The first step in repairing something is to understand how it works. At MIT, the next step is imagining how it could work even better than before. Plus: a special section on human and machine intelligence.

Omar Abudayyeh, left, and Feng Zhang. Photo: Sarah Bastille

To the Letter

In the Zhang lab, a leap forward in CRISPR-based genome editing offers precision RNA fixes with major therapeutic implications

Heidi Nepf, left, and Judy Qingjun Yang SM ’15. Photo: Sarah Bastille

Shore Lines

The Nepf lab is helping to restore wetlands by modeling how and why they are so beneficial

Renee Gosline. Photo: Ellen Glassman

Regaining Consciousness

The best path to unbiased algorithms? Recognize bias at the source, says marketing expert Renée Gosline

Susan Silbey. Photo: Jonathan Sachs

Culture Shift

Expanding engineers’ horizons beyond engineering is essential to addressing the field’s gender imbalance, says sociologist Susan Silbey

Puerto Rico’s governor, Ricardo Rosselló ’01, left, visited campus in December to discuss the challenges facing his island with MITEI and the Tata Center’s Robert Stoner. Photo: Justin Knight

Redefining Resilience

MIT experts mobilize to help hurricane-struck islands not only repair, but rebuild for a safer future

West Philadelphia middle school students, 1999. Students working with WPLP have learned to read their landscape as a product of natural forces and social, economic, and political processes. Photo: Anne Whiston Spirn

Greening the Block

Anne Whiston Spirn has made the West Philadelphia Landscape Project a model of urban restoration and community empowerment

A group of USA Lab students spent two weeks in Maine learning about the state’s agricultural sector, with visits to sites including the Blue Ox Malthouse (pictured) in Lisbon Falls. Photo: Bearwalk Cinema

Minding the Gap

The first US-focused MIT Sloan action learning course grapples with the divides in American society

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