News and Blog Landing | MIT Sustainability

“It’s a great example of how MIT is taking a leadership role and multidisciplinary approach to tackling climate change by combining engineering and climate system science in one undergraduate major,” says Professor Al...

MIT News Office

April 20, 2023

3 Questions: New MIT major and its role in fighting climate change

Ali Jadbabaie and Robert van der Hilst discuss how a new joint degree program in climate system science and engineering will prepare students to solve global-scale environmental problems.

Two 150mm perovskite mini-modules are tested in an accelerated degradation system at CubicPV under 1 sun illumination on a temperature-controlled stage at 75 degrees Celsius.
Image courtesy of CubicPV.

MIT News Office

April 20, 2023

Moving perovskite advancements from the lab to the manufacturing floor

U.S. Department of Energy selects MIT to establish collaborative research center for optimizing the development of tandem solar modules.

Associate professor of civil and environmental engineering Desirée Plata (left), and MIT President Sally Kornbluth.
Image: Christine Daniloff, MIT; and Gretchen Ertl

MIT News Office

April 19, 2023

Podcast: Curiosity Unbounded, Episode 1 — How a free-range kid from Maine is helping green-up industrial practices

President Sally Kornbluth talks with Associate Professor Desirée Plata about her research — and what she wishes students knew about their professors.

Normand Desrochers, MIT EHS technician, picks up pipette tip boxes and conical tube racks to be recycled.
Photo: Hao Nguyen

MIT News Office

April 18, 2023

Recycling plastics from research labs

With sustainability in mind, MIT’s EHS Lab Plastics Recycling Program gathers clean plastics from 212 MIT labs, recycling some 280 pounds per week.

MIT engineers have found that a common hydrogel has unique, super-soaking abilities. Even as temperatures climb, the transparent material continues to absorb moisture, and could serve to harvest water in desert regions, and passivel...

MIT News Office

April 18, 2023

Even as temperatures rise, this hydrogel material keeps absorbing moisture

MIT engineers identified an unusually absorbent material that could be used for passive cooling or water harvesting in warm climates.

The student-run MIT Energy Conference brought together energy leaders from around the world, with an eye toward the war in Ukraine and other international developments.
Image: Courtesy of MIT Energy Conference

MIT News Office

April 18, 2023

MIT Energy Conference grapples with geopolitics

With an eye toward the war in Ukraine and other international issues, the student-run conference brought together energy leaders from around the world.

2023 J-WAFS Fellows Gokul Sampath (left) and Jie Yun
Photos courtesy of J-WAFS.

MIT News Office

April 13, 2023

MIT PhD students honored for their work to solve critical issues in water and food

Gokul Sampath and Jie Yun have been named 2023-24 J-WAFS Fellows.

A new, inexpensive technology can limit the buildup of algae on the walls of photobioreactors that can help convert carbon dioxide into useful products. Reducing this fouling avoids costly cleanouts and allows more photosynthesis t...

MIT News Office

April 13, 2023

MIT engineers devise technology to prevent fouling in photobioreactors for CO2 capture

Applying a small voltage to the walls of algae growing tanks can prevent cloudy buildup and allow more photosynthesis to happen.

Silk microneedle array on a U.S. dime
Image courtesy of SMART.

MIT News Office

April 11, 2023

A new microneedle-based drug delivery technique for plants

Developed at SMART, the device can deliver controlled amounts of agrochemicals to specific plant tissues for research and could one day be used to improve crop quality and disease management.