Massachusetts Institute of Technology
hideThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological research. MIT's science education, especially in engineering, is widely regarded as among the best in the United States and the world. MIT is one of two private land-grant universities[b] and is also a sea-grant and space-grant university.
Founded by William Barton Rogers in 1861 in response to the increasing industrialization of the United States, the university adopted the German university model and emphasized laboratory instruction from an early date. Its current 168-acre (68.0 ha) campus opened in 1916 and extends over 1 mile (1.6 km) along the northern bank of the Charles River basin. MIT researchers were involved in efforts to develop computers, radar, and inertial guidance in connection with defense research during World War II and the Cold War. In the past 60 years, MIT's educational programs have expanded beyond the physical sciences and engineering into social sciences like economics, philosophy, linguistics, political science, and management.
MIT enrolled 4,172 undergraduates, 6,048 postgraduate students, and employed 1,008 faculty members in the 2007/08 school year. Its endowment and annual research expenditures are among the largest of any American university. 73 Nobel Laureates, 47 National Medal of Science recipients, and 31 MacArthur Fellows are currently or have previously been affiliated with the university.
The Engineers sponsor 33 sports, most of which compete in the NCAA Division III's New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference; the Division I rowing programs compete as part of the EARC and EAWRC. While students' irreverence is widely acknowledged due to the traditions of constructing elaborate pranks and engaging in esoteric activities, the aggregated revenues of companies founded by MIT affiliates would make it the seventeenth largest economy in the world.
For more information about Massachusetts Institute of Technology, read the full article at
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News tagged with mit
Preventing prostate cancer the complex way
Feb 03, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Blocking a specific protein complex prevents the formation of tumors in mice genetically predisposed to develop prostate cancer, researchers at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research ...
'Chameleon Guitar' blends old-world and high-tech
Feb 03, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Natural wood, with its unique grain patterns, is what gives traditional acoustic instruments warm and distinctive sounds, while the power of modern electronic processing provides an unlimited ...
Physicists discover surprising variation in superconductors
Jan 28, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- MIT physicists have discovered that several high-temperature superconductors display patchwork quilt-like variations at the atomic scale, a surprising finding that could help scientists understand a new class ...
Altered brain activity in schizophrenia may cause exaggerated focus on self
Jan 20, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Schizophrenia may blur the boundary between internal and external realities by over-activating a brain system that is involved in self-reflection, and thus causing an exaggerated focus on ...
Chemists engineer plants to produce new compounds
Jan 19, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- In work that could expand the frontiers of genetic engineering, MIT chemists have, for the first time, genetically altered a plant to produce entirely new compounds, some of which could be ...
Nanotubes Sniff Out Cancer Agents in Living Cells
Nanotechnology / Bio & Medicine
Jan 16, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A multidisciplinary team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has developed carbon nanotubes that can be used as sensors for cancer drugs and other DNA-damaging agents inside living cells. The ...
Robo-forklift keeps humans out of harm’s way
Jan 14, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers in MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) are working on a better way to handle supplies in a war zone: a semi-autonomous forklift that can be directed by people ...
Putting heads (and computers) together to solve global problems
Technology / Computer Sciences
Jan 13, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Imagine if the planet's collective brainpower and computing power could be brought together to tackle some of the world's toughest problems, including global climate change and cancer. It may sound like science ...
Do-it-yourself biology: Learning to build a better microbe
Biology /
Jan 13, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Building a cell from scratch is a lot more complicated than building a computer. But that's just what synthetic biologists, including many at MIT, are trying to figure out how to do.
