 — have been named 2026 P.D. Soros Fellows. In addition, P.D. Soros Fellow Avinash Vadali will begin a PhD in condensed-matter physics at MIT this fall.

The fellowship provides immigrants and the children of immigrants up to $90,000 in tuition and stipend support for up to two years of graduate studies. Interested students should contact Kim Benard, associate dean of distinguished fellowships in Career Advising and Professional Development.

Denisse Córdova Carrizales

Córdova Carrizales SM '26 is a PhD student in nuclear science and engineering in the lab of Professor Mingda Li, where she completed her master's work earlier this year. She is working on synthesizing and characterizing quantum materials with the goal of bridging fundamental science and industry to make our technology more energy-efficient and sustainable.

Córdova Carrizales, who is of Mexican descent, grew up in Houston, Texas, before attending Harvard University, where she graduated in 2023 with a BA in physics. At Harvard, she dove into experimental condensed-matter research. She also conducted research with the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Commonwealth Fusion Systems, and VEIR, spanning computational plasma physics and high-temperature superconducting magnet and cable engineering.

Her work includes coauthored papers in Nature Physics, Nature Materials, and Advanced Materials, as well as lead-author publications in Nano Letters and Physical Review Materials. In 2023, she received the LeRoy Apker Award from the American Physical Society.

Beyond research, Córdova Carrizales has advocated in Congress for nuclear disarmament and risk reduction and has written a piece on the nuclear stockpile stewardship program. At Harvard, she founded an organization to support first-generation college students studying physics. In a completely different arena, she performed as the lead in an off-Broadway show in New York.

Ria Das

Das ’21, MNG ’22 is a PhD student in the MIT Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. She graduated from MIT in 2021 with a BS dual degree in mathematics along with electrical engineering and computer science, and received her master of engineering degree in 2022.

The daughter of Indian immigrant parents, Das grew up in Nashua, New Hampshire, where she struggled with issues of belonging and identity. These questions came to the forefront during her PhD studies at Stanford University. Das decided to step off the academic treadmill by taking a leave from her PhD to think more deeply about these topics.

During her leave, she traveled around the country before moving to New York to work at Basis Research Institute, an AI research nonprofit. As a research associate, Das developed an urban data team that worked with federal and municipal government agencies on issues of economic and housing equity, blending her interests in science and social problems. She then returned to MIT to complete her doctoral studies.

Today, Das works with Professor Joshua Tenenbaum in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences to study how people undergo conceptual change to build more robust, accessible systems for automated (social) science and improved educational design. Looking ahead, she hopes to become a professor, collaborating closely with policy practitioners.

Ronak Desai

Desai is currently a student in the Harvard/MIT MD-PhD program, where his PhD focuses on chemistry. The son of immigrants from Gujarat, India, Desai was born in Tyler, Texas, and grew up in nearby Lindale. He earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Texas at Austin.

Desai spent a semester interning at the U.S. House of Representatives as a Bill Archer Fellow. He also completed biomedical research focused on studying and engineering novel polyketide synthases, aspiring to produce next-generation antibiotics by harnessing such newly engineered synthases.

Desai graduated with degrees in chemistry and biochemistry as a first-generation college student, Health Science Scholar, and Dean’s Honored Graduate, receiving nine scholarships throughout college. His research has resulted in publications in journals such as Cell and Nature Communications.

Desai hopes to combine his passions for medicine, science, and public policy in his career to advance the treatment of infectious diseases. He is conducting his doctoral research under Professor James J. Collins in the MIT Department of Biological Engineering and the Harvard-MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology. Desai’s research centers on using artificial intelligence to discover and design novel antibiotics, an opportunity to advance treatments for patients worldwide.

Stacy Godfreey-Igwe

Godfreey-Igwe ’22 attended MIT as a QuestBridge and Gates Scholar, graduating in 2022 with a BS in mechanical engineering and a concentration in sustainable design. A Burchard Scholar, she also became the first student at MIT to complete a major in African and African diaspora studies. After graduating, she pursued a science policy fellowship in Washington and interned at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Building Technologies Office, where she worked to broaden adoption of heat pump technologies across diverse stakeholders.

Growing up in Richardson, Texas, as the daughter of Nigerian immigrants, Godfreey-Igwe developed an early awareness of structural inequality, particularly in how families like hers managed the burden of the severe Texas heat and high electricity costs. These experiences formed the basis of her lifelong journey seeking to address systemic inequities embedded in everyday systems.

Godfreey-Igwe is currently a doctoral student in the joint engineering and public policy - civil and environmental engineering program at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), where she was selected for the inaugural CMU Rales Fellowship cohort. At CMU, she studies the impact of extreme heat on household energy use, particularly in vulnerable communities.

Beyond her research, Godfreey-Igwe organizes outreach and programming for local underrepresented students in STEM and participates in institutional efforts to expand access and belonging among graduate students. She aims to be a scholar and advocate whose work, drawing on her personal experiences, informs equitable energy solutions in a warming world.

Arya Rao

Rao is a student in the Harvard/MIT MD-PhD program. She completed her undergraduate degrees in biochemistry and computer science at Columbia University. Working with professors Pardis Sabeti (Harvard University) and Sangeeta Bhatia (MIT), Rao uses evolution as a lens for therapeutic design, developing artificial intelligence methods that read the genetic record and guide new intervention strategies.

Leveraging her dual training in medicine and computer science, Rao also leads the MESH AI Research Group at Mass General Brigham, where she develops simulation-based tools that test clinical AI systems in realistic educational settings before they reach patients.

Rao has been recognized for her work with a Forbes 30 Under 30 honor, the Massachusetts Medical Society Information Technology Award, the Harvard Presidential Public Service Fellowship, a Harvard Medical School Dean’s Innovation Award, and a Ladders to Cures Accelerator Award. She has published more than 30 manuscripts in publications including JAMA, Nature, and NEJM AI.

Growing up in rural northern Michigan, Rao was inspired by her parents, Konkani immigrants from India, who served as two of the area’s only physicians. She has always imagined a career that could leverage scientific innovation to improve patient care, especially for communities without access like her own. Going forward, she envisions a career as a surgeon-scientist that keeps her close to patients while taking on leadership that shapes how new technologies are evaluated, implemented, and made usable in the places that need them most.

Ananthan Sadagopan 

Sadagopan ’24 grew up in Westborough, Massachusetts, as the child of immigrants from Chennai, India. He participated in chemistry competitions, winning the You Be the Chemist Challenge in middle school and earning a gold medal at the International Chemistry Olympiad for the United States in high school. He attended MIT for college, graduating in three years in 2024 with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and biology.

At MIT, Sadagopan worked with Srinivas Viswanathan on computational biology projects and with William Gibson, Matthew Meyerson, and Stuart Schreiber on chemical biology projects. He led projects characterizing somatic perturbations of X chromosome inactivation in cancer, developing a machine-learning tool for cancer dependency prediction, using small molecules to relocalize proteins in cells, and creating a generalizable strategy to drug the most mutated gene in cancer, TP53. Sadagopan’s work has been patented and published in journals such as Cell and Nature Chemical Biology.

Sadogopan was president of the chemistry undergraduate association and led the events committee for MIT Science Olympiad. He is currently pursuing a PhD in biological and biomedical science at Harvard University as a Hertz Fellow and Herchel Smith Fellow. He is interested in de-risking new therapeutic strategies and hopes that his work will inspire pharma companies to bring first-in-class therapies to patients.

Lawmakers in Congress are moving quickly on the GUARD Act, an age-gating bill restricting minors’ access to a wide range of online tools, with a key vote expected this week. The proposal is framed as a response to alarming cases involving “AI companions” and vulnerable young users. But the text of the bill goes much further, and could require age gates even for search engines that use AI. 

TAKE ACTION

Tell Congress: oppose the guard act

If enacted, the GUARD Act won’t just target a narrow category of risky chatbots. It would require companies to verify the age of every user — then block anyone under 18 from interacting with a huge range of online systems. It would block minors from everyday online tools, undermine parental guidance, and force adults to sacrifice their privacy. In the process, it would require services to implement speech-restricting and privacy-invasive age-verification systems for everyone—not just kids. 

Under the GUARD Act’s broad definitions, a high school student could be barred from asking homework help tools questions about algebra problems. A teenager trying to return a product could be kicked out of a standard customer-service chat. 

The concerns behind this bill are serious. There have been troubling reports of AI systems engaging in harmful interactions with young users, including cases involving self-harm. Those risks deserve attention. But they call for targeted solutions, like better safeguards and enforcement against bad actors, not sweeping restrictions. The bill’s sponsors say they’re targeting worst-case scenarios — but the bill regulates everyday use. 

The GUARD Act’s Broad Definitions Reach Everyday Tools

The problem starts with how the bill defines an “AI chatbot.” It covers any system that generates responses that aren’t fully pre-written by the developer or operator. Such a broad definition sweeps in the basic functionality of all AI-powered tools. 

Then there’s the definition of an “AI companion,” which minors are banned from using entirely. An AI companion is any chatbot that produces human-like responses and is designed to “encourage or facilitate” interpersonal or emotional interaction. That may sound aimed at simulated “friends” or therapy chatbots. But in practice, it’s much fuzzier. 

Modern chatbots are designed to be conversational and helpful. A homework helper might say “good question” before walking a student through a problem. A customer service chatbot may respond empathetically to a complaint (“I’m sorry you’re having this problem.”) A general-purpose assistant might ask follow-up questions. All of these could be seen as facilitating “interpersonal” interaction — and triggering the GUARD Act. 

Faced with steep penalties and unclear boundaries, companies are unlikely to take chances on letting young people use their online tools. They’ll block minors entirely or strip their tools down to something less useful for everyone. The result isn’t a narrow safeguard—it’s a broad restriction on everyday online interactions.

Homework Question? Show ID And Call Your Parents

Start with a student getting help with homework. Under the GUARD Act, the service must verify the user’s age using more than a simple checkbox—it must rely on a “reasonable age verification” measure, which could require a government ID or a third-party age-checking system. If the system decides a user is under 18, the company must decide if its tool qualifies as an “AI Companion.” If there’s any risk it does, the safest move is to block access entirely. 

The same logic applies to everyday customer service. A teenager trying to fix an order issue gets routed to a chatbot, and the company faces a choice: build a full age-verification system for a routine interaction, or restrict access to avoid liability. Many will choose the latter.

This isn’t a narrow restriction aimed at a few risky products. It’s a compliance regime that pushes companies to block or limit any product that generates text for minors, across the board. 

ID Checks for Everyone

The GUARD Act doesn’t just affect minors. The bill takes a big step towards an internet that only works when users are willing to upload a valid ID or comply with other invasive age-verification schemes. Companies must verify the age of every user—not through a simple self-declaration, but through a “reasonable age verification” system tied to the individual. 

In practice, that means collecting sensitive personal information: government IDs, financial data, or biometric identifiers. Companies can outsource verification, but they remain legally responsible. And the law requires ongoing verification, so this isn’t a one-time check. Worse, studies consistently show that millions of people have outdated information on their IDs, such as an old address, or do not have government ID. Should services require ID, many folks without current or any ID will be shut out. 

And for those who do have compliant ID, turning over this information repeatedly creates obvious risks. Databases of sensitive identity information become targets for breaches. Anonymous or pseudonymous use of online tools becomes harder or impossible. 

To keep minors away from certain chatbots, the GUARD Act would require everyone to prove who they are just to use basic online tools. That’s a steep tradeoff. And it doesn’t actually address the specific harms the bill is supposed to solve.

Vague Definitions, Huge Penalties

The GUARD Act’s broad scope is enforced with steep penalties. Companies can face fines of up to $100,000 per violation, enforced by federal and state officials. At the same time, key terms like “AI companion” rely on vague concepts such as “emotional interaction.” That combination will lead to overblocking. Faced with legal uncertainty and serious liability, companies won’t parse small distinctions. They’ll restrict access, limit features, or block minors entirely.

That is the unfortunate result of the GUARD Act, even though the concerns animating it are worthy of fixing. But the GUARD Act’s broad terms will apply far beyond the concerning scenarios. 

In the end, that means a more restricted and more surveilled internet. Teenagers would lose access to tools they rely on for school and everyday tasks. Everyone else faces new barriers, including ID checks. Smaller developers, who aren’t able to absorb compliance costs and legal risk, would be pushed out, leaving the largest companies even more dominant. 

Young people — and all people — deserve protection from genuinely harmful products. But this bill doesn’t do that. It trades away privacy, access, and useful technology in exchange for a blunt system that misses the mark. 

Congress could act soon. Tell them to reject the GUARD Act. 

TAKE ACTION

Tell Congress: say no to mandatory online id checks

Speaker Johnson has introduced a new fig leaf over the American surveillance state, the Foreign Intelligence Accountability Act. Introduced with only days to go before Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) expires and the U.S. government loses one of its most invasive surveillance programs, the bill does nothing to make any of the substantial changes privacy advocates have been asking for --- most notably, it fails to give us a real warrant requirement for the FBI to snoop through the private conversations of people on U.S. soil.  

Section 702 needs to be reauthorized by Congress every few years. These reauthorizations give us a chance to tinker with the language of the law and introduce some much-needed reforms. This attempt at reauthorization has been particularly fraught, but there is still time for Congress to include real protection for Americans’ civil liberties and rights. We need to make sure that when an FBI agent wants to look through Americans’ conversations scooped up as part of a national security intelligence program, they need a warrant signed by a judge just as if they were trying to search your email account or your house. 

This new bill mandates that a civil liberties protection officer at the Director of National Intelligence review all queries of U.S. persons made by the FBI under this program to make sure no laws have been broken. It’s bad enough to let the intelligence community police itself, and what’s more, the assessment for illegality would be made after a U.S. person has already been spied on. This is hardly the reform we need and will likely just lead to continued abuse with no real accountability or consequences.  

The bill “prohibits targeting United States persons,” but so does current law. This “change” does absolutely nothing to address what’s really happening—which is that surveillance of people in the United States is usually justified as “incidental” because Americans aren’t the “target” of the surveillance. The bill does not create a warrant requirement, it does not create any new transparency requirements, and it does not protect Americans’ privacy.  

We urge Congress, and we urge you to write to your Congresspeople, to tell them this: Reject the surveillance state’s latest smokescreen known as the Foreign Intelligence Accountability Act and keep pushing for real reforms.  

SmugMug is a family-owned photo hosting and e-commerce platform that helps professional photographers run their businesses online. Founded in 2002, the company provides tools for photographers to show their work, deliver client galleries, sell prints, and manage payments. 

In 2018, SmugMug purchased Flickr, the long-running photo-sharing community, which added tens of millions of active hobbyist photographers to the company’s user base. 

Ben MacAskill is President and COO of SmugMug’s parent company, Awesome, which he co-founded with his family. Awesome also includes the media network This Week in Photo and the nonprofit Flickr Foundation, which focuses on preserving publicly available photography. MacAskill has been an active voice in policy discussions around Section 230 and online platform regulation. He was interviewed by Joe Mullin, a policy analyst on EFF's Activism Team.

Joe Mullin:  How would you explain Section 230 to a SmugMug photographer who hasn't heard of it but relies on you to share their work, run their business.

Ben MacAskill: Section 230 allows us to run our business. We are a small, family run business. We don’t have the resources to police every single upload, every single comment, or every single engagement that happens on the site. 

That includes photographers who have comments on their sites. Anywhere there’s interaction online, Section 230 protects us. 

It doesn't absolve us of liability. We can't run rampant and do anything we want. It  just helps protect us and make it scalable so that we can run our business.

What would you have to change if Section 230 were eliminated or significantly narrowed? 

Honestly, there's a high chance that it would bankrupt platforms like ours. They're not wildly profitable. If Section 230 is done away with, we have to [check] content that goes online to make sure we’re not liable. That means policing tens of millions of uploads per day. 

That would kill the business of a lot of photographers. Can you imagine—you just got married, and you’re waiting for your wedding photos for a week or two because they’re in some moderation queue? 

If we don’t have legal protections, and we get one nefarious customer—if something goes sideways—then I’m liable for that. 

I don't, and can't possibly know, whether every single photo is appropriate or legal, as it's uploaded. We would literally have to moderate everything before it goes online. I don’t think any business can afford that, period. I guess you could have an offshore call-center type thing. Still, it would change the entire nature of the real-time internet. Imagine posting something to Instagram and having the platform say, “Cool, we’ll get back to you in 8 to 12 days.” 

What kind of content moderation do you do on SmugMug? 

If a user uploads something illegal, we will report them as soon as we find it. We're not protecting them. We don’t condone or allow illegal behavior. We work very closely with organizations, nonprofits and governmental agencies to detect CSAM—child exploitative material—and we report that to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. We will report users, we eliminate illegal content on our platforms—which is one reason we have such a low prevalence of that problem. 

But that does take effort and time to find, and there is currently no perfect solution. The tech solutions that exist can’t detect it at 100% accuracy, or anywhere close. And with tens of millions of uploads a day, going through them one by one is impossible. 

How do you think more generally about protecting user speech and creative expression? 

On SmugMug, we’re really focusing on professionals running their business. So we don’t have to [weigh in] on content too much. 

On Flickr, we are big proponents of expression and artistic creativity. Photographers have opinions! But we do draw the line at things like hate speech and harassment. We aggressively maintain a friendly platform. Our community guidelines are very specific, that you cannot harass other customers, you cannot upload stuff classified as hate speech, or threats, or anything along those lines. 

Those rules are generally policed by the community. We do have some text analysis tools, but when community members feel harassed or threatened, reports will come in. We’ll address them on a one-by-one basis and remove harassing material from our platform. 

Our ability to moderate is one of the things that makes Flickr what it is. If we lose the ability to enforce our own moderation rules—or have that legislated for us—then it changes the entire nature of the community. And not in a good way. Losing the ability to moderate would permanently and forever change what we've built.

What kind of complaints or takedown requests do you receive, and how do you handle it, both in the U.S. and abroad? 

Flickr is often referred to as the friendliest community online. You know, we're not dealing with a lot of hate. We're not dealing with a lot of threats. Under other frameworks, like the DMCA, we do takedowns on copyrighted material. 

We’re able to handle it with a fully internal team, and we have a great track record. But the user base and the content base is so large that, if we had to assume that those tens of millions of uploads a day are problematic, the burden would be extreme. 

We have a robust Trust and Safety Team, and we operate in every non-embargoed country on Earth. So we are subject to a lot of different laws and regulations: “likeness” rules and privacy rules in certain countries that don't exist here in the United States. Even state to state, there’s some varying laws. It’s a complicated framework, but we pay attention to it. 

The globe responds in much the same way that Section 230 is working. That is, we operate on reports and discovery, not on pre-screening everything. 

What do you think that policy makers most often misunderstand about how platforms like yours operate?

One misconception is that we are not beholden to any laws. That Section 230 absolves us of any responsibility and any liability, and we can just do whatever we want. They talk about it as “reining in tech companies,” or “holding tech companies accountable.” But I am accountable for the content on my platform. We’re not given this “get out of jail free” card. 

And I think they assume all platforms don’t really care about this, that anything that is done is done begrudgingly. But we’re very proactive about keeping a clean, polite, and friendly community. We are already very aggressively policing our platform. 

And even legal content gets moderated, because it might just not be appropriate for a particular community. 

We enforce our rules, and much the way that other private in-person businesses will enforce their rules. If you start screaming hateful things at patrons in a coffee shop, they’re going to throw you out. They want a quiet, chill vibe where people can sip their lattes. We’re doing the same sort of things. 

As an independent family owned company you’re in an ecosystem dominated by much larger platforms. How are these issues different for you as a smaller service? 

I think it's a much more existential threat for middle and small tech companies. It also shuts off the next generation of these platforms. The computer science student in a dorm room right now won't have the legal protections to launch, to even try to build something new. At least not here in the United States.