RLE News

Perfect communication with imperfect chips

Perfect communication with imperfect chips

Error-correcting codes discovered at MIT can still guarantee reliable communication, even in cellphones with failure-prone low-power chips. «more» Related Links: Perfect communication with imperfect chips Professor Vivek K Goyal RLE Signal Transformation…

Sun-free photovoltaics

Sun-free photovoltaics

Materials engineered to give off precisely tuned wavelengths of light when heated are key to new high-efficiency generating system. «more» Related Links: Sun-free photovoltaics Prof. Marin Soljacic ab initio Physics Group

While you’re up, print me a solar cell

While you’re up, print me a solar cell

New MIT-developed materials make it possible to produce photovoltaic cells on paper or fabric, nearly as simply as printing a document. «more» Related Links: While you’re up, print me a solar cell Prof. Vladimir Bulovic Organic and Nanostructured…

The future of chip manufacturing

The future of chip manufacturing

MIT researchers show how to make e‑beam lithography, commonly used to prototype computer chips, more practical as a mass-production technique.«more» Related Links: The future of chip manufacturing Professor Karl K. Berggren Professor Henry I. Smith RLE

‘Artificial leaf’ moves closer to reality

Artificial leaf’ moves closer to reality

MIT researchers develop a device that combines a solar cell with a catalyst to split water molecules and generate energy. «more» Related Links: ‘Artificial leaf’ moves closer to reality Prof. Vladimir Bulovic Organic and Nanostructured Electronics (ONE

Spinning new materials in a thread

Spinning new materials in a thread

Researchers at MIT have succeeded in making a fine thread that functions as a diode, a device at the heart of modern electronics. This feat — made possible by a new approach to a type of fiber manufacturing known as fiber drawing — could open up possibilities for…

M+Vision announces Fellowship finalists

M+Vision announces Fellowship finalists

Groundbreaking international biomedical imaging consortium convenes 24 finalists for elite fellowship. «more» Related Links: M+Visión announces Fellowship finalists Madrid–MIT M+Visión Consortium Professor Martha Gray Professor Elfar…

Oppenheim the Unorthodox

Oppenheim the Unorthodox

Alan Oppenheim ’59, SM ’61, ScD ’64, who literally wrote the book on digital signal processing, encourages far-out thinking that gets concrete results. «more» Related Links: Oppenheim the Unorthodox Professor Alan V. Oppenheim RLE Digital Signal…

“Excited About Excitons” wins DOE contest

Excited About Excitons” wins DOE contest

RLE’s Center for Excitonics wins “Life at the Frontiers of Energy Research” Video Contest for outstanding portrayal of young scientists. «more» Related Links: Excited About Excitoncs Video More information about the contest Professor Marc A. Baldo RLE

Turning windows into powerplants

Turning windows into powerplants

If a new development from labs at MIT pans out as expected, someday the entire surface area of a building’s windows could be used to generate electricity — without interfering with the ability to see through them. «more» Related Links: Turning windows…

The bouncing gas

The bouncing gas

Clouds of gases that bounce off each other could help physicists model the behavior of high-temperature superconductors and other unusual materials. «more» Related Links: The bouncing gas Professor Martin W. Zwierlein RLE Ultracold Quantum Gases Group…

Secure, synchronized, social TV

Secure, synchronized, social TV

Secure, synchronized, social TV: A technique called network coding could protect users’ privacy and providers’ content while making communications networks more efficient. «more» Related Links: Secure Synchronized, social TV Professor Muriel Medard RLE

Fibres get functional

Fibres get functional

New forms of advanced optical fibres featuring exotic glasses, carefully designed microstructures and cores that are either hollow, fluidic, semiconductor or piezoelectric are giving light guides a new lease of life, reports Duncan Graham-Rowe. «more»…

Donald Troxel, longtime EECS professor, dies at 76

Donald Troxel, longtime EECS professor, dies at 76

Donald E. Troxel, an MIT alumnus who later spent 40 years at the Institute as an electrical engineering and computer science faculty member and principal investigator at the Research Laboratory of Electronics and Microsystems Technology Laboratories, died on Jan. 18.…

Fujimoto wins Carl Zeiss Research Award

Fujimoto wins Carl Zeiss Research Award

James Fujimoto, a professor of electrical engineering, has been named the recipient of the Carl Zeiss Research Award. Presented in alternating years, the award honors special scientific achievements in basic research and application in the field of…

Graphene electrodes for organic solar cells

Graphene electrodes for organic solar cells

A promising approach for making solar cells that are inexpensive, lightweight and flexible is to use organic (that is, carbon-containing) compounds instead of expensive, highly purified silicon. But one stubborn problem has slowed the development of such cells.…

New hope for terahertz

New hope for terahertz

Terahertz rays — radiation between microwaves and infrared rays on the electromagnetic spectrum — are a promising means of detecting explosives, but they’ve proven hard to generate cost effectively. So far, solid-state lasers — the cheap, miniature type of laser found…

MIT Smart Fibers Take In And Send Out Sound

MIT Smart Fibers Take In And Send Out Sound

Whether you slap on whatever’s handy or put together a well-coordinated ensemble, your outfit makes some sort of fashion statement. But imagine wearing clothes that could, literally, speak for themselves. «more» Related Links: MIT Smart Fibers Take In…

New Fibers Can See, Hear, Speak

New Fibers Can See, Hear, Speak

Clothing that can see, hear and even talk is being developed by scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. «more» Related Links: New Fibers Can See, Hear, Speak Professor Yoel Fink RLE Fibers@MIT

Exposing collagen’s double life: discovery by Collin Stultz’s group shows that rigid structural protein can switch to a floppy shape that could lead to new treatments for heart disease

Exposing collagen’s double life: discovery by Collin Stultz’s group shows that rigid structural protein can switch to a floppy shape that could lead to new treatments for heart disease

Collagen, a type of connective tissue that makes up about thirty percent of the human body, is a structural protein that serves as an important component of muscle, skin, bones and cartilage, and forms scar tissue when injuries heal. Recent work by Professor Collin…

Self-assembling computer chips

Self-assembling computer chips

Molecules that arrange themselves into predictable patterns on silicon chips could lead to microprocessors with much smaller circuit elements. Researchers in Karl Berggren’s group are using electron-beam lithography sparingly, to create patterns of tiny posts on a…

Mechanical devices stamped on plastic

Mechanical devices stamped on plastic

Microelectromechanical devices—tiny machines with moving parts—are everywhere these days: they monitor air pressure in car tires, register the gestures of video game players, and reflect light onto screens in movie theaters. RLE researchers in Vladimir Bulovic’s group…

Explained: Gallager codes

Explained: Gallager codes

In 1993, scientists achieved the maximum rate for data transmission—only to find they’d been scooped 30 years earlier by an MIT grad student. The startling performance of turbo codes mobilized researchers to try to explain why they worked so well. Within a few years,…

Qing Hu named 2010 IEEE fellow

Qing Hu named 2010 IEEE fellow

Qing Hu, professor of electrical engineering and head of the THz Quantum Cascade Laser Group in the Research Laboratory of Electronics at MIT, is cited by the IEEE “for contributions to terahertz (THz) quantum-cascade lasers and applications.” «more»…

Fine-tuned laser

Fine-tuned laser

A wholly new approach to tuning a laser’s frequency brings us a step closer to airport scanners that can distinguish aspirin from explosives. In a paper appearing in the most recent issue of Nature Photonics, Qing Hu of RLE and his colleagues describe the first…

I’m a Runner: Wolfgang Ketterle, Ph.D.

I’m a Runner: Wolfgang Ketterle, Ph.D.

The Nobel Prize-winning physicist from RLE, Wolfgang Ketterle, talks about his 2:50 marathon and how running helps him stay at the top of science. «more» Related Links: I’m a Runner: Wolfgang Ketterle, Ph.D. Professor Wolfgang Ketterle Center for…

Selling chip makers on optical computing

Selling chip makers on optical computing

By designing chips that can be built using existing fabrication processes, RLE researchers in the Stojanovic and Ram groups show that computing with light isn’t so far fetched. «more» Related Links: Selling chip makers on optical computing Professor…

The 50 Best Inventions of 2009: the Electric Eye

The 50 Best Inventions of 2009: the Electric Eye

The retinal implant under development in the RLE research group of John Wyatt has been named by TIME Magazine as one of its 50 best inventions of 2009. «more» Related Links: The 50 Best Inventions of 2009: the Electric Eye Professor John L. Wyatt, Jr.…

RLE Energy researchers find Obama an eager student

RLE Energy researchers find Obama an eager student

During a tour of RLE labs prior to his talk at Kresge Auditorium last Friday, President Barack Obama saw demonstrations of several clean-energy technologies being developed at MIT, including work in the RLE laboratories of Marc Baldo and Vladimir Bulovic showing…

William F. Schreiber, 1925–2009

William F. Schreiber, 1925–2009

William F. Schreiber, Professor Emeritus at M.I.T, died suddenly at his home in Cambridge, MA. on Monday September 21, 2009, at the age of 84. From l959 until his retirement in l990, he was a faculty member at MIT as Professor of Electrical Engineering. He was…

Stimulating Sight

Stimulating Sight

Led by electrical engineering professor John Wyatt, team develops retinal implant that could help restore useful level of vision to certain groups of blind people. Inspired by the success of cochlear implants that can restore hearing to some deaf people, researchers…

Magnetism observed in a gas for the first time

Magnetism observed in a gas for the first time

Led by Wolfgang Ketterle and David E. Pritchard, RLE physicists shed new light on magnetism in experiment with ultracold atoms. For the first time, RLE scientists in the Center for Ultracold Atoms have observed ferromagnetic behavior in an atomic gas, addressing a…

Louis D. Smullin, 1916–2009

Louis D. Smullin, 1916–2009

Louis D. Smullin, head the Microwave Tube Laboratory and the Active Plasma Systems Group of the Research Laboratory of Electronics, and former head of the electrical engineering department who helped to create MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer…

Chandrakasan honored for semiconductor work

Chandrakasan honored for semiconductor work

Anantha Chandrakasan, director of MIT’s Microsystems Technology Laboratories, today received the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) University Researcher Award. Chandrakasan, the Joseph F. and Nancy P. Keithley Professor of Electrical Engineering, was honored…

Bulovic named MacVicar faculty fellow

Bulovic named MacVicar faculty fellow

Vladimir Bulovic is one of the four newest MacVicar fellows. The program, now in its 18th year, is designed to create an elite group of MIT scholars committed to excellence in teaching and innovation in education. «more» Related Links: Four professors…

Ketterle wins Humboldt Award

Ketterle wins Humboldt Award

Wolfgang Ketterle has been elected the recipient of a Humboldt Research Award after having been nominated by the German scientist Theodor W. Hänsch. «more» Related Links: Ketterle wins award for lifetime achievements Professor Wolfgang Ketterle RLE

Nine from MIT named AAAS fellows

Nine from MIT named AAAS fellows

Martha L. Gray, the Edward Hood Taplin Professor of Medical and Electrical Engineering, was named a fellow for “pioneering contributions to advancing orthopedic science, and for distinguished leadership in the design and implementation of scholarly programs that…

Henry I. Smith receives 2008 Nano 50 Award

Henry I. Smith receives 2008 Nano 50 Award

Henry I. Smith of RLE was named a recipient of the 2008 Nano 50 Award from Nanotech Briefs, recognizing him as a leader and pioneer “with a significant background of accomplishments in advancing the state of the art in nanotechnology.” «more» Related…