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The iconic MIT home page Spotlight features a daily-changing image and design that focuses on advances in research, technology and education taking place at the Institute. Though some Spotlights do run multiple days - for example Friday's spot usually runs through the weekend, we work very hard to maintain the daily-changing tradition. We've combed our servers and have compiled a digital archive of the Institute home page through the years - well over 2000 images. Enjoy!
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Depth in taxesToday’s Spotlight features a photograph, taken by Allegra Boverman, of Stefanie Stantcheva, a fourth‑year PhD student in MIT’s Department of Economics.

Now that April 15 has come and gone, most Americans have turned their attention away from taxes. But MIT student Stefanie Stantcheva continues to ponder the trade‑offs associated with taxation.

A fourth‑year PhD student in MIT’s Department of Economics, Stantcheva studies optimal taxation — or, as she puts it, “how to set the tax system to generate revenue for the government while still preserving incentives for taxpayers to work and save, and carrying out whatever society deems to be an appropriate degree of redistribution.”

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The MIT home page Spotlight showcases the research, technology and education advances taking place at the Institute every day.

What makes it as a Spotlight image is an editorial decision by the MIT News Office based on factors that include timeliness, promotion of MIT's mission, the balance of interest to both internal and external audiences, and appropriateness.

We do welcome ideas and submissions for spotlights from community members, but please note we are not able to accommodate all requests. We are unable to run event previews or promotions as spotlights; for those looking to promote an event, we are happy to include your listing as an event headline on the homepage (when space is available) and you are free to submit an Of Note to the MIT News office. For more information, e-mail the spotlight team.

Request a Spotlight, Of Note or Event Headline, here.
Making the cut

Making the cut

Today’s Spotlight uses an image courtesy of Ilan E. Moyer, Alec Rivers and Frédo Durand.

Anyone who has tried to build a piece of furniture from scratch knows the frustration of painstakingly cutting pieces of wood, only to discover that they won’t fit together because the cutting was not quite accurate enough.

That’s exactly what happened to Alec Rivers, a PhD student in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), when he attempted to build a simple picture frame using woodworking equipment he had inherited from his grandfather. Despite measuring and aligning his tools as best he could by hand, Rivers found that he could not produce shapes with enough precision to make them all fit together. Read more