Genetically engineering any organism requires first getting its cells to take in foreign DNA. To do this, scientists often perform a process called electroporation, in which they expose cells to an electric field. If that field is at just the right magnitude, it will open up pores within the cell membrane, through which DNA can flow. But it can take scientists months or even years to figure out the exact electric field conditions to reversibly un...

Textile production has historically been a bellwether for innovations in manufacturing — from technological improvements such as the spinney jenny and the flying shuttle to recent developments in electronic and reactive textiles, transforming fabrics into wearable computers. Now, bioLogic, a research team in the Tangible Media Group within the MIT Media Lab, has created a completely new form of performance fabric that combines biomaterials ...

Autonomous robots performing a joint task send each other continual updates: “I’ve passed through a door and am turning 90 degrees right.” “After advancing 2 feet I’ve encountered a wall. I’m turning 90 degrees right.” “After advancing 4 feet I’ve encountered a wall.” And so on.

Concrete is the world’s most widely used construction material, so abundant that its production is one of the leading sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Yet answers to some fundamental questions about the microscopic structure and behaviour of this ubiquitous material have remained elusive.

Researchers at the MIT Media Lab have developed a new imaging device that consists of a loose bundle of optical fibres, with no need for lenses or a protective housing. The fibres are connected to an array of photosensors at one end; the other ends can be left to wave free, so they could pass individually through micrometer-scale gaps in a porous membrane, to image whatever is on the other side.

MIT researchers have developed a low-power chip for processing 3D camera data that could help visually impaired people navigate their environments. The chip consumes only one-thousandth as much power as a conventional computer processor executing the same algorithms. Using their chip, the researchers also built a prototype of a complete navigation system for the visually impaired.

In recent years, some of the most exciting advances in AI have come courtesy of convolutional neural networks, large virtual networks of simple information-processing units, which are loosely modelled on the anatomy of the human brain. Neural networks are typically implemented using GPUs, special-purpose graphics chips found in all computing devices with screens.

Researchers at MIT and Texas Instruments have developed a new type of RFID chip that is virtually impossible to hack. If such chips were widely adopted, it could mean that an identity thief couldn’t steal your credit card number or key card information by sitting next to you at a café and high-tech burglars couldn’t swipe expensive goods from a warehouse and replace them with dummy tags.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has announced the launch of its new MIT Sandbox programme that aims to open up new routes for student entrepreneurs and innovators in the form of funding, mentoring and educational experiences. MIT Sandbox, an Institute wide programme that will support student initiated ideas with up to $25,000 to help qualified students and teams nurture their creative brainstorms.

Traditional light bulbs, thought to be well on their way to oblivion, may receive a reprieve thanks to a technological breakthrough. Incandescent lighting and its warm, familiar glow is well over a century old yet survives virtually unchanged in homes around the world.

Researchers at MIT, the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Colorado have used existing processes found in microchip fabrication facilities to produce an optoelectronic microprocessor, which computes electronically but uses light to move information.

Micro-electromechanical systems - or MEMS - were a $12bn business in 2014. However, that market is dominated by just a handful of devices, such as the accelerometers that reorient the screens of most smartphones.

Emissions legislation is something that is at the forefront of automotive development and something that’s certainly been in the news over the last few months. The demands placed on today’s vehicles mean that manufacturers are constantly under pressure to produce safer, smarter and greener cars, bikes, vans and trucks.

MIT researchers have shown that by exploiting the polarisation of light — the physical phenomenon behind polarised sunglasses and most 3D movie systems — they can increase the resolution of conventional 3D imaging devices as much as 1,000 times. The technique could lead to high-quality 3D cameras built into cellphones, and perhaps to the ability to snap a photo of an object and then use a 3D printer to produce a replica.

A project, lead by Daniel McDuff at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab, is developing emotion-reading computers that could not only recognise faces but also understand the thoughts of the person behind them. It could eventually lead to machines that have emotional intelligence, or even everyday objects that are able to empathise with our moods.

Ways in which we measure our health and well-being have become increasingly portable in recent years, with significant advances in wearable technology such as heart monitors, fitness trackers, smartwatches and other related gadgets. The release of technology such as the Fitbit, the Jawbone, Samsung Gear, the Garmin Forerunner 620, and the Apple Watch have all helped put personal data at our fingertips.

  Researchers at MIT and Boston Children’s Hospital have developed a system that can take MRI scans of a patient’s heart and, in a matter of hours, convert them into a tangible, physical model that surgeons can use to plan surgery.

Sheets of graphene and other materials that are virtually two-dimensional hold great promise for electronic, optical, and other high-tech applications. But the biggest limitation in unleashing this potential has been figuring out how to make these materials in the form of anything larger than tiny flakes. Now researchers at MIT and elsewhere may have found a way to do so.

If you pry open one of today’s ubiquitous high-tech devices - whether a cellphone, a laptop, or an electric car - you’ll find that batteries take up most of the space inside. Indeed, the recent evolution of batteries has made it possible to pack ample power in small places. But people still always want their devices to last even longer, or go further on a charge, so researchers work night and day to boost the power a given size b...

An exotic kind of magnetic behavior, driven by the mere proximity of two materials, has been analysed by a team of researchers at MIT and elsewhere, using a technique called spin-polarised neutron reflectometry. They say the finding could be used to probe a variety of exotic physical phenomena, and could ultimately be used to produce key components of future quantum computers.