Kate Darling, a research specialist at the MIT Media Lab, spoke on Science Friday about “the historical lessons of our relationships with animals, and how they could inform our legal, ethical, and even emotional choices about robots and AI.”

Social media business models are under pressure from Congress and consumers. MIT Sloan’s Sinan Aral, host of the recent Social Media Summit @ MIT, and others say that subscription models, identity verification, and new regulation could help.

Students in STS.032 (Energy, Environment, and Society) learn about the environmental and health costs of discarded electronics. “The environment is an afterthought,” says Clapperton Chakanetsa Mavhunga, who teaches the course. “That’s a big mistake.”

PhD student Sarah Nyquist is using computational methods to study the composition of breast milk. “A lot is unknown about female reproductive health,” she says. “The idea that I can contribute to that knowledge is really exciting to me.”

Before coming to MIT, Carl Kwaku Dey MBA ’21 wanted to build a school with social impact, and had looked at land in Ghana. Once on campus, he embraced the entrepreneurial culture and moved ahead with his plans, inspiring many classmates to help him.

Imagining the ancient natural world has long intrigued David McGee. His study of the atmosphere’s response to paleoclimate changes has shown “the sensitivity of the Earth’s system: A few degrees of warming or cooling is a really big deal.”