Biological engineering

Prof. Feng Zhang has been named to STAT’s 2024 STATUS List, which highlights the leaders shaping the future of health and life sciences, reports Dialynn Dwyer for Boston.com. “Among the companies he’s co-founded is Editas Medicine, which as of late 2023 was now the official holder of patent rights to the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing tool used in the sickle cell therapy Casgevy, and Aera Therapeutics, which in February 2023 raised $193 million in venture funding to develop protein nanoparticles as a way of delivering gene editing,” Dwyer writes.

Research scientist Beth Pollack speaks with the New York Times’ Pam Belluck about her work studying the mechanisms of long Covid-19 and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS). “Experts said the study, which is the N.I.H’s first detailed look at ME/CFS, should be considered only one step in understanding the condition, its severity and potential remedies,” explains Belluck. “We must advance the field towards research on treatment,” says Pollack.

Omar Abudayyeh '12, PhD '18 and Jonathan Gootenberg '13 speak with Robert Weisman at The Boston Globe about their deep-rooted working relationship, which began as undergraduates at MIT and has gone on to include joint appointments at the McGovern and Broad Institutes and multiple startups. “Science is difficult, and it’s great to have someone to do it with,” said Gootenberg. “You got to work with people you enjoy hanging out with.”
 

MIT researchers have developed new technology that allows vaccines to be directly inserted into the lymph nodes to target two of the most common mutations in the KRAS gene, which cause roughly one third of all cancers, reports Jaimie Seaton for Scientific American. “The team modified the small vaccine components to include a fatty acid, which enables the vaccine to effectively hitch a ride on albumin, a common protein found throughout the body,” explains Seaton. “Albumin serves as a molecular shuttle bus, with pockets on its surface where fatty acids can bind to it.”

Graduate student Lauren “Ren” Ramlan programmed Doom, an iD software video game, to run on a display made from E.coli cells, reports Andrew Paul for Popular Science. For the project to work, “Ramlan first grew cells within a 32×48 1-bit well plate, then connected the makeshift screen to a controller capable of processing and translating binary code into the ‘addition or omission of a repressor controlling the fluorescence of the cells,’” writes Paul. “Basically, Ramlan swapped a traditional screen’s tiny light diodes for glowing bacterial cells."

Prof. Ron Weiss co-founded Strand Therapeutics, a biotech company developing mRNA therapies, reports Emily Mullin for Wired. “The notion is that genetic circuits can really have significant impact on safety and efficacy,” says Weiss. “This begins to really open up the door for creating therapies whose sophistication can match the underlying complexity of biology.”

Maya Levy '21 speaks with Boston Globe reporter Steve Annear about “The 24-Hour T Ride,” a play written by Levy and friends as part of their work with the MIT Shakespeare Ensemble group. The group is “known to produce 24-hour shows in which only the title is decided on beforehand,” explains Levy. “You can expect silly incredibly local scenes that would not hold up if you performed it anywhere else. You can expect the actors to be having a wonderful time.”

In a new paper, MIT researchers detail how they have used AI techniques to discover a class of “of antibiotics capable of killing methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA),” reports Helen Floresh for Fierce Biotech. “This paper announces the first AI-driven discovery of a new class of small molecule antibiotics capable of addressing antibiotic resistance, and one of the few to have been discovered overall in the past 60 years,” says postdoctoral fellow Felix Wong.

Researchers at MIT have used artificial intelligence to uncover, “a new class of antibiotics that can treat infections caused by drug-resistant bacteria,” reports Jeremy Hsu for New Scientist. “Our [AI] models tell us not only which compounds have selective antibiotic activity, but also why, in terms of their chemical structure,” says postdoctoral fellow Felix Wong.

Erika Debenedictis PhD '20 speaks with Nature reporter Rachel Pells about her experience building her own tools to use in her scientific research. “Inventions come from going out on a limb,” says Debenedictis. “The first version might be duct-taped together, but then you make another one, and another one, and the hope is that eventually the pay-off is greater than the pain of putting it together.”

MIT researchers have developed a new cell imaging technique that offers “the ability to observe up to seven different molecules simultaneously,” writes Amal Jos Chacko for Interesting Engineering. “This could open the door to a deeper understanding of cellular functions, aging, and diseases.”

MIT researchers have “used an algorithm to sort through millions of genomes to find new, rare types of CRISPR systems that could eventually be adapted into genome-editing tools,” writes Sara Reardon for Nature. “We are just amazed at the diversity of CRISPR systems,” says Prof. Feng Zhang. “Doing this analysis kind of allows us to kill two birds with one stone: both study biology and also potentially find useful things.”

Cognito Therapeutics, founded by Prof. Ed Boyden and Prof. Li Huei Tsai, has developed a “specialized headset that delivers 40Hz auditory and visual stimulation” to the brain, which could potentially slow down the cognitive decline and neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease, reports William A. Haseltine for Forbes. Prof. Li-Huei Tsai “and her team speculated that if gamma wave activity is reduced in Alzheimer’s disease, perhaps, artificially stimulating the brain may enhance synchronized firing and restore cognition,” writes Haseltine.

Institute Prof. Robert Langer speaks with Freakonomics host Stephen Dubner about his approach to failure and perseverance in his professional career. Langer recalls how despite early failures with developing new drug delivery methods, “I really believed that if we could do this, it would make a big difference in science, and I hoped a big difference in medicine.”

Cognito Therapeutics, founded by Prof. Ed Boyden and Prof. Li-Huei Tsai, is using a 40 Hzlight-flickering and auditory headset to help slow the progression of Alzheimer’s and restore cognition, reports William A. Haseltine for Forbes. “A recent pilot clinical trial found that this technology is not only safe and tolerable for home use, but also has a positive impact on reducing symptoms associated with age-related neurodegeneration,” writes Haseltine.