Anywhere people face challenges related to water and food—which is to say, just about everywhere—you are likely to find MIT students and recent alumni building projects and companies around creative solutions.
Students come to MIT with a passion to serve the world, and the Institute provides opportunities and tools to do just that, not just after they have graduated but while they’re earning their degree. Teams organized around wide-ranging problems—the wastefulness of conventional hotel laundry systems, say, or the maintenance of rural wells—seek funding and mentoring through competitions like the MIT Water Club’s new Water Innovation Prize, or the Public Service Center’s IDEAS Global Challenge.
Through MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives (MISTI), undergraduates conduct field research in promising technologies like fog harvesting. And students turn to centers such as D-Lab and the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship for support in implementing technologies in the developing world or getting their start-ups off the ground. After graduation, alumni put their ingenuity and skills to use across the US and around the globe, whether they are tracking bee populations, building better agricultural vehicles, or treating industrial wastewater.
Explore an interactive feature illustrating how MIT-trained problem-solvers from a range of disciplines are working across the map to invent and evaluate water- and food-related solutions.