# Curiosity Unbounded

Data: 11-01-2025 21:41:43

## Lista de Vídeos

1. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 12: Making sense of cities](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kIkIgD36GY)
2. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 11: Get out the vote](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtIxTFyn_ZQ)
3. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep.10: Making medicine easier to swallow](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdVTzLJqbhc)
4. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 9: Silk, the fabric of more sustainable agriculture](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFINHKHO3Tw)
5. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 8: Hard facts on soft skills](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXGmsXDHl0U)
6. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 7: Staying radical and relevant](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gj3w-feaOs)
7. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 6: Healing the ailing heart](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1OOzOY2Wg0)
8. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 5: Beyond words](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bp9e7pVTshw)
9. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 4: Build your own superpower, then share it with the world](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SKOZSHATYo)
10. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 3: Decoding the tree of life](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ujgCZHxigw)
11. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 2: Bureaucracies, dictatorships, and the power of Africa’s people](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLEGe4UhKqM)
12. [Curiosity Unbounded, Ep 1: How a free-range kid from Maine is helping green-up industrial practices](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcujt6l3UyM)

## Transcrições

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 12: Making sense of cities
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kIkIgD36GY

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello, I'm
Sally Kornbluth, President
of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome
you to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
One of the greatest
pleasures of my job
is the opportunity to talk
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they're pushing the boundaries
of knowledge and possibility.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
And this podcast is a way
to share that inspiration
with the world.
Today, my guest
is Andres Sevtsuk.
Andres is an associate
professor in MIT's Department
of Urban Studies and Planning.
His research focuses on how
urban planning can improve
the quality of life in cities,
including by encouraging people
to walk, bike, or ride
public transportation.
Andres, welcome to the show.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Thank you.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So your work
looks at sustainable mobility
in cities.
In particular, I know
pedestrian traffic flow
has been a key focus for you.
Your group has developed
models of traffic in cities,
studied how we can
shape urban environments
to encourage sustainable
ways of getting around.
Can you tell us about that
work and why it's so important?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yeah.
So transportation is
one of these areas that
is consuming a huge share
of urban energy use,
about a third, and also
responsible for about a third
of all CO2 emissions.
So we can really not make a big
dent in urban sustainability
without tackling transportation.
And while there's a
lot of work going on,
at MIT and other
technical universities,
on electrifying the vehicle
fleet and technology
innovations, one of the
most powerful things,
I believe we can
do, is build cities
in a way that naturally makes
people want to walk and use
transit more.
And when we do that,
we obtain efficiencies
that can be an
order of magnitude
greater than any marginal
technology improvement.
So as an example, for instance,
when you live in a city,
like Boston, that's
fairly dense, historic,
and provides opportunities for
public transit and walking,
an average person emits about
2 and 1/2 tons of carbon from
mobility every year.
If that similar person
lives in Houston, Texas,
a city that's a lot
more car-oriented,
then that average person emits
about 9 and 1/2 tons of carbon
per year.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
Wow.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And that's
about a four-fold difference.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's huge.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And that's
purely because of city design,
how the city makes us behave.
So I'm interested
in incentivizing
more of that kind of behavior
that we get, here, in Boston.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
And I mean, there's also the
health benefits, obviously.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Absolutely.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: As you
were talking about ways
to make the cities more
pedestrian-friendly, et cetera,
I was also thinking about
Boston and the terrible parking.
In other words, that's one way
to incentivize other systems.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: It is.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Design a city
where the parking is really bad.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: In fact, I think
that's one of the key reasons
that incentivize folks to come
to MIT by transit, biking,
and walking is parking is pretty
expensive, as it should be.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: It's one
of those public goods that
oftentimes is far underpriced
in American cities.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's very interesting.
So city design, then, can
influence pedestrian traffic.
How does pedestrian
traffic actually
influence how people
develop cities
and how people plan for what
cities are going to look like?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Well,
historically, all cities
are, in some ways,
walking cities.
And we have few left in
the world that are still
entirely like that,
we're just automobiles
were never introduced.
But those are very rare these
days, places like Venice, Italy.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And so there
is this sort of interaction
between land uses and
built environments,
where we have origins,
destinations and attractions,
between them, for daily
travel purposes in the city.
We all need to get
to work or to school
or to social meetings
and recreational meetings
and so forth.
And how the land use
pattern is structured really
induces the demand for
different kinds of mobility.
If things are far apart, and
the most logical, rational,
and cheapest comfortable way
of getting there is by car,
then people will act rationally
and drive everywhere.
But if a city provides
that opportunity
of having things close
enough and creating
pleasant, comfortable,
safe experiences,
then actually most
of us choose to walk.
It's a pleasant thing to do.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: It's just
incredibly hard in many cities.
So my research has
really looked at, well,
what are precisely these
configurations that
actually trigger that behavior
and how can we model that.
And we've done a huge
amount of modeling
on traffic, at places like
MIT, over decades and decades,
and not that much modeling
on the non-motorized side
of things.
So I'm very excited
about the opportunity
to actually take the
kind of technical rigor
to this domain that's
historically been thought
of as soft and imprecise.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's interesting.
I'm wondering, with all of
these sort of bike systems
that are now commercial,
where people can-- like
the blue bikes, for instance--
where people can take a bike
and check it out and
bring it back and not
have to think about ownership
or maintenance, et cetera.
Do you have any sense of how
that's actually affected,
first of all,
people's utilization
and how people rely on
cars or anything else?
Have you looked at that at all
ANDRES SEVTSUK: To
some extent, yeah.
But in places that have
invested a lot into safer bike
infrastructure, places
like Cambridge--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: --bicycling
has grown tremendously
over the last 20 years.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: In fact, when I
first moved to Boston in 2004,
I remember biking everywhere
without a single bike lane.
And that was normal.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And now,
when I bike in Cambridge,
if I don't have a bike
lane, I feel awkward.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
I mean, I guess it's
just the intersections
we need to worry about.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Right.
Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
ANDRES SEVTSUK:
You're absolutely
right that oftentimes it's a lot
easier to design one on a block.
But when things get complicated,
intersections, for example--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: --people
kind of leave it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: But that
infrastructure provision
makes a huge difference.
And we see in cities
around the world--
in Paris has had a
doubling of bicycling--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Really?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: --within
the last year, roughly.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Really?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Olympics
played a big role in that, too.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, of course.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: But they
have very aggressively,
under Anne Hidalgo's leadership,
built new infrastructure.
And it pays off.
The behavior follows.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's really interesting.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: We
call it induced demand,
induced by infrastructure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
So what are your favorite
walkable and bikeable cities?
Are there cities that are doing
a particularly good job of this?
You mentioned Paris having
evolved their usage.
What other cities are at
the forefront of this?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: I think
cities, around the world,
are generally understanding
that transportation,
land use dynamics are such
a big part of sustainability
and climate change
mitigation that we
need to do something about it.
Cities that are ahead
of the game, I think,
oftentimes, are in
Europe and East Asia--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: --that
have been prioritizing
dense, transit-oriented
development for a long time.
In Holland, it's almost
like every city, not just
one particular place.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: But many
cities have-- for instance,
Paris has made a big dent in
biking not so much walking.
Because it's already been
extremely walkable because it's
one of the densest
cities in Europe.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Lisbon
has made big strides now,
Milan in Europe.
But in the US context,
too, many cities
are taking it very seriously.
Boston has a 2030
plan that is aiming
to achieve quite an aggressive
shift in mode share.
And if you look at any
midsize or even large
sized city in America,
they have a strategy
to incentivize that mode
shift into the future.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Now that's interesting.
My experience in Holland
was that everybody,
no matter how old, was riding
way faster than I could ride.
You could see that.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That was just
so embedded in the culture.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: It is.
Yeah.
And it's a very interesting
history to that, too.
It wasn't always there.
Holland was extremely
car-centric in the 1960s
and '70s.
And there were so many
deaths caused by traffic
that people
protested, especially
mothers with prams
and strollers,
whose kids were being run over.
And that's the story most
places around the world.
That kind of shift
in policy making
and social support
for sustainable
mobility doesn't just
come out of nowhere.
It comes out of
organizing and protests.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I'm
curious, thinking
about how those
places evolved, one
is if there's a model
for other cities,
but the other is, are there
pockets of resistance to this?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Sure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: What
does that look like?
Is it cities that were already
built on an urban sprawl
and it's just too
hard to back-design?
Or are there other
areas of resistance
to these sort of arrangements?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: I think, as
in almost all domains of life,
it's easiest to keep going the
way things have been going.
So people don't like
change all that much.
And that definitely
holds for mobility, too.
Even here in Cambridge, the
most recent council elections
were pretty much premised on
the support for sustainable
mobility or not.
I mean, we had a very
tense election here.
And in many cities, there
have been big public debates
about even minor changes.
I remember a case out
of Manhattan Beach,
around Los Angeles,
where there was
a huge backlash
against a bike lane
that was being
planned on a road.
And I think oftentimes change
is really hard to digest,
especially if it goes very fast.
And cities need to plan
how quickly they introduce
some of these large shifts.
But yeah, there are certainly
a lot of backlash, too,
and, largely, because people are
unfamiliar with the alternative.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: In fact,
here, in Cambridge, too,
a lot of businesses are
concerned about sustainable
mobility.
They think that they lose
customers if you take away
parking in front of them.
In fact, most of
the research has
shown that would benefit them.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Foot
traffic, exactly.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: People are much
more likely to pop into a store
if they bike or
walk past it rather
than if they drive past it.
But I think people
generally just
haven't seen the
alternatives, so it's safer
to hold on to what you know.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
So maybe you can
give the listeners
and give me an idea of
what research looks like
in this area?
What sort of questions
do you actually ask?
How do you approach them?
What's the methodology
to get to the answers?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: So
a lot of my research
looks at cities as networks.
So we use network science
to analyze these land
use and mobility dynamics,
how land use patterns
create demand for mobility.
And so, for instance,
recently, I've
been working on a model
of pedestrian activity
for the city of New York.
And so the research has involved
first creating a city-wide
precise network of
pedestrian infrastructure,
so that we would have a
topologically interconnected
infrastructure network of
all sidewalks, crosswalks,
and footpaths--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, I see.
ANDRES SEVTSUK:
--that represents
how you can get around, and then
all the origin destination data
on top of that, where are
jobs, where are homes,
where are schools,
parks, subway stops,
and all sorts of destinations
that people might want to go to.
And then we use
network algorithms
to estimate how trips
flow over the networks,
from certain origins to
certain destinations,
in a way that actually
represents pedestrian behavior.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: So we know
from behavioral studies
how far people are
willing to walk,
what routes they
prefer, how that
may vary between men and
women or old or young,
and then try to bring these
findings, from the research,
into the model and accurately
simulate how they actually
move through the networks.
And then we calibrate
these models,
on observed traffic
counts, to try
to get them to precisely
reflect what actually
is seen on the streets.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh
that's interesting.
So then, using that
information for design--
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
--you will predict
new paths that would
be more efficient
or encourage more
pedestrian traffic?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yeah.
So there's lots of
interesting applications.
The beauty of
models is precisely
that they not only describe
what it is but they can forecast
if-then kinds of changes.
And we can, for instance,
say, if the model is
built in such a way
that it accounts
for street characteristics--
and we know, actually,
from pedestrian
behavior research what
sorts of routes
people prefer to walk
if presented with alternatives.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
ANDRES SEVTSUK:
So, for instance,
how would you walk
from here to Harvard?
Most likely Mass Ave, but
this is a pretty obvious walk.
But oftentimes, you have
hundreds of alternatives
you could choose.
And we know, statistically, what
kinds of routes people prefer.
They prefer wider sidewalks.
They prefer business
frontages on the sidewalks.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
I see.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: They
prefer greenery.
They prefer to see other people.
And so if all these
features are in the model,
then we can also model how
changing these features
will shift for
traffic in the city.
And so if the City
of New York wants
to revitalize a neighborhood
and bring more foot
traffic on a
commercial street, they
contemplate changes
like widening sidewalks
or taking away certain
traffic features
and quieting traffic down.
And these sorts of models can
help forecast what will happen
and what will work
and what won't work.
In fact, all foot traffic and
pedestrian-related investments
and infrastructure, by
law, require some form
of cost-benefit analysis.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: So these sorts
of models are great for that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: They can
help forecast the benefit
and also quantify the cost.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
There's also some
natural experiments,
like during the pandemic when
outdoor dining was put in place.
And people reacted
towards the impact
of both foot
traffic and merchant
utilization and accessibility.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yes, indeed.
Yeah, that was one of those
things that a lot of people
said, we'd like that
to stay beyond COVID.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: It's
quite nice to see
that Cambridge and
Boston actually can
function with outdoor dining.
And I think it's kind of
adjusted to a certain steady
state now where some have
disappeared but a lot of them
have actually stayed.
And it's made our streets, I
think, more vibrant and fun.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: No, absolutely.
So I'm just wondering
about the overall impact
on carbon emissions, then.
For some of the major cities--
you mentioned the difference
between Houston and New York,
for instance-- what do you think
the potential upside of this is?
In other words,
how big an impact
could this have
if we really could
see a shift in major
cities to pedestrian,
bicycle traffic, et cetera?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: I'm
glad you asked that.
I think it's a really
critical question.
And I would love
to see city design
as one of the key
features in the climate
initiative at the
institute because it
plays such a huge role that
we don't usually look at.
So a couple of thoughts on that.
One is that the sustainable
mobility benefits, which
I mentioned between
Boston and Houston
are four-fold or
sometimes even larger,
they don't only
pertain to mobility.
In fact, the same kind of
denser and more mixed use city,
like Boston, also saves
energy from buildings
themselves not just mobility.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Sure.
Sure.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And that
is also very significant,
about 2 and 1/2 times.
An average inhabitant in Houston
will spend about 5 megawatts
of residential energy per year.
And the same type of person,
in Boston, will spend about 2.
That's not only heating
but also cooling.
And the fact, in
car-oriented cities,
buildings are low
rise, they're generally
all apart from each other,
with four walls and a roof that
exposes to climate,
whether it's heat or cold.
It requires mitigation.
And in cities where we build
vertically and more compactly,
we have less perimeter to
volume ratio in buildings,
so we actually have less
heat exchange outside.
And that actually plays
a pretty critical role
in cutting down building
energy demand, as well,
and building emissions.
So combined through
transportation
and heating/cooling,
the benefits
are really very significant.
And oftentimes, the
question is, well,
that's great for building new
cities, but what do we do?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: How
do we back-- yeah.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: We
already have our cities.
We have Boston.
What are we going
to do about it?
Well, the interesting
thing is that roughly 30%
of all buildings in Greater
Boston, that we see today,
date from the last 40 years.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, wow.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And that
is just to say, even
in cities that don't massively
grow, like in the Global South,
we keep renovating
and rebuilding.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And
MIT is a prime example.
We build a lot.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And so that
process of continuous building
and where we build and
how we build, I think
will have very significant
impacts on climate change.
And so even in built-out
cities, like Boston,
if we can funnel our growth
closer to public transit,
closer to amenities where
we can walk to places--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's interesting.
ANDRES SEVTSUK:
--this will take time,
but, in three or
four decades, we
will see the benefits
of all of this.
And the benefits are not
going to be marginal.
They're going to be
big, several times
savings compared to developing
in suburbs and so forth.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And so I
think that's, potentially,
a really big area of benefit
that we should really
investigate more with
the climate initiative.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's interesting,
mentioning the
climate initiative,
which we call the
Climate Project at MIT.
We selected, intentionally,
six missions that we really
thought could move the
needle in significant ways.
And one of them really
is about building
healthy, resilient cities.
And that brings up sort of
an interesting question,
in my mind, which is the
intersection between policy
and technology that we see here.
So for example, we
have a group that's
interested in the
technology side,
on cement production, that's
low carbon or carbon free.
And I think there was already a
building pour in Massachusetts.
And so how can policy direct
some of these actions,
like you have to use
these sort of materials
or you have to have a certain
percentage of the city dedicated
to pedestrian
traffic, et cetera?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: No,
policy is absolutely key
when it comes to urban
planning and urban development.
And there are countless
examples of the key influence
that that has.
For instance, we talked,
earlier, about parking
and how managing parking can
be so effective in mode shift.
All the parking we have in
buildings today, as is required,
is an idea that was
introduced in the 1950s.
Until 1950s, you did not have to
build parking with a building.
People would just dump
their cars on the streets
and somehow get by.
And then people said, well,
that's public resources.
You can't do that.
And in five decades or so,
we've built cities such
that there's enormous reservoirs
of parking, everywhere,
in private lots and buildings.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes, yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And
they're all interconnected
into a seamless system that
makes driving very easy.
Now, I always use
this as an example
to say that, what if we
did that for pedestrians?
What if every project
that gets built
has to do a little bit,
for a better public realm,
for pedestrians?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: A little
pocket park, here, or plaza,
there, or a public space, here,
and if we stitch them together,
seamlessly, and let that
process run for 50 years, what
sort of a city would we get?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And
that's a public policy.
And parking is a public policy.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And then
I think, similarly, we're
seeing today how some
of these policies
are being introduced
but they're also hard.
Massachusetts has a state law
now called the MBTA Communities
Act, which requires that
every community that's
next to rail lines,
commuter rail and MBTA,
has to upzone and allow more
housing into their area.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, interesting.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And
especially affordable housing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And
if you read the news,
communities are
fighting back and saying
that the state has no business
telling us what to do.
But of course, this kind
of low-rise suburban zoning
is one of those
legacies, in Boston,
that happened after the
school busing was required.
And this was largely
racial undertones.
People fled the inner
cities to the suburbs
and then zoned
them in such a way
that you can't have apartments
or multi-family homes.
And now we're dealing
with the legacy of that.
And I think this is
on the right track.
I think the state
should be zoning up
around transit so we can finally
get cities built around transit.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: But it
has its own backlashes,
like we talked about, also,
with sustainable mobility.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's really interesting.
I mean, it does look like some
cities are starting to repurpose
parking, for example,
taking away parking lots,
taking down parking
garages and using them
for the more dense housing--
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Absolutely.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: --that
you're talking about.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: There's
one in downtown Boston,
right next to Government Center,
that was for years an eyesore
and now is being redeveloped.
And I live in Somerville.
The city of Somerville is
actively actually repurposing
parking lots and down-zoning
parking, which I think
is a music to my ears.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
very interesting.
I mentioned the
pandemic, earlier,
when we were talking about
street dining, et cetera.
But the pandemic actually led
to people leaving the cities,
going to the suburbs.
And I'm wondering, is
that trend continuing?
Are people moving
back to cities?
We see, for instance, not only
on individual residential issues
but also commercial buildings
trying to fill up again.
We hear a lot,
here, about people
working from home, which
obviously has pluses,
in terms of the dense,
congested cities,
but has other side
effects on the workplace.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yeah.
Definitely, we saw a very
quick shift during COVID
towards suburbs, towards places
where there was more space.
And then, as part
of that process,
we saw a great deal of
individual car purchases
in the United States.
So not only did people
shift their residence,
a lot more people bought cars.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, interesting.
ANDRES SEVTSUK:
And that's the part
that makes it really hard to
reverberate back, quickly,
because it's a sunk cost.
People have bought a new car.
And they're not not
going to use it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
ANDRES SEVTSUK:
Whereas we do actually
see demand for inner
city locations.
In fact, a lot of people would
live in Boston or in Cambridge,
they just can't afford to
because the real estate
market doesn't provide
enough affordable options.
It's too expensive.
And so even if we see people
who want to come back,
oftentimes, that
kind of lifestyle,
they are now quasi locked
into with vehicles,
prevents that, as well.
There has been a
back swing, though.
There are many not even
suburbs but small towns
that packed up with people
in COVID, who said they
had the best year ever in 2020.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Because,
all of a sudden, everybody
was flocking there.
Now, prices have
dropped 50% or more
because the same people have
left back to the cities.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Got it.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: But
we still don't quite
have the supply of housing,
especially for a large housing
that accommodates families with
kids, in central city locations.
And that's the key reason why
people stay in the suburbs,
oftentimes, because they
get the space for cheaper.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
It was funny.
I think I saw a talk--
and I hope I get this right--
by one of your colleagues,
Jinhua Zhao, who was
analyzing energy utilization.
And I think we all thought
that more working from home
was, in a sense,
more energy efficient
because there was less
commuting, et cetera.
But it turned out
the patterns by which
people heated their home
versus heated the buildings
meant that cities didn't
necessarily realize those gains.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Oh,
that's super interesting.
Yeah, I mean, it
makes sense to me
that if you're two people in a--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: --2,000 even
4,000 square foot home versus
a small office.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And
run your heat all day.
Exactly.
Exactly.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: That
is a shared cost, yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So I thought
that was kind of interesting.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I'm just
wondering how you became
interested in urban planning.
Most 10-year-olds don't say, I
want to grow up to be an urban
planner.
I'm wondering what got you
interested in this area.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: So I grew up in
Estonia, in northeastern Europe.
And I grew up in public
housing and, I think,
very much relied on
the city as a resource.
I mean, it was a kind of an
experience where everything
was in the public sphere
rather than the private sphere,
like the playground,
the transportation,
the cultural amenities.
So I think I got my
appreciation for cities
somewhat from that experience.
I studied architecture
as an undergraduate.
And I lived in Paris
during that time--
in France.
And I think, as an undergraduate
architecture student,
I developed this
kind of interest
in understanding cities
during that time,
in Paris, for a few
different reasons.
On the one hand, Paris has
this amazing urban culture
where everyone has an
opinion about the city.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: I
mean, I went to dinners
where people still debate
whether they should
have allowed the pyramid
at the Louvre 30 years
after or the Pompidou
from 45 years after.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And so that
urban culture was, I think,
contagious if everybody's
interested in questions
of city design.
And as an architect, the
complexity fascinates me.
In architecture, oftentimes,
you have a client.
And as long as you
satisfy their demands,
you can design a building.
Like if your client
is happy with it,
that's usually the end of it
so long as it's in budget.
But cities are never
shaped by individuals.
They're an emergent
phenomenon that's
the result of complex forces,
some of which are economic,
some of which are cultural,
historic, social, real estates.
And all of them,
together, shape cities.
And I'm always
fascinated by this
because we can study cities
like people study nature.
They are a phenomenon where you
try to apply scientific methods
to make sense of them.
And moreover, we don't just
need to make sense of them,
we also need to make sense of
how could we change things,
so they're also forward-looking.
And we need to understand how
policy shifts or spatial shifts
or other kinds of
strategies can shift
things in the right
direction down the line.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
it's interesting.
As you were talking,
I was thinking about,
we tend to think about the
differences between cities.
But as you think about your
comment about complexity,
emergent properties, et
cetera, given human behavior,
I would assume that there's sort
of similar underlying properties
that are affecting each city.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: There are.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
And then they're
all sort of variations
on the theme?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: There are.
Yeah.
That's really interesting.
I wrote a book called Street
Commerce, Creating Vibrant Urban
Sidewalks.
It's really a book about
small-scale business patterns
in cities, the kind of
street-facing amenities
and retail and restaurant
types of businesses.
And one of the fundamental
questions in the book
is that, if you actually
look at it, scientifically,
there's huge amounts
of commonality.
The location patterns of
small businesses in cities
are, in fact,
highly predictable.
Yet when you go to
a town, every town
is very proud of its
unique characteristics.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: You go to Keene,
New Hampshire, or Burlington,
Vermont, or Boston, everybody's
very proud of their main street.
And so I think it's precisely
the patterns that are common
versus the traits that are
unique that makes cities really
interesting.
And all cities try to
deviate from the norm,
be special in some ways.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: But
we can understand
some of the common forces
that shape them in a very
predictable manner, as well.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Interesting.
Before we sign off, how do you
feel about our own local transit
system, the T?
Do you think it's
getting better?
Any advice for easing
Boston traffic?
ANDRES SEVTSUK: I'm very
pleased to see the new MBTA
general manager, Phillip Eng.
I think things have totally
turned around since his arrival.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's great.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And I know
there's a lot of backlog,
a lot of work still
needs to be done,
but I think things are moving
in the right direction, at last.
I live very close to the
new Green Line extension,
so I benefit from that, a lot.
And it's really nice to
see that we are again
talking about not just
maintaining the old legacy
infrastructure but
creating new things,
like the North-South Station
Corridor, potentially,
new subway extensions that
are being discussed again.
So I think this is a truly
unique feature that Boston has.
Historically, the most
expensive or difficult thing
is to get the right-of-ways.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: We
already have those.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: We have
these train corridors that
emanate out of the city center.
We just need to
operate the service
and find the money
to support that.
And I very much like
to see that things
are shifting in that direction.
So there's work to be done.
But I'm positive about where
things are moving towards.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's
funny, because I moved here
from Durham, North
Carolina, which really
has bad public transportation.
And even with the inefficiencies
I've heard about in the T,
I'm so thrilled to be able to
hop on the T and go someplace.
Of course, Durham has
very good cheap parking.
But the benefits I'm
hearing, as you're saying it,
getting better and better,
I think it's great.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Yeah, it is.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I
look forward to riding.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And then
people sometimes complain
that it costs the
taxpayer a lot of money.
It needs to be subsidized.
But we need not forget that
the driving infrastructure
is fully subsidized and
has been for decades.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
Yes.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And
it's no different.
So we need to subsidize what
makes us better as a society.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
People need only
to think back to the Big Dig.
I mean, Boston was years being
dug up on taxpayer money.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: And not
just that, the largest state
expenditures tend to
be infrastructure.
So the roads, every
single year, the budget
goes largely to maintaining
our infrastructure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Exactly, exactly.
Well, this was really fun.
I learned a lot in
this conversation.
ANDRES SEVTSUK: Thank
you for the initiative.
It's such a
wonderful experience.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
To our audience,
I hope you've all
enjoyed listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.
[MUSIC PLAYING]

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 11: Get out the vote
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtIxTFyn_ZQ

Idioma: en

CREW: This episode of
Curiosity Unbounded
was recorded on November 7,
two days following the 2024
presidential election.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello.
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
president of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome
you to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
One of the great
pleasures of my job
is the opportunity to talk
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they're pushing the boundaries
of knowledge and possibility.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
And this podcast is a way
to share that inspiration
with the world.
Today, my guest is Ariel White.
Ariel is an associate professor
of political science at MIT.
She studies voting
and voting rights
and examines why voters do or
do not participate in elections
at all levels of government.
Very timely.
Ariel, welcome to the show.
ARIEL WHITE: Thanks
very much for having me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
let's start because we're
right in the thick of the--
I would say-- the aftermath.
Let's talk about the recent
presidential elections.
Were there any surprises
for you in voter turnout?
ARIEL WHITE: So it's
early days to be
completely sure about turnout.
But it doesn't
look, for example,
we will see anything
that surpassed 2020.
And there were certainly
some predictions
that we might see
particularly strong turnout
among specific groups.
I am not someone who makes
a lot of election forecasts.
And so sometimes I
get to say, well, I
didn't predict anything that
was wrong, which is true here.
But no, I think
that we will have
to see in the weeks
and months to come,
just who did end up turning
out, not just geographically
but across various
sectors of society.
And that's something that
we'll know a lot more about in,
as I said, the weeks
and months to come.
It's something that takes
a while after an election
to put together.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, it's interesting
because I think we
tend to think of people
voting for a variety of
different motivations
and reasons.
And I'm wondering,
do you think there
were particular issues in this
election that were bringing
people to the
polls, keeping them
from the polls that might have
contributed to turnout overall?
ARIEL WHITE: Well,
this is something
that I am generally pretty
reluctant to piece together
a narrative about in a couple
of days after an election.
And that's, I think,
particularly why
political scientists can
be frustrating to people
who want to talk about politics,
because that's of course
exactly when we want to talk
about an election is right
after it happened.
I feel this intensely.
But in talking before this
podcast, a couple of days ago,
about what we
should cover here, I
think I said basically,
in a couple of days
after the election,
we will know--
we'll know probably
who won, which we do.
And we probably won't
quite know how or why.
And that unfortunately
continues to be true.
I could speculate, but I would
be speculating pretty wildly.
And so I would say, it's worth
approaching with some caution.
Anybody who tells you in
the week of an election
that they have a
very clear picture
of what it means, both about the
electorate and the coalitions
that support a given
party or candidate,
as well as perhaps what it means
about the broader structure
of American public opinion.
Election returns
are not necessarily
our best or only guide
to those kinds of things.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So well,
let's think a little bit then,
maybe look back at
previous elections,
and think about the degree to
which single-issue voting is
prevalent.
And does that tend to be at the
really local level as opposed
to at the presidential level?
And how much do you think single
issues really impact turnout?
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah.
So there are
certainly some voters
who care very strongly
about specific issues.
As you say, some of
them at the local level,
especially if that's
how they got activated
to know that there were
elections happening
at the local level, which
can be a little variable,
as well as at the
national or state level,
there's both the set of people
who care deeply about an issue
consistently.
And then there's sometimes
this broader sense
of issues that matter across
the electorate in a given year,
even if those aren't
necessarily people
we would usually think of as
a specific issue-driven voter.
But there's also just
a lot of other things
that shape the vote
exactly as you suspected.
So people come in with
their own partisanship.
They come in with habits.
They come in with really
varied information
about both the candidates and
parties and really varied levels
of, I would say, attention
and interest in politics.
And so this is
something that I think
can be really hard for people to
picture when they themselves are
very interested in politics.
This is certainly the problem
for many political scientists.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: How
could you not care?
ARIEL WHITE: Yes,
especially when
elections are as contested
and as high stakes
as they have been
in recent years.
And yet it is the case,
we see in a variety
of measurement efforts,
that people often
don't have a ton of
information about politics.
They don't necessarily
like politics
enough to be wanting to
spend more time on it.
They have plenty of other stuff
going on in their daily lives.
And so yeah, there
are certainly people
who care about a specific issue,
follow it, and vote on it.
There are also a lot of
people who don't necessarily
have the kind of detailed
ideological world view
that people might
be picturing when
they think about the
kinds of decisions
that voters are making.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
I mean, at least in
terms of press coverage,
it always seems that the
economy, purchasing power, et
cetera, is an overarching
issue for many people.
Now, that may be
a press narrative.
But particularly
in this election,
we're seeing that as an
explanation of voters
splitting from their
previous social convictions
and voting differently from
how they have in the past.
And do you think that's an
accurate narrative that people--
not just about this
election but that people
vote with their wallet?
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah.
So I think it's a plausible
narrative about this election,
though, as I said--
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
ARIEL WHITE: But
it is absolutely
a broader story about how
voting works in the US.
Certainly, yeah,
I mean, there is
work on economic-- both shocks
and over time economic status
that is certainly
predictive of how especially
the incumbent party does.
And so there are models that
predict election outcomes based
on the fundamentals
earlier in the year.
And I think a fair
number of people
who are running those
models earlier this year
said this is going to be a
tough election for the Democrats
to make headway in, especially
as they also look not just
at historic US patterns
of voting and election
fundamentals, like the economy,
as well as when they looked
at international comparisons
to what's been going on
with incumbent parties in
the last couple of years,
as we see this kind of
post-COVID inflation period.
So it is not only the US
where the incumbent party
has been pretty roundly
thrown out this year.
So yeah, there
are broader trends
there that we can certainly
see as predictive and probably
part of the story, even
as I hesitate to say,
this is definitely
the one thing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
I mean, it's actually
kind of interesting
when you think about
it, because first
of all, the direct impact of
any individual leader or even
any individual party holding
power on the economy,
there's impact, but it
can be pretty loose.
I mean, there's extreme
examples, like the New Deal.
But from year to year,
it can be pretty loose.
But the other thing is
the lagging indicators
so that each person inherits the
policies of their predecessor.
And there's a lag.
It takes time.
ARIEL WHITE: Yes, yeah.
I mean, the question of
how to assess a given
candidate and a given
party in the wake of four
years of information
with a really
difficult set of
counterfactual stories of what
would have happened, that's
a really daunting task
to ask of voters.
And it's worth keeping in
mind that different people
will approach how to do that
in really different ways.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah, exactly.
So you've been hesitant to
make any sort of conclusions
about this particular election.
But what kinds of
data are available
immediately after an election?
What can we learn from that?
And if there's not a lot
available immediately,
what's the lag?
When will you feel
comfortable saying,
this is what happened
in this election?
ARIEL WHITE: So it gets
better and better in the weeks
and then in the months after the
election, which is like, again,
why political scientists
are just no fun at parties.
But in the days immediately
after the election,
we typically have some at
least preliminary returns.
I mean, some places are, of
course, still counting ballots,
depending on their
approaches and turnout.
But we have a general sense
of about where turnout landed
at a high level of aggregation.
So we know about what that
looked like nationally.
We know what the vote
outcome was nationally
as well as by state
and, in a lot of cases,
by county and city.
And then we have some
preliminary exit polls
about what people
said, who they said
they voted for, and some of
their personal characteristics,
as well as why they said
they voted for them, which
I would say we
particularly want to be
cautious about as a question.
We can come back to
that if we want to.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Post
facto rationales.
ARIEL WHITE: Yes.
This is not the kind of
question that human beings are
good at answering, I would say.
And so we want to be really
cautious about those.
We also know that
exit polling can
depend on a variety of sampling
approaches and assumptions
about the electorate that
are hard to maintain,
especially given the many ways
that people vote right now.
So I would say we want to be
ready for those to be revised
as we learn more about who
was actually in the electorate
and how to think about how
different sectors might
have voted.
So that's, I would say, a
work in progress in the time
after the election.
But then as time
goes on, we start
to get other sources of data.
So we have, for example, more
and more granular information
about voting, about, for
example, how many people turned
out, not just at the county,
not just at the town level,
but at, for example,
the precinct level.
This is something one of my
colleagues, Charles Stewart,
puts together in his lab.
And then we also start
to be able to combine
that with data at the individual
level from voting records.
So we can see not just what's
the vote count in a precinct,
but we can also see,
who voted there?
Who are the people who
actually turned out?
And so we can map those things--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Do you get
party registration data as well?
ARIEL WHITE: In
many places, yes.
And so you can start to say
some things demographically
and partisanship-wise
about who was
part of the coalition of
the different parties.
And you can also start
to sometimes map that
to survey data that may
have asked much more
detailed questions about issue
preferences before the election
than we're ever going to get out
of something like exit polling.
And so by next
spring, when nobody
is interested in talking
about it anymore,
I think we should have a
very clear picture of just
kind of what all came together.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So what
do you think about-- you
talked about exit polling.
Obviously, that's a
particular sampling.
What do you think
about mail-in voting
and how that influences
both turnout?
And does it actually
impact an election outcome?
I always wondered about
places that have--
particularly with
geographical differences--
the impact of what's
happening in earlier returns,
particularly in states that
don't count the mail-in voting
until after election day
or on election day, how
that flow of information impacts
turnout or decision-making
at later polling places.
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah,
this is something
where a lot of recent
election changes, whether it's
vote by mail or early voting,
these things that spread
out the election do have
the potential for people
to be operating in a different
information environment
depending on when they
happen to cast their ballot.
And it's a hard
thing to quantify.
In a few cases, we see
variation in how these get
rolled out or implemented.
But often, it's a state
doesn't have mail-in voting.
And then it does.
And so the kinds of the units
that we can observe here
are pretty small.
We don't, I would say,
have a lot of evidence
that making it a little bit
easier to vote, convenience
voting reforms, necessarily
have big effects on turnout,
on participation, as
we might have thought.
Generally, in the
context of the modern US,
things like early voting don't
seem to bring more people out
so much as they
often make it easier
and more convenient
for the people who
would have voted to vote.
If you're thinking
about the margin
where we do tend to see
more people actually
make it to the polls, I would
think about voter registration--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
interesting, yeah.
ARIEL WHITE: --where
in cases where
you have to know to
register and know
how to register a month
before the election or even
a couple of weeks.
You can get people who might
have made it to the polls
if they were able to
register on the day,
or if they had been
automatically registered.
So that's the stage of the
process I would look to there.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, interesting.
Your work has actually
provided evidence
in support of simpler
election law and policies
to help draw people
to the polls,
alleviate the burdens of voting.
In general, what are
the largest hurdles?
Is it registration?
Is it transportation?
We always hear about the
famous effects of weather.
I'm just wondering what
you've actually seen.
ARIEL WHITE: Oh, there's a lot
of reasons people don't vote,
just like there's a lot
of reasons people do vote
or they vote the way they do.
When I think about the whole
universe of possibilities,
I think about this classic
book in political science
about political participation
that basically says,
why don't people participate?
Well, they can't, they don't
want to, or nobody asked them.
And that's basically
the set of options.
And so for voting,
that can be that people
might struggle logistically
with getting registered.
They might not know
how to take that step.
In some cases,
they're legally not
allowed to, which is
something that I also study.
They might also just find
politics distasteful enough
that they don't want to.
That's another big reason people
don't make it to the polls.
And then in some cases, like
I said, nobody asked them,
which we do have
a real sense can
matter for people's
participation
in a wide variety of actions.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I
mean, actually, there
are things that politically
have made their way into law
in some states that actually
actively discourage people
from voting, state laws that
ban offering water to voters who
are waiting in line, et cetera.
Intuitively, you think they
really do discourage people
from coming to vote.
Do you know empirically,
is that the case?
ARIEL WHITE: This
is a good question.
And it is another
one that I would
say empirically is going to
be really hard to observe,
where we don't have
a lot of variation
in these kinds of state laws.
But when you think of things
that have been in place
for a while that have
been studied more--
so things like voter
identification requirements,
for example, which we might
think of on that spectrum
of making it harder or easier
for some people to vote--
what we see is
pretty clear evidence
that they make life harder
for people trying to vote,
that they introduce
barriers for people voting.
And we can characterize who
is most affected by that.
But as far as whether we
see clear turnout effects
from those laws, it's,
I would say, not nearly
as clear empirically that
people are-- in fact,
that large numbers of people
are being deterred from voting.
We can see some individual
people, for sure.
In some cases, we can see
some estimates among people,
for example, who
don't have a driver's
license in a specific place.
But in a lot of cases,
it seems that people
manage to vote, which is not
to say that this was an OK way
to treat voters.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
So you're more speaking of
treating certain voters.
Your most recent work
details how people got back
into political life as voters
following a felony conviction
or some other punitive
interaction with the state.
So can you tell us a little
bit more about that work?
ARIEL WHITE: Absolutely.
So some of my
earlier work had been
about how these kinds
of negative or punitive
interactions with
government made people
less likely to participate.
And you can imagine
the many reasons.
That might be both
from not knowing
they were eligible
to not thinking
anybody wanted to hear from
them to being unregistered.
And so in a lot of ways,
kind of invisible to all
the political machinery that
tells us about elections.
And so after doing that
work for a while and telling
the "here's a problem" story,
I got to talking with some
coauthors about, what
do you do about it?
Can people actually make their
way back into political life
after having experiences like
a conviction or incarceration,
where there are millions of
people in this country that
have had this experience
but are eligible to vote?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I was about
to ask, not to interrupt,
but how do the laws of
different states impact that?
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah.
Yeah, there's huge
variation across states
in whether people can vote
after a felony conviction.
And so in some cases, you
never lose the right to vote,
like in Maine and Vermont.
And in other cases,
you may lose it
at various stages of serving
the sentence or well after that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
in Maine and Vermont,
can people vote when they're
actually incarcerated?
ARIEL WHITE: Yes, indeed.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, interesting.
ARIEL WHITE: Yes.
As well as in Washington, DC.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
ARIEL WHITE: That
said, some of my work
is also on how in practice,
even in these places like Maine
and Vermont, people very, very
rarely manage to use that vote.
And so this is part of why
we're thinking about what
can change that exactly,
is like seeing that even
having the legal right to
vote in some of these states
doesn't translate
into actually being
represented in the electorate.
And so yeah, we got
to thinking what
could help people make their way
back into political life, which
is especially relevant for this
group of people that often face
some kind of specific
barriers but also
just have really high
rates of nonparticipation.
But we think there's also room
to think about the broader
set of people who are not
only not voting but fully not
registered to vote and just
in some ways, like I said,
not even visible to the world
of election and campaign work.
So we started testing
out approaches
that might give
people information
to register and vote, might
let them navigate that process.
And then this election, we
also started testing out ways
that people might be able to
help their loved ones register
and vote.
They might be able to reach
out to their social networks
and help them navigate that
registration voting process.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I would
guess some of those folks
don't want to interact with the
official machinery in any way,
having had negative
interactions.
And so perhaps, as you
say, friends and family--
do things like political
flyers or television ads
have any positive effect?
ARIEL WHITE: So
there's been less work,
I would say, on how these
kinds of mass media approaches
can affect registration.
Certainly, there can be smallish
campaign effects on vote choice.
So certainly, right before the
election, when a lot of things
can matter just a little
bit, campaign efforts
can matter a little bit too.
But as far as registration,
we know a lot less
about how to do it, partly
because it's something
that campaigns invest
less in than trying
to get out existing voters.
And it's something
where you don't--
in some sense, you often
don't know where to look,
because unlike the list of
voters that you can call
or you can knock on
their doors, the list
of people who aren't registered
to vote simply doesn't exist.
There's nothing to work off of.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
It's actually interesting for
this election-- in my case,
I had moved to MIT from Duke.
And we still own a house
in Durham, North Carolina.
And we have a driver's
license here in Massachusetts.
We voted in Massachusetts,
registered to vote.
But our names hadn't
been taken off.
There's no effective
way to do that.
And with text messages
now, there's a low barrier.
And they're definitely
tracking who's
gotten to the
polls in some ways,
as you were saying, because
I just kept getting,
are you going to vote?
We still don't see
that you're voting.
And I felt like, do you
really think I'm not voting?
[LAUGHTER]
But anyway, it just seems
that those kind of efforts
have ramped up just in
terms of really direct
to the individual hassling.
ARIEL WHITE: Yes.
It's absolutely true.
And as I tell my mom, when she
complains about this to me,
because you've seen both the
promise and the peril of this,
they do it because it works.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah, I bet.
I mean, if I had not gone to
vote, I would have been like,
oh, my god, I haven't
gotten to vote.
And I wasn't go to--
ARIEL WHITE: Precisely.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: --text back
to some anonymous, opt-out kind
of thing.
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah.
Well, and that's, I
guess, the spectrum
of possibilities there
is texts actually
work a little less well than
if somebody calls you up,
especially a real person,
not a paid person.
If they can get your neighbor to
knock on your door, that does--
it really does--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That
does have more impact.
ARIEL WHITE: It gives people the
sense that people will notice.
And there is a norm
of voting when people
feel that kind of pressure.
They do.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
in an institution
that's very heavy, obviously,
on science and engineering,
we always think about
experimental approaches.
And I'm always
curious about what
sort of methodologies people
use in different areas.
And so you run field
experiments to gather data.
Can you give us an example
of what that looks like?
ARIEL WHITE: Oh, certainly.
So one thing, for example, that
we were doing this very fall
was trying to see
if giving people
better information about
eligibility to vote
and just how you would
register and vote
would help them, in fact,
get registered and vote.
And so with some coauthors, we
put together a list of people
that we could see
had had some contact
with the criminal
legal system but were
eligible to vote
after that experience
but hadn't registered.
And this is the kind
of thing that you
can do using large-scale
administrative databases.
There's a certain amount of
triangulation across them
and then trying to figure
out how to merge them.
That is, I would say, not
the stuff of fun podcasts.
But once we had
done that, we were
able to say, OK, what
happens if you send out
a letter with a copy of
the registration form,
because in some
places in the US,
you actually still need a
paper registration form,
and information about how to
figure out if you're eligible?
Does that actually help people
end up getting registered
and voting?
And we've done this in
a couple of elections
now with certain variations.
And we can see that people will
become more likely to navigate
that process with even a
little bit of help from us,
though this election
cycle, we're
also going to see
what that looks
like when their friends
can get in on that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
So the other thing is, if
you follow the news, which
I'm sure you do,
election news dominated
media coverage for the last
I don't how many months.
Do you think
Americans are actually
that focused or
interested in politics?
In other words, the media acts
like this is something that
everyone wants to read
and think about 24/7.
And I'm just wondering what
your sense of the reality is.
ARIEL WHITE: Yes, you're
right to ask this because,
no, a great many people
really do not want
to consume this kind of news.
And we know that many of them
don't, that given the option,
they consume various other forms
of entertainment, of course,
in the era of streaming
and social media
as other sources of things.
Yeah, a lot of
people tune that out.
There are some extremely
invested political--
I wouldn't say junkies.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Junkies?
[LAUGHTER]
ARIEL WHITE: One of
my colleagues at Tufts
calls them political
hobbyists, people
who are very
interested in politics
and follow it as almost as
one would follow sports.
There are also a
lot of people who
are highly invested in the
day-to-day work of doing
politics.
So yeah, there are a lot of
people who really, really care
about this.
And then there's a
very large number
of people who pay a little
less attention or almost
no attention.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I guess
that's true about everything.
Actually, it was funny
that election night,
we could have been
watching the returns
and decided to watch
season two of The Diplomat.
I thought watching
fake politics was--
felt better than watching
real politics in real-time.
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah.
Once the votes are
cast, it's like, they're
going to get counted.
And you're going to
find out what happened.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
ARIEL WHITE: The
actual hour-by-hour
slicing of it doesn't,
in fact, matter.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
But you feel like it's
having some kind of impact.
So in your opinion, what's
the most important thing
we could implement in the
US to get people to vote?
Is there a single most--
ARIEL WHITE: Oh, if
I could do anything?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: If you
could wave your magic wand,
what would you do to
get everybody to vote?
ARIEL WHITE: I would probably
start with automatic voter
registration.
I would probably just get
everybody on the rolls.
Or in some cases, there's
election day registration.
But automatic has the
benefit, I would say,
of, again, people being visible
once they're registered.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's interesting
because the state-to-state
variation in that is also huge,
which has to impact the
outcome in some very closely
contested-- it has to be
part of the mobilizing voter
turnout in certain areas
really having some impact,
maybe not, on the
presidential election.
But you could imagine
in other elections,
it could have an effect.
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah,
you're right that there
is immense state-to-state
variation in how you can observe
and reach out to voters.
And I don't think we
have a full accounting
of what campaigns then do.
This is one of the
things we so wish
we could observe a little
more of is actually--
you see a lot of discussion
of the ground game
in any given campaign.
Political scientists
share this interest
because we've done some highly
focused investigations into how
various parts of the
ground game matter.
But what resources are actually
being put into the ground game
and exactly where they're
targeted, extraordinarily
hard to observe.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Because that would
lose the edge if we all knew.
ARIEL WHITE: Precisely.
So if only we knew exactly
what was going on there,
we would learn a
lot of useful stuff.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
So I heard your
interest in voting
started in high school,
which is unusual.
Can you tell us about that?
ARIEL WHITE: Yeah, that's true.
I was remembering the other
day that in high school,
at graduation, I got
to give a speech.
And so the day before
graduation or whatever,
we were doing a little practice
where they brought everybody
in the gym.
And we all walked
across the stage.
And so in the time that I got to
practice standing at the lectern
to give my speech, I did a
little voter registration drive
with all my peers--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's really funny.
ARIEL WHITE: --where it
was like, under your seat,
you will find a
registration form.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's great.
ARIEL WHITE: You could
fill it out right now.
Give it back to me, which
looking back, I guess,
yeah, I was always interested
in people getting registered,
as it turns out.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I think
I was more narrow minded.
I ran for office and stuff
when I was in high school.
I was interested in
that vote in particular.
[LAUGHTER]
Not the national vote.
So what do you do to get
your mind off of politics?
ARIEL WHITE: Oh, goodness.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: What do you
do when you're not here at MIT
or you're not
sitting at a podcast?
What do you do?
ARIEL WHITE: Indeed.
Yeah.
Well, so I have a
10-month-old daughter.
So she keeps us pretty busy.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That
keeps you occupied.
ARIEL WHITE: Yes, she is
uninterested in the minutia
of any given election.
So she's been a real joy
to hang out with this year.
Also, in the last
couple of years,
I've tried my hand at
gardening a little bit.
We don't have a lot
of room in Somerville.
But it's been fun.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
I like gardening.
I was a little dissuaded.
In North Carolina,
I still remember.
I was growing
tomatoes every year.
And I came out, and
on the fence was
a squirrel with a tomato
in his front paws,
eating it like it
was his dinner.
And it was downhill from there.
ARIEL WHITE: Heartbreaking,
heartbreaking.
I never thought I would
have a personal feud
with a specific rabbit
until I got into this.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
ARIEL WHITE: But
I feel that pain.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: No political
strategies work there.
[LAUGHTER]
Anyway, well, this was very fun,
very interesting, very timely.
I'll be tempted to come back
to you in a month, two months,
three months, and then ask
you a little bit more what
you made of all of this.
ARIEL WHITE: More than fair.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: In the
meantime, to our audience,
thank you for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.
CREW: Curiosity Unbounded
is a production of MIT News
and the Institute Office
of Communications,
in partnership with the
Office of the President.
This episode was
researched, written,
and produced by Christine
Daniloff, Alexandra Steed,
and Melanie Gonick.
Our sound engineer
is Dave Lishansky.
For show notes, transcripts,
and other episodes,
please visit
news.mit.edu/podcasts/curiosity
unbounded.
And find us on YouTube,
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or wherever you
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To learn about the latest
developments and updates
from MIT, please
visit news.mit.edu.
You can follow us on Facebook,
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at CuriosityUnboundedPodcast.
Thank you for joining us today.
We hope you'll tune in next
time when Sally will be speaking
with Andres Sevtsuk,
an associate professor
of urban science planning.
They'll break down the
effects of planning
on quality of life
for city dwellers
and look at sustainable mobility
within an urban environment.
We hope you'll be there.
And remember, stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep.10: Making medicine easier to swallow
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdVTzLJqbhc

Idioma: en

SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello, I'm
Sally Kornbluth, President
of MIT, and I'm
thrilled to welcome you
to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
One of the great
pleasures of my job
is the opportunity to talk
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure,
like their colleagues
in every field here, they're
pushing the boundaries
of knowledge and possibility.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT,
and this podcast is a way
to share that inspiration
with the world.
Today, my guest is
Giovanni Traverso.
Gio has a foot in two worlds.
He's an associate professor of
Mechanical Engineering at MIT,
and he's a gastroenterologist
at Boston's Brigham
and Women's Hospital.
His work focuses on
innovative methods
for drug delivery, diagnostics,
and biological sensing.
So Gio, welcome to the show.
GIO TRAVERSO: Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Very
happy to have you here.
You moved around
quite a bit when
you were young, from
England to Peru to Canada,
then back to England.
Can you tell us a little
bit about these early moves,
your early life, and how
this all led you to MIT?
GIO TRAVERSO: Absolutely
so I was born in England.
My dad is from Peru, and my
mother is from Nicaragua,
and they met in the UK.
My dad had been sent to
England to study economics,
and then my mom was
learning English.
And they met, and that's
where they had me.
That's where I was born.
And then we left when I was
just about to turn five,
and we moved to Peru.
And I lived there for
just under 10 years.
So I spent the better part
of my younger years there.
And then we emigrated to Canada.
And we emigrated because of
the instability in the country.
And my parents really
restarted their lives again
and found that Canada was
very receptive, really,
to hosting foreigners.
And they built a new life there,
and I went to school there.
I spent six years there.
And then when my time came up
for thinking about university,
I had started and been
exposed to science
and had an opportunity
to do research.
And as part of that,
I started to explore
different opportunities.
And I applied back to the
UK, but also in Canada.
But I had a
wonderful opportunity
to go back to England to study.
And, specifically, one of the
areas of interest was medicine.
And outside of North America
and most countries in the world,
most folks will start
studying medicine right
after high school.
So I went directly
into medicine and I
moved to Cambridge,
England, and studied there
at the University of Cambridge.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I did
physiology part 1B and part two
genetics at Cambridge.
GIO TRAVERSO: So I was a part
two genetics student two.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
Interesting.
GIO TRAVERSO: So I did
my part one in medicine.
And so I did physiology also.
But part two was in genetics.
Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: For
our American listeners,
this means, in
England, you really
only do one single subject for
the whole final undergraduate
year.
And it's very, very different
from an American education,
where you're doing so
many different subjects.
And I have to say, I
was kind of tripped up
by the exam system in England,
because in America, you're
doing continuous assessment,
where you're always taking exams
all the time, as our
students at MIT do.
In England, they save one
exam till the end of the year.
And that's not easy for an
American person to adapt to.
GIO TRAVERSO: No, absolutely.
I would say it took
me a couple of years
to get used to the
system, because it
is sort of 100% finals
across all the subjects.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And the
temptation is to do nothing.
SUBJECT: Exactly.
And there are many distractions.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Exactly, exactly.
SUBJECT: Absolutely.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I understand
that you had an early co-op
working in a lab.
And how did you start getting
interested in research?
How did this sort of foster
your love of research?
GIO TRAVERSO: So in
high school, in Canada,
in Ontario at the time, the
system essentially involved
13 years or grades.
And so by grade
12, I had completed
almost all of my
requirements, requirements.
And I had a wonderful
chemistry teacher
who really suggested I think
about doing research in the lab,
and she connected
me with someone.
That someone's name
is Steve Schearer.
He's now the runs,
essentially all
of the research at the Hospital
for Sick kids in Toronto,
but at the time was
a graduate student
in the lab of Lap-Chee Tsui.
Lap-Chee Tsui is known
for, essentially,
the linkage analysis,
and really identification
of the gene for cystic
fibrosis, together with,
Francis Collins' group.
And I worked in Lap-Chee's
lab as a high school student,
together with Steve Schearer.
And, to me, this
was unbelievable,
that this was an actual job.
This was from the high
school student perspective.
And I really enjoyed it
and, really, I would say,
steered me in this direction,
I mean, to this day.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
So you work on
ingestible devices
that have medical function,
known as electroceuticals.
Can you explain a
little bit about this?
How do these work?
GIO TRAVERSO: Absolutely.
So we do many things
across a range of areas.
As you mentioned earlier,
I'm a gastroenterologist,
so I tend to think about how
we can interact and engage
with our bodies and the
bodies, obviously, of patients
to really help them through
the gastrointestinal tract.
And one of the areas that we've
started to really understand,
to a much greater
degree, is essentially
our capacity to
stimulate the GI tract,
to modulate different hormones.
And so let me give
you an example.
What we've shown is
that we have the ability
to either stimulate hunger or
stimulate a sense of fullness,
depending on where and how
we're stimulating the GI tract.
And so, essentially, these are
capsules that one would swallow.
And they can stimulate
either the stomach
or the small intestine.
And depending on
the stimulation,
whether it's an
electrical stimulus
or whether it's a
mechanical stimulus,
it will induce these
different patterns.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So,
presumably, you're
stimulating some
nerve that is then
feeding back to what's going on
in the central nervous system.
So how would you
compare this to what's
happening with the use
of GLP-1 agonists, which
clearly are affecting appetite?
So there are neural
gut pathways that
must be modulating all this.
So, in a sense, you're
activating this potentially
similar pathways.
GIO TRAVERSO: Exactly.
Just as, for example, if someone
has a big Bowl of oatmeal
and they feel full
in the morning,
that feeling of
fullness is really
transmitted through nerves
directly into the brain,
to really signal,
essentially, that feeling
of fullness or of satiety.
And so what we're
able to do, and this
is part of what we're
doing right now,
is characterizing how that
signaling is taking place
and how we can
encapsulate or capture
that signal inside of an
ingestible form factor
to really facilitate
patients to have control,
essentially, over
their nutrition needs
and modulate their own intake.
And I would say similar to the
effects of many of the drugs,
including GLP-1 receptor
agonists, as well as
others, that start to modulate
that sensation or the need
or drive for intake.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's interesting.
And, presumably, this could be
done with fewer side effects
than--
The one thing about
the GLP-1 drugs
is they seem to be now having
just a huge array of effects
that are at least
heretofore, inexplicable.
So, presumably, they're
doing lots of other things,
either directly on organs or
in the brain, which hopefully
these sort of
things would be more
precisely stimulating the gut.
I don't know, the
gut brain axis.
GIO TRAVERSO: No,
I mean, I think
that's our hypothesis
also, is that by really
tuning and working
with, essentially
the endogenous
systems, that we're
maximizing our own
capacity to modulate intake
and rather than add an
exogenous substance, as such.
That being said, I also want to
recognize that GLP-1 receptor
agonists are transforming how
we can look after patients.
And there was just another
paper in The New England Journal
that I just saw looking at how
these drugs are helping people,
for example, with sleep apnea.
But we've seen like--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
It's Kind of crazy.
GIO TRAVERSO: Yeah, it's a
really exciting time right now.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So what
other type of health issues
do your devices address?
What other disease areas
are you working in?
GIO TRAVERSO: So we have
a lot of development on,
really the core challenges
of taking medication.
And several years
ago, one of the things
that we started with
the Gates Foundation,
involved addressing
a fundamental aspect
of essentially interacting
with medication,
and that is when
medications are administered
on a frequent basis, in
general, if a patient has
an option of taking
something more infrequently,
they are likely to continue
to take that medication.
So this is the adherence
or the compliance problem,
although I think adherence
is a better term.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: HIV regimens
or notorious, in a sense.
GIO TRAVERSO: HIV, exactly.
And the condition may, for
example, affect the ability
for the individual to take.
So neuropsychiatric
conditions, for example.
We've done some
incredible work, again,
starting about 10
years ago, also
together with collaborators,
and now through a company
that we started a few years
ago, where, for example, we've
been able to take a drug that's
used for schizophrenia, where
a patient would have had to
take it once or twice a day,
but now they just
take it once a week.
And that can really
give a stable dose
to help maximize, essentially,
the care of that person.
So that's one example.
But there's also
examples exactly
like you said in HIV, but also
in substance abuse disorders,
where again, there's essentially
the condition itself may impact
the likelihood that the
individual will continue
to adhere.
So again, it's more at
the core of engaging
with a therapeutic that
exists and is known
to have a positive impact.
But the challenge
that we're addressing
is actually more of
a behavioral one,
at the core of
being a patient and
engaging with that therapeutic.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: To give
our listeners a visual,
I recall seeing
one of your devices
that you swallow this
pill, and then it
opens up in your stomach,
almost like a spider
adheres to the wall and then
gradually releases drug.
GIO TRAVERSO: That's
exactly right.
It opens up.
And because of the shape,
because of the size,
and some of the
mechanical properties,
it can safely stay
in the stomach,
and we can control exactly
for how long it stays.
And using those systems,
we are applying it
across a range of
different areas.
But schizophrenia
is, I would say,
the one that's most
advanced and currently
in phase III clinical trials.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
really interesting.
You're doing something in
diabetes as well, I believe.
Tell me a little bit about that.
GIO TRAVERSO: So we
have several things.
We've been collaborating
with Novo Nordisk
now for almost a decade,
and we've worked with them
in many different areas.
So we started this
collaboration back
in 2015, really focused
on developing systems that
could enable the
delivery of drugs,
like GLP-1 receptor
agonists or insulin,
where the capsule
could achieve levels
comparable to a
standard injection.
And so the technical term
here is a bioavailability
and essentially
having bioavailability
that are greater than 10%.
The systems that
are on the market,
for example, and folks may be
familiar with a drug called
Rybelsus, which is semaglutide,
in an oral format that
has an oral
bioavailability of about 1%
to 2% The systems
that we're looking at
are 10, 50, and greater,
so they actually
achieve comparable
levels to the injection.
And we've actually
demonstrated that.
We've developed a
whole array of systems
that enable that, some that look
like a little leopard tortoise,
and they can self-oriet,
but it's certainly
a whole array of systems.
So that was the
initial body of work.
But using those systems you
can deliver several drugs,
like GLP-1 receptor
agonists, where now you
can deliver a much lower amount
than what is being included
in the current capsules.
So that starts to
potentially address
some of the challenges
with the availability
of these medications.
That has been a major
issue here, in the US,
over the past few years.
Now, about three years ago, we
continued and really expanded
that collaboration and have
been working on cell therapies
and really thinking
about how we can
develop curative interventions
for patients suffering
from diabetes.
And that certainly is a very
active area of research,
really thinking about everything
from the manufacturing
to the administration, to
how do these systems survive
in the body, and how
do we monitor those--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: To have to
not immunosuppress people,
basically.
GIO TRAVERSO: Exactly.
That's exactly right.
So those are very active
areas of research.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
very interesting.
So you're an associate
professor in MEC at MIT.
You're a gastroenterologist
at Brigham and Women's.
This is a really
perfect combination
of skills for your work.
But how do you manage
to juggle both?
Do you still see
patients and how
does your clinical work
inform how you're thinking
about your laboratory work?
GIO TRAVERSO: Absolutely.
And I should add,
I have three kids,
and I'm married,
so there's a lot.
But I think it's a team effort.
And I think whether it's in the
lab, whether it's in the clinic
or at home, what we
do as a team sport,
and I think we have a
wonderful team in all
of these different venues.
And so I cut down
my clinical time.
I used to have a regular
clinic and endoscopy session.
But once I started at
MIT, I really removed
my outpatient practice or
stopped my outpatient practice.
And so now I've transitioned
to only doing inpatient time
in between the semesters.
So, usually, in January
is when I'm on service
and I do that at the Brigham.
And I do that as part of a team.
And so I work with
Fellows and trainees
and also medical students, which
I think is honestly a privilege,
to be able to interact with
the trainees and, of course,
the patients.
I think it gives me
a unique perspective.
And it's a very
different, I would say,
interaction than the one, for
example, that I would have
in class, like later today.
When I'm seeing
someone at the bedside,
it's a very different
interaction.
And I would say, gives me at
least a different perspective
and different level of
motivation for everything
that we do.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's interesting,
as a basic science,
it always struck me
that the clinical scientists
who also had laboratories
could actually see, coming down
the road, clinical needs that
would really help direct
where you were going
with the basic science,
where it's not that it's not
fundamentally curiosity
driven research,
it's just that it also has
a trajectory, up front,
of a problem you
would like to solve.
GIO TRAVERSO: Absolutely.
And I think our
goal is to, overall,
essentially have impact and
really develop systems that
will translate to patients.
And so I would say, I
mean, I love to read,
and certainly, several of
our scientists and students
are investigating
fundamental questions.
But I also, I would say, have
a tremendous amount of interest
in ensuring that what we're
doing and spending our time on
will translate to help
patients in the end.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Absolutely.
Also, you mentioned your family
life, your clinical work,
your laboratory work, but
you also hold 45 patents
and have founded or
co-founded a dozen companies
that use your work.
So how do you think about this?
Is the entrepreneurial
spirit something you--
Where did you get that from.
And do you aim that to
instill that in your students?
GIO TRAVERSO: To
me, this is part
of an arc, where we start with
a lot of the basic discoveries,
developments, and
that arc continues
beyond the academic realm.
And in order to have those
technologies essentially help
people in the end, beyond
just the publication
and beyond the
educational value,
involves basically
generating products.
And that often involves
a startup or partnering
or working and collaborating
with other companies.
And I was first exposed to
this as a graduate student
with Bert Vogelstein
at Johns Hopkins.
And Bert has spent his
career as a cancer biologist,
but also as someone
who's very focused
on translating the
work from his lab
and the lab of Ken kinzler,
his close collaborator,
for many decades.
And one of the things
that I did during my PhD
was actually work very
closely with a company,
a small company at that
time called Exact Sciences.
And it was really through
those interactions
that I would say my initial
curiosity was really stimulated
because I could see how the
work that I was doing in the lab
could eventually make
it into a product.
And eventually that work
contributed to a test
that is now on the market.
I mean, it took many years, but
that really gave me a window.
And then fast forward, I would
say about seven or eight years,
I was a resident at
the Brigham, and I
was looking into my
fellowship or specialty
training in gastroenterology,
a big component of which is
actually the research aspect.
And I had reached out to
Bob Langer here at MIT,
and I remember meeting
with Bob and I said, look,
I don't know anything about
chemical engineering, material
science.
These are some of
the areas that I'm
interested in really
learning about.
And he's like, just come.
And he was extremely welcoming.
And to this day, I mean,
he remains a mentor,
a collaborator.
And that also gave
me, that experience,
gave me a window
and an opportunity
to learn more about that
translational aspect
with respect to the
intellectual property
aspects, the considerations that
go into new company formation.
And it's something
that I try and pass
on to the next generation.
I do it through the
classes that I teach.
I do it in lab.
And I continue to
learn myself, I mean,
from both the people that I work
with, as well as the students.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah, I
mean, it's actually so woven
into the fabric at
MIT, in a way that I
haven't seen a lot elsewhere.
And Bob Langer is
the epitome of this.
And also your story
of coming and saying,
I don't know much about
this, but I want to do this.
This echoes, in my mind, Bob's
tales of his early career,
of people being willing
to take a chance on him.
And we all know how that
turned out, very well.
You obviously don't have a lot
of free time, given everything
we followed.
But when you do have free
time, what do you like to do?
GIO TRAVERSO: I mean, I love
to spend time with my family.
My kids are 8, 11 and 13.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
SUBJECT: And they
all play sports.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's,
your weekend's done, then.
GIO TRAVERSO: Absolutely.
And so they all have
tournaments every weekend.
There are multiple games.
But I think it's wonderful
to see them grow and develop
their own interests.
And I love to be outside.
I love to go biking.
We live in the
Northeast, so I do love
and I've tried to support winter
sports, also, with our kids.
So I'm a snowboarder.
All of our kids either
ski or snowboard.
So we try, as soon as the snow
comes, we do try and get out,
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, that's Great.
That's great.
GIO TRAVERSO: And
enjoy the outdoors.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: The snow has
been a little bit limited.
I mean, we could have
a whole conversation
about climate change.
In any event, one final question
about the work, which is we
think about drug delivery
and bioinspiration,
and you mentioned cell
and gene therapies.
So how do you think about
bioinspiration in your work?
In other words, how do you
think about the intrinsic ways
biological systems
operate and how
you leverage them
for therapeutic end
in your own work?
GIO TRAVERSO: Great question.
And we have this large
grant that we received
from the government
earlier this year,
and we just gave our
six month report.
And as part of
that, I had convened
an external advisory panel,
and one of the members
had asked me about
bioinspiration
because they could see
that in several programs.
And I would say we look at
bioinspiration in generally
two different ways.
One, is essentially when we
map out a set of challenges
for a project, we do look for
adjacencies in nature, to see
has nature solved this
challenge in a similar way?
And that certainly does happen.
And we have two
projects right now.
There's one that
essentially looks
at the evolutionary
elements that
underpin the behavior
of a specific fish.
And we've taken that
learning and applied it now,
to a whole new
family of devices.
So that certainly is
something that we do.
And we collaorated, in
that specific body of work,
with a scientist over
at Boston College.
But we also look
at bioinspiration
to help convey our work.
And so sometimes
the complexity that
is involved in developing
these systems, I recognize,
can be complex, but
we also want to be
able to share and
essentially help
the audience quickly appreciate
the nuances of the work.
And so we also look
at bioinspiration
as a way of explaining or
helping explain the work.
So I would say those are the two
ways that bioinspiration really
weaves into what we do and how
we explain the work that we do.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
I mean, it seems
like there's an infinite
array of possibilities
with the approaches you take.
So many disease states
and, indeed, sort of health
states that could be stimulated
by the variety of devices.
So we really look
forward to seeing
what happens in
the coming years,
from having sat in discussions
of your promotion case,
that everyone was very excited.
So now I'm extremely excited
to see what comes next.
So thank you for having
this conversation.
GIO TRAVERSO: Well, thank
you so much for having me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Absolutely.
And to our audience,
thank you for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.
VOICEOVER: Curiosity Unbounded
is a production of MIT news
and the Institute Office
of Communications,
in partnership with the
Office of the President.
This episode was
researched, written,
and produced by Kristin
Danilov and Alexandra Steed.
Our sound engineer
is Dave Lishansky.
For show notes, transcripts,
and other episodes,
please visit
News.MIT.edu/podcasts/curiosity
unbounded.
And.
Find us on YouTube,
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or wherever you
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To learn about the latest
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visit News.MIT.edu.
You can follow us on Facebook,
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at Curiosity Unbounded podcast.
Thank you for joining us today.
We hope you'll tune
in next time, when
Sally will be speaking with
political scientist Ariel White.
Ariel's work touches on
voting, voter rights,
the criminal legal system,
and how ordinary people
can make a difference.
We hope you'll be there.
And remember, stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 9: Silk, the fabric of more sustainable agriculture
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFINHKHO3Tw

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello.
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
president of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome
you to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
Since coming to MIT, I've
been particularly inspired
by talking with
members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they are pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, my guest is Benedetto
Marelli, an associate professor
in MIT'S department of Civil
and Environmental Engineering.
Benedetto's work
focuses on using
biomaterials-based innovation
to improve agricultural methods,
food security and food safety.
Benedetto, welcome
to the podcast.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Thank
you very much for having me.
It's a pleasure to be here.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So you do
incredibly interesting work.
And I really want to
highlight a number of things.
First of all, hunger
and food insecurity
are huge global
problems, obviously,
with approximately 750 million
people worldwide experiencing
hunger on a regular basis.
Benedetto, you're a biomedical
engineer and a material
scientist who works on
making food systems more
sustainable by using
silk as a coating
for both food preservation
and to enhance seed growth.
Why silk?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: That
is a very good question,
and I'm still asking
myself sometimes how
I came up to this solution.
The reality is that I did
study biopolymers, which
are the materials that
nature uses to design life--
for biomedical applications,
mostly, for tissue engineering
and regenerative medicine.
And then during
my postdoc, I came
by chance with the discovery
that these materials
can be applied to food and
can make membranes around food
and extend the shelf life.
And from there, I discover
a completely new world
almost overnight.
And a new frontier opened
in front of my eyes.
And I was like, let's
see what we can now
do with these materials when we
apply to food and agriculture.
Because they were applied
before to food and agriculture,
but not with the lens of
a biomedical engineer.
And so I started to
look at the problems.
So I started to literally
go through literature,
understanding what were the big
problems, the big challenges
in the agri food
systems, and try
to match the problems with
solutions that my lab could
create with these biomaterials.
To go back to your
question, why silk?
Silk is a material
that is very ancient,
is almost 5,000 years old,
and is also entrenched with
my history.
I grew up in Milan, which
is a big fashion city.
And when I was
doing my undergrad,
in front of my university, there
was a silk institute where they
were doing textile research.
And so I did my Europe there--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, wow.
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
--and at the same time
they were using silk for
biomedical application.
It was just the beginning of it.
And so I really got excited
about using these materials.
And I never gave up using it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's fantastic.
So you said you discovered
that silk had this ability
to be used in the
context of food.
I heard there were maybe
chocolate-dipped strawberries
somewhere in this inspiration.
Tell me a little bit more
about how you stumbled
on the food connection.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: There were.
So the lab where I was doing my
postdoc organized competitions
where we had to cook with silk.
Because silk is
considered edible
in many parts of the world.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, I see.
Interesting.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: And
so I was coming back
from a conference in Switzerland
where I saw in the airport a lot
of these chocolate-coated
strawberries.
And so at the time, I was
studying the optical properties
of silk.
Because silk, we're experiencing
it as a white fiber.
But in reality, that's how
the caterpillar, the silkworm
makes it, or the spider.
Silk naturally makes films,
like the defect-less films,
monolithic materials that
are transparent-- really,
really transparent.
And so I was trying to embed on
the surface of the strawberries,
optical gratings.
So these are
diffraction gratings
that look like a little bit
the back of a CD or a DVD,
so that you could add a sort
of eye experience to the--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see, I see.
A little shiny.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Exactly--
to eating your strawberries.
But it failed.
It never happened.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: And so
I left it on the bench.
And then I came
back a week later,
and I saw that the half of
the strawberries were rotten
and were not edible, but
the other were preserved.
And so I came back
to the idea and I
said, why this is happening?
And that's how it started.
So we started looking at the
membrane properties of silk
and how it works
as a food coating.
And that's how
everything started.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's great.
It's like your
penicillin moment.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Exactly.
[LAUGHTER]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's
funny, because I always
think about this.
You're always told to keep all
your research materials neat,
and clean up right away.
And there are a lot of things
that come up with, well,
I left it on the bench and
came back a week later,
and it was like, a-ha!
BENEDETTO MARELLI: It's what
I keep saying to my students.
I tell them when they're in the
lab, you have to be very neat.
And you have to respect the lab
as a neat working environment.
But be playful.
And if you are a little
bit messy, it's fine.
Because typically, that's
how new discoveries may come.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Exactly, exactly.
Have you either
yourself worked on,
or are you aware
of other coatings
that people use--
natural coating that
work in a similar way,
or even synthetic codings
that people are developing?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Yeah,
there are other coatings.
So we're not the only one
in the world that did that.
And this is a good thing.
There are other coatings,
there are other companies
that make edible coatings.
Some of them-- like
everybody, probably,
who lives in the United States,
experience apples that sometimes
are coated with waxes.
And that's to extend
the shelf life.
So that's the typical food
coating when it comes to mind.
There are pros and cons
with the different coatings.
The beauty of silk and
why it works so well
is because we can use just
a tiny amount of material,
a very little amount.
Because it makes
very thin coatings
that are very good
in keeping the water
in the food and the oxygen out.
And so that's key to
extend the shelf life.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
So food preservation
in general then,
is keeping air out,
keeping water in?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: I would
say so-- for some foods, yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Got it.
So your seed coating
was recognized
as one of the inaugural
projects of MIT's Climate Grand
Challenge.
Ultimately, how do you see
this addressing problems
of hunger and food insecurity in
the context of climate change?
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
Yeah, so that's
a project that is
led by Chris Voight.
And I think we were a good
cohort of MIT PI's professors
who are working all together
from different angles
to try to make agriculture
more sustainable
and revolutionize fertilizers.
And so as we are developing
innovations in the lab,
we have an eye of rapidly
translating the technologies
in different markets.
And so we're now looking
at making field experiments
in different parts of the world.
Plants are stressed by different
what we call abiotic stressors.
So this can be salinity
of the soil, scarcity
of water, excessive heat.
And these bio fertilizers
that we're developing
are microbes that
boost the plant health.
And so we are engineering the
interface between the microbes
and the plants.
And so we're now trying to
translate the technology
by doing field experiments
and see how far we can go.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
So you're working
directly with farmers now?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
really interesting.
The other thing that I
think is really interesting,
just in terms of
environmental health,
is the notion of using
silk as a material
to filter out contaminants.
So tell me a little
bit about that.
How is it different from
traditional filtration methods?
What are the advantages?
And where do you see
this going, longer term?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: So
something that always amazed me
about these biopolymers is
that thermodynamically, they
want to come together
to make nanomaterials.
So that's really
nanomaterials for free.
You just have to take
food waste or the waste
from the paper industry
or other industry that
use natural polymers,
extract the raw materials,
and then engineering how
they can come together
to make nanofibrils.
Nanofibrils are very good
for several application
because they have a very
high surface to volume ratio.
So they can make a lot of
interfaces with the environment.
And so we discovered that if you
pass water through membranes,
nano membranes made out
of silk and cellulose,
we are able to extract forever
chemicals from the water,
and some heavy
metal contaminants.
They perform extremely well.
They perform similarly, if not
better, to existing standard.
And the big advantage, I
think, is that first of all, we
take a waste material
and it's transforming
a technical material.
And on top of that, these
membrane are biodegradable.
So at the moment we extract
the forever chemicals,
then we can simply
degrade the membrane,
take the forever chemicals
out, and then dispose them
according to the laws.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Makes sense.
You don't compound the problem
with a forever membrane.
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
Yeah, you don't
want to create a new problem--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly
BENEDETTO MARELLI: --by
absorbing another problem.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
I mean, it's clear now that
we're all carrying around
a burden of many, many chemicals
over a lifetime of consuming
what are minor contaminants in
any individual food or drink,
but over the long
haul, are probably
accumulating in our tissues.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: And
this is a challenge
that we will need to
face in the future.
So as the humanity
addresses new technologies,
we need to engineer
new technologies that
take care of what inherited
from the past, right?
So I think we discover
so many new technologies
in the past which has a
huge beneficial impact
on the human health.
But now we also need to think
about the planetary health--
and so how we can develop
new technologies that
complement the existing one,
but also mitigating the impact.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
We recently announced,
MIT recently
announced our initiative
on climate change.
And the whole notion--
we have the Climate
Project at MIT
is, we're going to have
very focused missions
on different areas of science,
technology, policy, et
cetera, that will be focused
on solving particular problems,
whether it be decarbonizing
industry or building
more resilient cities.
We made one called Wild Cards.
Because in part, we don't know
what's coming down the road.
And we want to make sure that
everyone's really interesting
creativity can be incorporated
into this project directed
towards solving
what I think is one
of the most significant
problems of our time.
You've been recently
announced as one
of our mission
leads of Wild Cards,
thinking about
unconventional solutions.
So I'm just wondering, is it
too early to hear a little bit
from you about this mission--
what kinds of projects
and how you think about
moving things forward?
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
I think I'm starting
to have an idea of how the
Wild Card will look like.
First of all, it's going
to be a place where
serendipitous innovation
will find the right place
to grow and to thrive.
And at the same
time, we're going
to try to push
technology from what
we call the proof of principle
to the proof of concept.
So we're going to try to
take technologies that
are almost ready, that
have been already developed
at the Institute, and
they need a final push
so that they can have
an impact on society,
typically by spinning
out or by being licensed.
At the same time, we're going to
have a very open communication
channel with policy making.
And we're going to
have stakeholders
be part of the innovation
realm, so that they
can give the innovators
a very early stage
feedback of how the
innovation could have
an impact in the real world.
So we're going to try to
merge solution and problems
in a single mission so that we
can accelerate this innovation,
and we can really
push it forward.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That sounds great.
I think there are so
many fantastic ideas that
are going to be emerging.
And thinking about how we
essentially select the best ones
and help them expedite a
move into real use, I think,
is going to be critical.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Absolutely.
And then something we're
also going to try to do
is typically when you
spin out a company,
eventually the company
needs to survive.
So it's going to
look for market,
and it's going to
look for making money.
This is natural, right?
But at the same time, we can
try to develop innovation
that while it's chasing
the money-making solution,
it will also chase
solutions that
have an impact in
the real world,
where it's needed the most.
These are typically
hotspots for climate,
hotspot for population growth.
And so can we develop in
parallel the same innovation
so that it can bring us
solutions that target two
completely different market--
so a profitable market
and a less profitable,
or maybe
not-profitable-at-all market,
but using the profit of the
profitable market to sustain
the nonprofitable one.
I think that would
be a good model.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
And also the nonprofitable
one, as you say,
provides proof of concept
that these things can actually
be deployed.
And so that will
attract more investment
for those who are interested
in the for profit side.
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
Absolutely, absolutely.
And at the same time,
the nonprofitable market
provide us also a possibility
to develop technologies that
are low tech, that are simpler.
So also mentally,
it's very challenging
to make technology that look
simpler and is more accessible.
So I think it would be
a good exercise also
for the innovators.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
You raise something
that I think is really
important about the Climate
Project at MIT, which
is, it's one thing
to address some
of these problems in
the United States,
often in a more
high-tech, high-cost way.
But one of our goals is
to make these technologies
affordable, deployable, usable.
Because the impact on
climate, we all share.
And I always joke that
changing climate over Cambridge
isn't going to do us
a whole lot of good.
So I think that's right.
If we can find a
way to reduce cost,
make it easy to use, that
will go much further,
in terms of potentially
having an impact.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Absolutely.
And I had a firsthand
experience on this
in the project on
the seed coatings.
We're applying some
of these seed coatings
in Morocco where we
are deploying them
in experimental
farms in Morocco,
in collaboration with
local universities.
And we do have the stakeholders'
feedback at a very early stage,
and they really help us in
developing solutions that
can be deployed very rapidly.
Because if we close ourselves
in the basement of building one,
we don't know what the farmer
in Morocco really needs, right?
So having their feedback
early on is very important.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's right.
I think our partnerships
with local--
whether it be farmers or NGOs
or local industry, I think,
is going to be important.
You have a company called Mori.
How is that operating?
How is it being used
commercially, et cetera?
Maybe you can tell me a
little bit about that.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Yeah.
So I co-founded the company.
The company grew up out of
my postdoctoral research.
And then it was spin
out when I was at MIT.
And I think it, for
me, was the best
way to really see my
technology going out and having
an impact in the real world.
So I'm very proud that
there are people that
now working in the company.
And they make my original
idea actually having
an impact in the real world.
And when I go to
the grocery store
and they see food that is
coated with the materials
that they develop, of course
it makes me very, very proud.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So I have
a really silly question
to ask you.
In terms of the
production of the silk
you use, what does
that look like?
In other words, are you
using natural methodologies?
Are you synthesizing it?
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
So silk can be made
both through synthetic biology.
Or the one that we're using
is extracted from the cocoon
of the bombyx mori caterpillar.
For food application,
it has to be approved
by the FDA, which made the
silk generally recognized
as safe material-- so an edible
materials for the intended use
of food coating.
And so we simply
get the cocoons.
And then from the cocoons,
we extract the protein.
And then the protein is
applied directly on the food.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I mean,
how does this scale up?
In other words, do you
have a huge [LAUGHS]
farm where you're got
caterpillars making cocoons?
How do you come by
all this material?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: We retrofit
the sericulture system.
So some of the cocoons
that are supposed
to go to the textile industries,
they actually come to us.
Because they've been
produced to satisfy
the regulations of the United
States for food safety.
And then once we
receive them, we
treat them in the United States.
And then we apply the
coating at the farm level.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
interesting, very interesting.
It seems that Boston now
is experiencing a growing
cluster of food tech companies.
Have you interacted with any
of the other efforts that
are developing here?
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
I did, over time.
And I must say, when
I joined MIT in 2015,
it was not such a big food
cluster, as far as I know.
And when I was going around
saying, oh, we can use silk to--
[CHUCKLES] to prevent
food loss and food waste,
people were looking
at me in a weird way.
But then over time,
I think it grew,
that the biomedical industry
and the innovation in biotech
could actually have a big
impact in food and agriculture.
So Boston became a hub.
And I was fortunate,
in that sense,
that it was matching the same
time when the company came out.
And I think the
there's a good cluster
of people that is growing.
And there's a lot of
idea that are exchanged.
And the MIT
students, they really
want to have an impact
in food and agriculture.
So they realize that is a major
societal problem, first of all,
because not everybody has food.
We are also wasting
too much food.
So the food that we waste
can feed 1.6 billion people.
It depletes 25% of
the fresh water.
So that's a societal problem.
And so students are really--
particularly at MIT--
are really passionate
about this problem.
They really want to go
there and make a difference
and move the needle.
And so they're very
eager to find solutions.
And they take
classes around MIT.
And they're looking forward
to solve these problems.
So it's very interesting.
It's a very, very vibrant
community that is keep growing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's terrific.
Backing up a little bit
now from your time here,
you studied in Milan.
You studied at McGill.
You studied at Tufts
before you landed at MIT.
Tell me a little bit
about the journey,
and what actually brought
you to MIT, specifically.
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
I still want to know
if I'm the only
biomedical engineer who's
a professor in the Civil
Environmental Engineering
Department.
I don't think there are many.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Maybe not, maybe not.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: And I think
that's the beauty of MIT.
I think bringing me
to MIT was the vision
of the former department
head, Markus Buehler, who
works on silk.
So we had that connection.
And I have to say, also
my interest in food
and agriculture,
and understanding
that this could become
my career-- also
Markus had a big role on that.
Because I remember
the first time
I was presenting my research.
When I talk about food,
his eyes shot open,
and he looked very interesting.
He was like, oh, this is
not the usual silk research.
So that told me something.
And what I noticed at MIT
is that everybody was not
skeptical.
They embraced, come
in and say, look,
we can use silk for
food and agriculture.
They were encouraging
me to do so.
They gave me good advices.
They pair me with many
mentors in the senior faculty
that could help me
developing the technology
and thinking how to
critically solve problems.
So I think it was
very instrumental,
if you like, for my research and
for my success and the success
of my students, particularly.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Two
things you said resonate.
One is the impact of mentors
and mentor reactions.
Sometimes it just takes that
spark of encouragement to think,
this is not a
completely crazy thing,
that it's important
pathway to follow.
The other thing is, as
you're talking about it,
I'm thinking about you as
director of the Wild Card
part of our project, and
the notion that you're
going to hear these kinds of
things that will sort of spark
entirely new areas.
And they might sound crazy
a little bit sometimes.
But MIT is sort of
the place where crazy
becomes the norm kind of thing.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Absolutely.
And you need to be bold.
And you need to remain creative.
And when the two merge,
typically good things
can happen.
So I really hope in the
future for the missions,
I will have the
same reaction that I
saw in Markus when
some people are going
to present me their research.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
I'm wondering where
this desire to make a
world impact came from.
What was your family like?
Was this something that you
remember growing up with,
or something you
developed later?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: I
think-- so I grew up
in a very normal family,
middle class family.
I think what really sparked
that wanted to change the word,
it came from almost my
experience in the Boy Scout.
I had an experience in the
Boy Scout when I was young.
And they really taught me
about having a positive impact
on society and respecting
the environment,
and being a steward for the
environment and a good citizen.
And I liked the idea.
And from there, I started to
have this idea that my work
could actually benefit society.
Of course, I never thought I
would become a professor at MIT.
But even in the small,
day-by-day tasks,
I always tried to
embrace that vision.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
What do you like
to do if you have a day off?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: I like
typically to play with my kids.
They both play soccer.
So we play a lot of
football-- or soccer together.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yes, that's nice.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: And I
like to use my motorcycle.
So I'm an avid motorcycler.
And so I'm using a
lot my motorcycle
and I'm going around with that.
So if you see me around
MIT with the motorcycle--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow!
So do you-- where do you
go on your motorcycle?
BENEDETTO MARELLI:
From here, you
typically go to New Hampshire,
Vermont, or to Rhode island.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Nice, nice.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: In Italy,
you have much more options.
Because I had the Alps close by.
So these are very,
very nice to drive.
But, yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And maybe
there's a limited time of year
here, or?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: You're
right, unfortunately.
Yeah, it's April till October.
Sometimes I push it to November.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Where
do you do your thinking?
Is it-- do you think
on your motorcycle?
BENEDETTO MARELLI: No I have
to be focused on the road.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Pay attention, yeah!
BENEDETTO MARELLI: The plane,
it's incredibly the plane.
And when I'm flying, it's
where I have all my ideas.
I'm very relaxed.
And I don't watch
movies typically,
and I just take notes.
And I think and I
think and they think,
and eventually
some ideas come up.
And typically 99 don't work.
But you need one that works.
And that's the best part for me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So when you're
trying to come up with something
new, you plan a trip.
[LAUGHS]
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Yeah.
I'm flying several times a year.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, that's great.
So I've really enjoyed
this conversation.
I've learned a lot.
I had never thought about
silk before, and the notion
of its sort of
multifaceted use, and also
just the notion
of thinking really
outside the box to come up
with solutions to real world
problems.
So thank you very much
for joining us here today.
BENEDETTO MARELLI: Thank you
very much for the opportunity.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And I also
want to thank our audience again
for listening to
Curiosity Unbounded.
I hope you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
ANNOUNCER: Curiosity Unbounded
is a production of MIT News
and The Institute Office
of Communications,
in partnership with The
Office of the President.
This episode was
researched, written,
and produced by Christine
Daniloff and Melanie Gonick.
Our sound engineer
is Dave Lishansky.
For show notes, transcripts,
and other episodes,
please visit news.mit.edu/pod
casts/curiosityunbouned.
Find us on YouTube,
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or wherever you
get your podcasts.
To learn about the latest
developments and updates
from MIT, please
visit news.mit.edu.
Thank you for joining us today.
We hope you'll tune in
next time for a brand
new season when Sally will
be talking with Dr. Giovanni
Traverso about his
work developing
the next generation of drug
delivery systems and treatments,
and the implications that it
has for the future of medicine.
We hope you'll be there.
And remember, stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 8: Hard facts on soft skills
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXGmsXDHl0U

Idioma: en

[PEACEFUL MUSIC]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello, I'm
Sally Kornbluth, president
of MIT, and I'm
thrilled to welcome you
to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
A great pleasure of my
job is the opportunity
to talk with members
of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they are pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity,
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of knowledge.
Today, my guest is Namrata Kala.
Namrata is an
associate professor
in applied economics at the
MIT Sloan School of Management.
Her wide-ranging
research includes
studying how communities
adapt to environmental change
and regulation, the returns
on environmental technology
investment, and the
value of training
employees in soft skills.
Problem solving, communication
skills, the ability
to work well with others,
just how important
are these skills in terms
of workplace productivity,
and how can we
measure their impact?
So Namrata, welcome
to the podcast.
NAMRATA KALA: Thank
you for having me.
I think it's amazing
that you do this.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Well, thank you.
So you're an economist.
You study soft skills.
How did you become
interested in that field?
NAMRATA KALA: So
as a grad student,
I had the good fortune of being
able to spend a lot of time
in the field.
And for a few years,
what that meant
was that I spent a lot of
time in these large factories
in India where technology
is essentially team-based.
There's production lines.
There's a lot of
things going on,
and I got to just
sit and observe
for a really, really long
time and talk to both workers
and managers to see
how productivity
happens in these large,
complicated environments.
And what came up a lot was
that while it's amazing
if workers have really great
technical skills, what managers
really value and what workers
really value in other co-workers
is soft skills-- the ability
to work collaboratively,
the ability to communicate,
solve problems together.
And that got me thinking about
what the returns to these
might be.
And I was also fortunate enough
that there was a training
program that they were
thinking of rolling out,
which I was able to then
randomize across workers.
And so I often tell my students
that getting an idea is great.
Now you have to spend
three years testing it.
And in this case, it meant after
the training program was over,
we collected data for another
two years at an hourly level
to see who sits next to who,
what they're working on,
what their managers are
doing, what their wages are,
to get a really
comprehensive assessment.
But that's how I started
thinking about the question.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So I was a
cancer biologist by training,
and I think about what
a randomized trial looks
like in that setting,
for instance,
with cancer therapeutics.
How do you actually set up a
randomized controlled trial?
How do you design a
controlled study for something
like soft skills?
NAMRATA KALA: I think the
answer is with great pain
and over many years.
But essentially, what
we did in this case
is we told the workers,
which was true,
that we had limited slots
available for the training
because we did not have
that many trainers.
And in this environment,
where we don't really
know who's going to
benefit from this training
or who's really serious about
it, the fairest way to allocate
is via a lottery.
And so we were able to
design that in that manner.
Now, what was from my
perspective, additionally
interesting is that we
were also able to randomize
whether your coworkers
got training or not.
So we could then see if you
didn't get the training,
but your coworker did, does
that make you more productive?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Does it
take two to tango or not.
NAMRATA KALA: Precisely.
So that's how we set it up.
And then we just wait
and collect data.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: How
very interesting.
Field studies can
actually be challenging.
From what I understand
of your work
and this sort of dual training
or single training, what
was surprising is that
their co-workers were
more productive, even when
they received the training.
So tell us a little bit about
how you think about that.
NAMRATA KALA: Absolutely.
So this also kind
of goes back to how
we formed this
hypothesis, which was just
watching them work together.
And what we often see is on the
production line, there's a snag.
So how you solve that
when there's a problem
is really about workers coming
together with the manager
to figure it out, as opposed
to, say, assigning blame
or trying to cover it up
or something like that.
And what we see in the data is
there's this positive spillover,
so even if I didn't get
training, but my coworker did,
I'm more productive.
They are more
pronounced when we're
working on collaborative-type
garments, which
is sort of consistent
with our theory of change.
And that they also
substitute and complement
certain managerial skills, so
if I have soft skills training,
the manager does not
need to oversee me.
One thing about economics RCTs
that I think is fascinating,
at least personally,
is that you really
get to have these slightly
complicated stories,
and then get to collect
data to tease out
these different mechanisms.
And that's sort of fulfilling.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's interesting,
there's a format of medical
school interview where they will
bring in multiple candidates
from medical school,
and they have these
mini interviews.
And they might sit two
prospective candidates
back to back and have to
build a tower, one instructing
the other kind of thing.
And obviously, it's not specific
to your scientific knowledge
or your technical skills.
It's that sort of communication.
Can you help somebody else
to do something effectively
because you will have
to work in a team.
NAMRATA KALA: Absolutely.
No, I think that's
a great example.
And I think that shows up in
all these other rich settings
as well.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly because
I think much of your work
is in developing countries
and involves manual labor.
I can already hear managers in
Western companies saying, that's
great, but that's not us.
So what would you say to them?
NAMRATA KALA: Every time I
look at these surveys of what
skills employers want, they
say they want soft skills,
so I think there's some
recognition that this
is really important.
I think what I thought was
interesting in our setting
is that there were managers who
thought technical skills were
so much more important.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
NAMRATA KALA: And it
was surprising to them.
I think, if anything,
this is more
binding for knowledge work and
collaborative work and teamwork.
So I would tell
them, try it out.
I think you'd be surprised.
And I think that this is
really, really important,
from co-authoring papers
to making garments.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's right.
It is interesting.
It actually has implications for
how we teach our students here
and what's important because
we can churn out students who
have this great
technical expertise,
and if we don't find
some ways to impart
the soft skills and also
a knowledge of the world
around them in society.
I mean, people talk about
requirements in humanities,
social sciences, et cetera.
I think that's
important for them
to be able to succeed
in the workplace.
NAMRATA KALA: We try to get
at this in oblique ways.
So at the Sloan School,
we try to set up
assignments that will
bring this out in students.
But I think having a more
targeted approach would probably
be better for students and
for the outcomes as well.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
So many companies
really are concerned
about their bottom line.
How do you motivate-- what
are the tangible returns
on investment?
Presumably in your studies,
you saw enhanced productivity
and less headaches
for the managers.
I mean, are those
the kinds of things?
NAMRATA KALA: Absolutely.
And I think this is part of
just my broader research agenda,
which is at the intersection of
sustainability and productivity.
So that's labor sustainability
and productivity, and also
environmental sustainability
and productivity.
And what I often find,
although not always,
is that there are interventions
that improve productivity and so
are good for firms and that
are also good for workers,
or that improve sustainability
and that are also
good for firm returns.
And partly just going
back to the question
of working in
developing countries,
I think as developing
countries struggle
with poverty
reduction in a world
where environmental
sustainability is extremely
important, these
kinds of interventions
become important to
identify because you
can't lose a lot of time saying
we're going to prioritize
the environment later.
There is no later.
Or that we're going to
prioritize workers later.
These workers need
jobs now, and you
need to get productivity now.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's right.
We've had a sort of natural
field experiment in the sense
now that remote work is
increasingly common, especially
since many companies
were forced to go remote
during the COVID pandemic.
So have you thought about
or studied soft skills
in a sort of remote setting?
How does that play out?
NAMRATA KALA: So I haven't
studied soft skills
in a remote setting,
but what I have
done, in some recent work,
looked at how knowledge work is
affected by communication
flows and decision rights
in the organizations.
So there's a new paper that I
have that's co-authored with
James Fenske and Mohammad Haseeb
where we essentially got data--
this is really, personally,
very exciting for me.
We got data on firms--
private firms in India applying
to get environmental permits
from the equivalent
of a state EPA.
And the data included
all communication
within the regulator, so we
can see bureaucrats escalate
and delegate and communicate.
And so we can try to come
up with managerial styles--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
NAMRATA KALA: --which is
related to the soft skills.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And
this included things
like email exchanges.
So their participation in
this is motivated, presumably,
by trying to make
their processes better?
NAMRATA KALA: And
there's a reform
in the middle that
sort of says, well,
now junior officers can
decide some aspects of some
of these permits.
And what we show is, A, what
does that do for firm outcomes?
But B, not all
managers delegate,
even though it's actually
less work if you delegate.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's so interesting.
I mean, that also has
implications obviously
for how we operate
as an administration
in the university.
NAMRATA KALA: Yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
The question, you
always wonder how much churn
there is in communication.
In other words, what's
moving things forward,
and what's just getting
you stuck in that eddy,
around and around and around?
And there's the issue
of other individuals
that may be related
to the issue at hand.
How much information
do they need?
What information do they get?
NAMRATA KALA: Absolutely.
Absolutely.
And in fact, how do baseline
working relationships
shape the returns to
a reform like that.
So what--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
NAMRATA KALA: What we find is
that when junior officers are
making recommendations,
the rate at which
they get overturned predicts
after the reform how
much decision rights they get.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's fascinating.
NAMRATA KALA: And so when you
said, like stuck in the eddy,
I'm like, that should be a
great title for the paper.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's all yours.
NAMRATA KALA:
That's exactly what
we see in both that these
relationships predict
productivity, they also predict
future working relationships
and therefore
future productivity.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's very interesting.
Presumably, also, and I don't
know if this is something
you can factor into these
sort of field studies.
But there's almost a network
of preexisting relationships.
When people have
social relationships
outside the workplace,
how does that
affect these soft skills
inside the workplace?
NAMRATA KALA: Absolutely.
And so that has, I
think, implications
for both the returns to
an intervention like this,
as well as whether
you want to target
an intervention like this.
So you might want
to target people
with fewer access to
networks because you think it
might allow them to make more.
Depending on what exactly
the intervention is,
you might want to
seed it with someone
who has a lot of networks
to see it disseminate
through the
communication network.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So another
branch of your research
focuses on
developmental economics.
I believe you first came to MIT
for a postdoc with what we call
J-PAL, the Jameel
Poverty Action Lab.
And you know, J-PAL is
famous for this pioneering
of randomized controlled
trials to assess
whether a government's poverty
fighting interventions were
actually effective.
Can you talk a little bit
about what you learned
from being part of J-PAL?
NAMRATA KALA: The postdoc
was, in some sense,
the best of both worlds because
I got to spend time at J-PAL,
and then I got to spend some
time at the Center for History
and Economics at Harvard.
And so it was this joint thing.
And I had had some experiences
with randomized controlled
trials before.
But in addition to just
cementing the methods for me,
one thing that I really admire
about some of the things
that J-PAL has done is just
sort of encourage people
to spend more time in the field.
So there's less emphasis
on armchair development,
and I think that's
for the better.
I was just joking
earlier and the field
is where theories go to die.
It's so humbling.
And you write better papers.
You come up with
better interventions
and collect better data.
And I think both in
terms of the RCT methods,
but also in terms of that
aspect, I found very compelling.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I want
to talk a little bit
about your work related to
climate and the environment.
Obviously, MIT is in the
midst of a large configuring
of our climate efforts.
We really want to think
about how we can best
have an impact on the planet.
So your work seems to require
its own set of soft skills.
So for example, with
farmers, I can imagine
you have to earn their trust.
With the companies, you
have to earn their trust
to get access to employees.
What is it like studying
these soft skills,
but really having to do
something, particularly
in the climate arena, where it
affects people's daily practices
so personally?
How do you navigate that?
NAMRATA KALA: This is some of
the hardest and most rewarding
work that I get to
do, which is why
I keep doing it, despite
the, let's just say,
non-zero failure rate.
And so as an example, one
project that I just launched
is a randomized
controlled trial that
is testing the impact on
farmers, if they get access
to cold storage that
is powered by solar.
And so for me, this
kind of brings home
some of my core interests.
It's about climate adaptation.
It's about reducing spoilage
and improving incomes
in the face of heat waves.
It's about mitigation,
so these aren't
things that are going to
cause more climate damages.
It's solar powered.
And it's about productivity and
development, where it's saying,
can we make farmers'
lives better,
given these large
post-harvest losses
that happen in this setting.
And because of that, it
required coordinating
with a state government,
a district government,
a startup that's doing
the installation,
us trying to get research
funding, an international NGO
that's giving us
part of the funding,
and then timing it so that we
can get the seasonal impacts.
And so that sort of
gives you a sense
of how I try to go about
deploying any soft skills that I
might have in bringing
together these actors.
But at the end of the
day, what I'm amazed by
is everyone sort of
shows up, and everyone
is so excited about it, which
makes it all worthwhile.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It sounds
a little nerve wracking.
NAMRATA KALA: Oh, yeah.
I have no stomach lining left.
It's just gone.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, trying to get
the planets to align so
that you can actually
address your questions.
So one thing, having started to
think more about the MIT climate
effort, there's
always this debate
over whether what we
really need to fix,
the climate or policy
changes, regulation.
In other words, do we already
have the technology we need
versus really putting our eggs
in the basket of developing
new technologies that might
be more affordable, more
deployable, particularly in
underdeveloped countries,
because a lot of the climate
change that was produced,
obviously, all over the world is
affecting developing communities
disproportionately.
And we can make all the
policies we want here.
They will not necessarily
change the practices
in other countries.
So I'm just wondering how you
think about that in general,
and how you think about
that at a place like MIT,
that in a sense has
both sorts of expertise?
NAMRATA KALA: I think
both are necessary,
and neither is sufficient.
I think there's certainly newer
technologies that are more
adapted to a variety
of different settings
that could really push
the envelope in terms
of both mitigation
and adaptation.
And I think that's
hugely important.
I also think that field
testing technologies
in a variety of setting and
making sure that the policy
conditions are correct is going
to go a long way in deploying
them at a large enough scale and
getting buy-in, which ends up
being very important politically
all over the world, when
it comes to deploying
these new technologies.
So I think both are
hugely important.
These new initiatives that are
pushing people out of the lab
and away from our computers to
talk to people who are making
these new
technologies, I'm super
excited about that
intersection because I
think that's where the real
progress is going to go.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: One
thing, actually, you
mentioned that I hadn't
thought that much about
is this sort of virtuous circle.
I've thought a lot
about technology
informing our policy
recommendations,
but the real world experience,
deployment, the soft part of it,
as you will, informing the next
phase of technology development
is also critical.
What is the end
user's experience,
and is it really
changing practice?
NAMRATA KALA: For a range of
technologies that I look at,
it really needs to be adapted.
So it could be
taking into account
the fact that the grid isn't
as stable, for instance,
or that if you're looking at
agricultural technologies that
are drought resistant,
the range of temperatures
you're going to encounter
is just very different.
And so the conditions are
going to be different.
The constraints are
going to be different.
And so figuring out what is the
best case real-world return,
as opposed to the ideal
return in the lab,
that actually might flip
the calculus on adoption
across the range
of technologies.
And so I think that's
really important.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And sometimes
funds are just deployed,
and they're not actually used.
So going out to see how
resources are actually
being used in the
real world obviously
can have an impact then again on
the policymakers in a feedback
loop.
NAMRATA KALA: And
generate support,
as you're saying,
for that adoption.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
Let's see, you described
your work with companies,
but you also work
with governments,
and you mentioned this
cold storage unit.
How do you actually interface
with governments, particularly
in developing countries,
to actually make
such things happen?
NAMRATA KALA: It's a
variety of different ways,
but at this point, what
often happens is either J-PAL
or someone else
will say, there's
some work that they're
interested in doing.
They mentioned that
you have a background,
or we told them that
you have a background,
so will you talk to them.
And that first conversation
can be a way for a larger
collaboration,
and sometimes not,
depending on timelines and
feasibility, et cetera.
But what I found
most useful is just
being persistent and
showing up and respecting
the constraints people
in the real world have
and trying to work around
them is the best recipe
for collaboration.
And it also buys
you a lot of support
when things really
hit the ground,
so I try to do that
with all my projects.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
actually a perfect description
of success in
administration as well,
which is laying out
what you're going to do,
doing what you say you're going
to do, and trying to do no harm.
And actually, you
can see in your work
that the trust
built up over time
is important because you
need those networks to know
that you have access to all
the company's materials.
And you then turn
on them, if you
will, if it turns
out to be an expose,
rather than this is critical.
I think people, whether
it's in administration
or in a corporation or in
government, if people come
to trust that you're trying
to be a straight shooter, that
will allow you further access.
NAMRATA KALA: That's been really
key in any of the successes
that I've had.
And sometimes, some
of the failures
have been because people are
just like, I don't want to.
I'm just not sure.
I'm not going to do it.
And in fact, I think what's also
been very helpful is early on,
delineating what the
boundaries are as well.
So for example, if at
any point anybody says,
well, we'd like to
be able to make edits
to the paper, or something--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
NAMRATA KALA: And I'm like, no,
that's never going to happen.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's right.
NAMRATA KALA: But then
I'll work with your data.
I'll send you insights.
We'll collaborate, and then
trust will build up over time.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So let's
turn for a few minutes
here to sort of a who you are.
We've got a flavor of your work.
So where did you
actually grow up?
NAMRATA KALA: So I
grew up in India.
I'm originally from Punjab,
and that's where I was born.
I was in Delhi for my undergrad,
and then I first came to the US
for a master's at Yale.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So what made
you come to the US, and why
economics?
NAMRATA KALA:
Growing up in India,
it's very hard to ignore
the development challenges
that this amazingly
innovative country faces.
And I think that
just naturally makes
people interested in
problems around development
and innovation and
sustainability.
I did my undergraduate
degree in economics.
That's where I first found
development economics.
I decided that's
what I wanted to do.
And I came to Yale because
they had a master's
in development economics
that was really excellent,
and that's where I found
environmental economics
and decided that was
the intersection I
wanted to spend my life in.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So I
think I read somewhere
about you that you took up
climbing during the pandemic.
Is that right?
NAMRATA KALA: I took up climbing
right before the pandemic.
Yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And tell
me a little bit about that.
That seems like a hard
thing to just take up.
NAMRATA KALA: So I think
one of the things you
have to do when you take up
difficult things like climbing
is just not put too many
expectations on yourself
and just try to
enjoy the process.
And what I really
like about climbing
is you don't have to be very
good to enjoy it and get
some exercise.
It's really fun because
it's very focusing
and problem solving-y, almost
in a non-intellectual way.
And it's great for community.
So it's kind of a thing.
You go with a bunch of friends.
You do a climb.
You chit chat, catch
up on people's lives.
And so it's a very sort of nice,
fun community activity to do.
And once you lay
off the pressure
of really trying to do
that super hard climb,
it's immense fun.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And you get
some upper body strength,
I guess, too.
NAMRATA KALA: Not necessarily.
Yes, I went in with none.
I came out with none.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So how did--
I know this isn't really the
subject of our conversation,
but I am curious.
How is that the case?
The public perception,
I would say,
or the novice
perception of climbing
is that it's a kind of upper
body effort to pull yourself up.
Is that not true?
NAMRATA KALA: So if
you use your legs,
you can get a long way without
using upper body strength.
The terrifying thing is that
the leg holds are really small.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
NAMRATA KALA: So you don't
think you can balance on them,
but you can.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
NAMRATA KALA: And if you
have no upper body strength,
like me, you have no
choice, so you just
get better at form because
strength is not an option.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
How interesting.
Aside from climbing, what's
sort of your favorite ways
to spend time off, if
you have any time off?
NAMRATA KALA: Yeah, so
I garden in the summer.
Again, I don't know if I'm any
good, but I really enjoy it.
Being outdoors, I think,
just hiking and gardening
as much as I can.
I'm learning to ski downhill,
which is fun, having grown up
in a hot country.
Not exactly my
competitive advantage,
but I'm learning to enjoy it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
it's funny, I also
like gardening, although
I don't have as much time.
But also I've been dissuaded.
I still remember one time
I was growing tomatoes,
and I came out in the yard.
And there was a squirrel
perched on the fence with one
of my tomatoes in
his front paws,
just kind of enjoying
himself, eating my tomatoes.
NAMRATA KALA: But that's how you
know you arrived as a gardener.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: There you go.
NAMRATA KALA: You have both
grown tomatoes and animals have
shown up to endorse them.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: There you go.
There you go.
NAMRATA KALA:
That's the pinnacle.
Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Anyway, well, I've
really enjoyed
hearing a little bit
about your
professional interests,
getting to know you a
little bit as a person.
I'm sure that our listeners
will enjoy hearing all of this
as well.
NAMRATA KALA: Thank you so
much again for doing this.
This has been wonderful.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
To our audience,
thank you again for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 7: Staying radical and relevant
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gj3w-feaOs

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello.
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
president of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome
you to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
Since coming to MIT, I've
been particularly inspired
by talking with
members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they are pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and
their brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, my guest
is Skylar Tibbits,
a designer and computer
scientist whose research
focuses on self-assembling
and programmable materials
as well as both 3D
and 4D printing.
He is the founder of the
MIT Self-Assembly lab.
So Skylar, welcome
to the podcast.
SKYLAR TIBBITS:
Thank you so much.
Pleasure to be here.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
I'd love to start
by hearing you define a
couple of the terms that
run through your work
because they're not actually
self-evident to some of us.
The first is 4D printing,
which is arguably
what you're best known for.
So can you define for
our listeners and for me
what that actually means?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Sure.
So we called it 4D
printing because we
want to take 3D printing
and add the element of time.
So 4, referencing time.
But we want to 3D print things
that transform over time.
They evolve.
They reconfigure.
They're very lifelike.
And it started
with this dream of,
Can we print something that
would walk off the machine?
How would you do that?
No motors, no electronics.
Similar to a robot
but purely material.
And the machine
could produce that.
So we called that 4D printing.
And it was in 2012 or '13.
And now that's grown
to many other things
and different materials,
different machine processes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
I'm curious, what
are the features of the
material that allow that?
And is it sometimes
in response to
changing environmental
conditions or stimuli?
Or is it somehow intrinsic when
you set up the initial print?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Most of
our work is about response
to the environment.
And we try to do that through
temperature or moisture
or pressure or wind or waves.
And the mechanism often is
two different materials.
It could be more.
Sometimes you could do one.
But the easiest is you have at
least two different materials
that have very
different properties.
So one is going to
expand or contract.
And that causes it, then,
to curl or to shrink or do
something, fold.
And you can use
that as a mechanism.
When you print it, you can
then deposit different material
properties with
different geometries
and three-dimensional
structures.
But you can also do the
same thing with knitting.
You can do it with weaving.
You can do-- all sorts of
other manufacturing processes.
And it's really about combining
those material properties
in the right thee-dimensional
structure in response
to some kind of activation.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
I see.
Interesting.
So can you give
some kind of example
of an everyday system
that could benefit
from this sort of technology.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
About half of our work right
now is in textiles, actually.
And so we're doing exactly
that with fibers and yarns,
industrial knitting, everything
from dresses to shoes
to jackets to swimsuits.
And there's really
two reasons you
would want that in clothing.
The whole apparel industry
and wearables industry
is trying to make
smarter clothing.
But most of that is focused
on sensors and more devices.
In our case, we're trying not
to have sensors and motors
and stuff in your clothes.
You don't want to charge
your shoes at night, right?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: So
it's material-driven.
And there's two main reasons.
One would be tailoring.
So customize for fit
or customize for style.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
pretty interesting.
SKYLAR TIBBITS:
So it autonomously
tailors or can get a perfect
fit for your body or my body.
But the second one is usually
climate or moisture regulation.
So we have a project right
now about insulation,
adaptive insulation,
that basically keeps you
cool or warm when you need it.
Same thing could happen
for moisture regulation.
Or think about
compression garments
like adaptive
compression in apparel.
So basically, they're
always adapting
to how you're living or
the environment around you
or how you're performing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It seems to
me that this could also have
medical device applications.
In other words, adaptation to
physiological circumstances.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah, exactly.
And the compression
is a great example.
And we've done some work
in that area little bit
in prosthetics, some early
work on orthodontics.
So there's some.
I wouldn't say our lab is
heavily in the medical space.
But we've done a little bit.
And you can see there's a
lot of applications there.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
So what do you actually
think the future, then, is?
If you're looking where
your lab might go,
what other sort of arenas
are you're interested in
and others may be
interested in 4D printing?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: In terms
of the applications of it,
my lab works across many
different disciplines
from footwear and apparel
to aviation, automotive,
manufacturing, architecture,
and construction.
I'm faculty in architecture.
So we work across many.
And we think about it as
systems, behaviors, phenomenon
that can then be applied
at different scales,
at different domains.
But I think the longer vision
is that right now we all want
the smart XYZ smart home,
smart car, smart shoe,
smart whatever.
And that's all
very device-heavy.
I think over time, it'll
get more and more elegant.
And it'll be more about
material properties
and our environments.
And we'll still
have the smartness,
but they'll be more and
more simple and seamless.
That likely makes
them more lifelike.
I mean, we're all smart
right without devices.
So our products and environments
will become smarter and smarter
but more and more material.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Plus
presumably, it'll
be potentially easier to
scale and more affordable.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Exactly.
That's one of the key benefits.
Less assembly.
Less energy intensive.
Less failure.
Less components.
All that kind of stuff.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
I've seen some self-assembly
structure videos.
So that helps make the concept
of self-assembly really vivid.
And as a biologist, I always
think about this, the old--
if you take a sponge and
you dissociate the cells
and you separate them, they can
self-assemble into an organism.
Can you talk a bit
about self-assembly,
how you define it?
And how do you compare it to
traditional assembly methods?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I think about self-assembly
as disordered parts
that build an ordered structure
without humans or machines.
So you have a bunch of
components, LEGOs, bricks,
cells, whatever it is.
They should be able to organize
themselves, ordered structure--
maybe that's function,
behavior, design--
without us guiding it,
like screwdrivers, drills,
printers, or without robots
or something else doing it.
It should be able to
do that on its own.
Most of the time, you see that
in biology, chemistry, material
science, at very small scales.
And frankly, that's-- usually
when I say self-assembly,
either people think I mean IKEA,
and I don't mean literally you
are the self-assembling.
Or they're from biology,
chemistry material science.
They're like, yeah,
self-assembly.
I know about that.
But most other people don't
really think about that.
And at the human scale in
manufacturing construction,
that's almost non-existent.
We don't use self-assembly in
construction and manufacturing,
typically.
But when you go
above that, think
of geological or
planetary scale,
self-assembly is
the only mechanism.
Planets form themselves.
So that was the question of,
why don't we use that as humans?
That's another possible
way to build things.
And so my lab focuses on
macroscale self-assembly
mostly for construction.
And now we have a big project
in the Maldives trying to grow
islands using self-assembly.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's really interesting.
So the intrinsic properties
of the system or the material
to self-associate, you
capitalize on that.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Exactly.
It's usually you have
some material component.
That can be sand or that
could be blocks or LEGOs
or whatever it is.
They need some
kind of stickiness.
But that needs to be patterned.
So it can't just be everything
sticks to everything.
And then you need just the
right amount of energy.
Too much, it usually
breaks apart.
Not enough, it doesn't assemble.
And if you get those
right, that can
happen at any scale
with any component.
And then order can emerge.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's great.
So in terms of thinking
about the self-assembly,
how do you predict its future
impact on manufacturing?
We're starting to rethink
manufacturing in the US
in terms of robotic input and
how the labor force is changing
and what expertise is needed.
Do you actually see this as
a viable, scalable, future
manufacturing process?
SKYLAR TIBBITS:
You're seeing that
starting to happen, especially
in materials science,
starting also in
chip and electronics,
small-scale components
where there's complexity.
It's hard to get robots,
hard to get people.
You're seeing it
emerge in that space.
But wider-spread
manufacturing, I would hope so.
But I will say that for
the past 10 years or so,
we didn't think of
self-assembly as really applied.
It was basic research to us.
We were like, is this
possible, in the beginning.
What can we do with this?
What if we change the
number of components?
What if we change the
geometry so it's not
always deterministic?
It becomes non-deterministic,
and designs emerge.
We have things in tumblers.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So you
might get different outputs.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
We had a tumbler
where parts learn
to fly, essentially, because
they would come together.
And the ones that
were good at hovering,
they evolved this
mechanism of hovering.
And the other ones broke.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's crazy.
SKYLAR TIBBITS:
Things like that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I like it.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: But the Maldives
project became very applied.
And that's where it sort
of skipped over factories
for a second and thinks
about geology in a way,
like landforms that
already self-assemble.
We think about them
as either we sculpt
it or we move, like
geoengineering, and move earth.
Or we're just like,
erosion happened.
I don't know what to do.
But there's another
option, which
is sort of dancing with the
forces of nature and saying,
let's try to promote
something to happen naturally.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And we
usually think those things
on geologic time frame, things
that are changing geologically.
So when you do something like
this, what sort of time frame
does this-- these kind of
projects operate under?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: In the
Maldives, there's a lot of sand,
and it moves very quickly.
So on the order of
weeks to months,
a sandbar will form that's
above the surface of the water,
like a full-on island.
And locals will go and have
a party or have a reunion.
So it's very, very fast.
Longest timeframe
there is one season.
And we're really trying to
compete against dredging.
We're trying to eliminate
dredging or basically barriers
to try to fight nature.
Those are the two
things that people
think of, pump sand or build
walls and block nature.
And we're trying to show that
you can let nature build things
by helping guide it,
guide where the sand goes.
You can't sculpt it.
But the sand can
naturally accumulate.
And so you're kind of up
against how fast can they
pump an island?
And that is usually on
the order of months.
But we think within
a season, you
can get the same amount
of accumulation naturally.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
I mentioned early on
in the conversation,
you're sort of a designer
and computer science.
And do you think of yourself
more as one or the other?
What's the interplay there?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Definitely
more on the design side.
I came from a
background of artists.
I studied architecture
originally.
I'm much more designer
than I am computer science.
And frankly, I don't really
do much in computer science.
I have a degree in it.
We write code.
And we have that
as a background.
But most of our work is not
software-driven and computing
in the traditional sense.
But you can see a lot of
that mentality of computation
is embedded in our work.
And so I got into computing
because of design.
And software was just booming
at that time a few decades ago.
And I started writing code to
create new tools for design.
And so I kind of came in
through the lens of design.
But I was much more
interested in what are
the fundamentals of computing.
Literally, what is information?
And how is one thing
communicate to another thing?
And information theory and
how do we transfer information
into physical objects?
And how do we use information?
How do we program materials?
That's the kind of
computing that we do,
although we do also traditional
computing and coding.
But definitely,
the lab is design
meets computation,
science, engineering rather
than science, engineering first
has a little bit of design.
We're the other way around.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's interesting,
as you talk about computing, and
also it sounds analogous to me
to the notion of how do
you make the whole greater
than the sum of the parts.
In other words,
what are the modules
you need to create what
you're going to do?
And what makes new
emergent properties?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
Totally.
What's the most fundamental,
simple amount of information
that can lead to the maximum
diversity of options?
And for design, that's awesome.
You can have simple
building blocks.
Or I can have simple
rules or precedents.
And that can lead to many
different creative outputs.
That's the Holy Grail.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
Exactly.
We hear a lot about design
thinking in education
and how we teach our students
design thinking that's
applicable to all
different fields.
I'm just wondering how
you think about that
in terms of how you
teach that and how
people change their
mindset when they come in
with a design lens.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
And I teach a studio called
How to Design, literally
how to design.
And it came out of a very famous
historic class at MIT called
How to Make Almost Anything.
And Neil Gershenfeld
teaches that.
And then we created
a section called
How to Design because we thought
we also need to talk about that
and not just making for making.
How do we literally design
the things we want to make?
So every week, we go through
one step of the design process.
What is a concept?
What is representation?
How do we represent ideas?
What does iteration do
for the design process?
We go through
testing, fabrication,
all these different
aspects of design.
And that is for any
MIT undergraduate
across the campus that
is interested in design.
That started to then boom,
and we have a design minor.
So any student on campus can be
a major in anything-- physics,
biology, math, whatever.
And then they can have
a minor in design.
And now we have a
major in design.
So they can be an MIT design
major or double major.
And it was all about trying
to create a very different
perspective on design.
We're not a traditional
design school.
There's very strong design
schools around the world.
But how do we create
polymath designers
that are physicists designers
and biological designers
and mathematician designers
and engineer designers,
these hybrid creative
technical right brain, left
brain kind of ethos?
And MIT is the perfect
place for that.
We can mix the creative
with the technical.
So those studios, we
teach the design process.
But then they're also building
materials and machines.
And they're testing.
And they're thinking about--
one of the assignments
is called the
physics fabricator.
Take a principle
from physics and use
that to build something.
And so they think about double
pendulums and chaotic systems
that can fabricate parts
better than something else
or dropping things
or spinning things
or some principle in physics.
So we try to think of the MIT
ethos as a design generator
and amplify all their
technical pursuits as well
as their creative, bring
those two together.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
very interesting.
So I was going to ask
you how you came to MIT.
It sounds like MIT is
the perfect environment
for your work.
But how did you
find your way here?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
So I studied
architecture in Philly.
I have a five-year
professional degree.
And as I was saying,
at the end of that,
it was just right as
computation was coming on board
and changing that discipline.
I started by hand drafting.
And then it got to CAD.
And then it's like, OK, let's
generate our own software
tools.
And fabrication
was just booming.
We didn't even have printers
or anything at the school.
So I started getting into
code for software and code
for machines and then
applied for grad school.
I applied for a bunch of places.
Got into a number of them.
At the very last
second, got into MIT.
And I'm like, OK,
I'm going there.
I'm going there because I
want to learn computation
from computer scientists
not from architects.
I felt like I had a
strong design background.
And I want to go--
I was taking classes
with Minsky and Patrick
Winston, these pioneers
of AI and computation.
And then I could use that and
translate it back to design.
And the design
minor, when we first
created that 2016, that boom to
become the second or third most
popular minor, it kind of
oscillates right there.
So it just exploded.
We realized all these
students want to take design.
And then I think,
partly because of that
and other forces of design
happening around campus,
Morningside was created.
And that's really become the
hub for design on campus.
And I direct our design
minor and major programs
in our department,
and then I lead
the academic part of
Morningside Academy for Design.
I think about the
Academy for Design
as a way to connect
all of the efforts
across campus in design, whether
that's undergraduate education,
like I've talked about, graduate
education, research, even
K-through-12 outreach,
entrepreneurship
meets innovation.
How do we use design as a way
to amplify all the other things
that are happening?
Create a hub, bring students
there, take classes,
do your ops research,
help them with portfolios,
getting jobs outside
afterwards so that they
are both the creative
and the technical,
which is super rare for
a student to have that.
So anyway, the
Morningside Academy
is really trying to amplify and
connect across campus design.
And historically, I don't
think MIT is thought
of as the center of design.
Similarly in arts.
But we have such a strong
history in arts and design.
We're the first architecture
school in the country.
We've been number
one for a long time.
We have a really
strong design program.
But more than that,
I think we just
have a very different
perspective on design
that not a lot of traditional
design schools have.
And I think that's a perfect
match for our MIT undergrads,
the creative and the technical.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
It's interesting.
You talked about right
brain, left brain.
And a lot of people with
sophisticated quantitative
skills don't think about design.
And a lot of people go
into design never delve
into the arena of sophisticated
mathematics or computation.
And to get those in the
same students, as you say,
will create a sort
of unique person
to go out into the workforce.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: And
it shouldn't just
be like, let's solve the
problem any way we can,
or let's just make
things beautiful,
which are kind of the cliches
of engineering and design.
But how do we imagine a
future that isn't possible
today and have the
skills to both design
it, test it, build it,
prototype it, communicate it?
That whole process is
what we need to combine.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So in
terms of your perspectives,
you have a family history
in art and design.
I understand your
grandfather was an architect.
Did that in some
way inspire you,
even starting at a young
age to move towards design?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Certainly.
And at first, I wanted to be an
artist or maybe a photographer.
And you can probably see some of
that come through in our work,
the way we shoot
photo or video of it.
But at some point, I just
remember thinking that, oh,
architecture.
That's a practical art form.
I could have a career
in art or architecture.
I've definitely gone more
on the artistic side.
And being at MIT allows
me to blend those things
as we're talking about.
And I don't practice
architecture and build
buildings in a traditional way.
I run a research lab.
But I think that ethos
of imagining and creating
and discovering and playing,
that is definitely built in.
And then there's
different tools.
And sometimes
that's computation.
And sometimes
that's a paintbrush.
And sometimes that's
something else.
But we can be creative
through many different tools
and many different disciplines.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
in your spare time,
which you probably
don't have much of,
do you actually do art as
part of your slate of hobbies
and interests?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Not
so much art anymore.
I used to be really
into drawing.
And at some point,
I was painting.
And I built a lot of stuff.
But now it's been much
more like photo, video.
And I've been to drone
photography and video stuff.
We got into that through
our work in the Maldives,
flying drones.
And so now that has
been my creative outlet,
just use the camera as
a lens and to see things
in a different way.
And that translates to how
we document our work as well.
Think about the self-assembly
we're talking about.
It's really hard,
even just right now,
to imagine what I mean
without seeing it.
And then even while
you're seeing it,
we're always thinking
about how do I film this
so that it can communicate
what's happening so that anyone
can see it right away and
understand how this happened
or what's possible with it?
So the filming, the
visual aspect of it
is just important
in the storytelling.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So you have
two young children, five
and almost one.
And it must feel your work
has a kind of big arts
and crafts-y class
kind of feel to it.
Do you share your work
on some level with them?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
And my daughter thinks we are
a toy store or a toy factory.
She comes to my lab and
thinks that we make toys.
I mean, we make a lot of
things that look like toys,
are fuzzy and fluffy and
squishy and interesting
shapes and colors and stuff.
So for the first time this
past weekend, she said, Papa,
can we 3D print something?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, fun.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: So she's
starting to think about
that you can make something.
So I'm super excited about that.
Before that, it was more like,
do you want to make this thing?
But now she's
starting to ask me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, that's fun.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: And
she's on campus.
She goes to daycare here.
Both of them do.
And once a week, I try to
take her out for lunch.
And we just explore campus.
We wander through
the that's tunnels.
We went to the glass lab.
We wander into maker spaces.
And so I'm hoping some of
that creative, technical part
of MIT, the curiosity
starts to come through.
But we'll see.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's so
funny how these things
get internalized by your kids.
So my son's a PhD
student at MIT.
But I think both for
his childhood and many
of my friends who
were scientists,
I think kids just
thought having a lab was
sort of a rite of passage.
You would reach a certain age,
and you would acquire a lab.
It's just sort of--
SKYLAR TIBBITS:
Everyone's got a lab.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
what everybody does.
And some of them
stay that course.
And some of them do
something different.
But you're definitely influenced
by your parents' professions.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: I had
two psychologist parents.
So I went the complete
opposite direction than that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: There you go.
Well, my mom was
an opera singer.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Oh, wow.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
And the farthest I
went with that was a
cappella singing in college.
You have to actually
have the talent
to be an opera singer, which
was certainly an impediment.
So you have young
children at home.
You have the pressures
of co-directing
a lab, teaching, managing
your undergraduate programs.
You have a huge
amount on your plate.
I find coming up with
new ideas actually
requires some mental space.
When do you have creative time?
How do you think about it?
Do you go running?
Do you do you carve out time to
think carefully about things?
I'm just curious.
SKYLAR TIBBITS:
One is the plane.
So traveling and
the plane has become
a really good space for that.
Just stare out the window.
You can't move for
however many hours.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And don't
sign up for the internet.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
Your battery only lasts so long.
And you just-- my
mind starts to wander.
And you just start to imagine.
And things start to connect.
So that has historically been
a really great place for that.
I come back from trips
with a million new ideas
and come into the lab.
But the other thing
is that I just
have an amazing lab
full of amazing people,
super creative talented--
and if anything, at this
point, I set the vision
and do fundraising
and management.
But they have way more
talent than I ever did.
And so just hanging out
with them, especially
during IEP or the summers--
and I can spend
like a lot of time
in the lab-- hanging out
with them is super inspiring.
And it's like, oh, you
did-- oh, we should do this.
You guys did this together.
OK.
Here's a new-- a
lot of ideas are
generated from that,
just bouncing ideas
off the people in the lab.
But my own quiet time is either
like the shower or the drive.
Or the plane was
a really good one.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: To me, the most
fun thing about having a lab
was just what you're
saying, which is just
seeing the excitement,
looking at the ideas,
looking across the
scope of the lab,
and thinking about
novel combinations.
And just sort of harnessing
that creativity and excitement
of the collective is so fun.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: And
especially our undergrads.
We have research scientists
that are amazing.
PhDs, master's students
are super talented,
super passionate.
But our undergrads come
from all across MIT.
Everything-- brain and cog to
computer science and materials
design, everything
you can imagine.
And there's just
something different
about their excitement,
their knowledge.
There's something
really enjoyable
about that energy in the lab.
And if you combine that with
this deep skill and creativity
that the upper-level,
experienced researchers have,
pretty awesome things emerge.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
I mean, I think that
captures extremely well sort
of the magic of MIT.
Brilliant people,
interdisciplinarity,
and what you can get magically
when you throw people together.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: And
I've always thought
about the grad versus
undergrad culture
as two very different things.
When they work together,
it's super powerful.
But the undergrads are just
pure brilliance and energy,
creativity, and
technical expertise.
The grads-- and I
say this for myself.
But we worked hard and proved
ourselves but maybe aren't just
the most purely brilliant XYZ.
But we really worked
hard and have gotten
somewhere because of that.
But when you combine those
two, that's super powerful.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: There's
also the pressures, right?
You're looking for a
particular career outcome
when you're a graduate
student or a postdoc.
You have some
freedom to explore.
But there's a little pragmatic
thing ringing in your head.
So it is nice to have this kind
of unconstrained, what would
be the most cool thing to do?
SKYLAR TIBBITS: And
sometimes, the brilliance
of not being the expert
or having knowledge
in some other
domain, that inspires
the people that are deeply
knowledgeable in that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You're not
constrained by what you know.
That's interesting.
Well, I've really
enjoyed our conversation.
This is an area that I have
not gotten a lot of a chance
to think about before.
So I really enjoyed that.
And I'm sure our
audience is going
to feel exactly the same way.
So let me just thank you again.
SKYLAR TIBBITS: Pleasure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And
say to our audience,
thank you for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
And I very much hope
you will join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 6: Healing the ailing heart
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1OOzOY2Wg0

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello.
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
President of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome you
to this MIT Community podcast
Curiosity Unbounded.
Since I arrived at MIT, I've
been particularly inspired
by talking with
members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they're pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and
their brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, my guest is Ellen Roche.
Ellen is an Associate
Professor in the Department
of Mechanical Engineering.
Her work focuses on mechanical
devices and biomaterials
with medical applications.
She also directs the
Therapeutic Technology Design
and Development Lab at MIT.
Now, because so much of
what happens here at MIT
happens in the labs, I
wanted to bring Ellen
on to the podcast to talk
about how lab work translates
to the real world.
So Ellen, thank you
for being here today.
ELLEN ROCHE: Thank
you for having me.
It's a pleasure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You have
worked on a biorobotic heart.
So this heart, I
was looking forward
to hearing more about this,
talking to you about it.
So as I understand
it, in 2020 your lab
developed a heart
that's described
as being like the real thing.
Then COVID happened, and
your lab, like many at MIT,
had to close.
And then when your lab
reopened, the work continued.
And I believe you actually
improved on the heart
by turning to 3D printing.
So tell me a little bit about
the story of this heart.
How did it get started?
Where are you now?
Where are you hoping
to go with it?
ELLEN ROCHE: I guess
the work started kind
of during my doctoral
work at Harvard.
I did my PhD there.
And I worked on a device that
was an implantable device that
went around a heart
like a sock or a sleeve
that would be implanted
around a failing
heart in a person
with heart failure.
And it would act to give an
extra assistance to the heart
muscle to pump enough
blood around the body.
That was really kind of the
first configuration or version
of these soft robotic
heart devices.
When I started my
group here at MIT,
I continued that
work a little bit,
and we made a textile sleeve.
We showed that that
could work even better
than the original version.
And then I thought, how
can we use this technology
to develop better
test beds on the bench
so that we can recreate the
motion and the biomechanics
of the heart on the
bench to allow for better
testing of devices
like heart valves
and implantable devices
that go inside the heart?
And you want to test them
in a very realistic setting.
So the first version
in 2020 was led
by my first graduate student--
or actually second, but
first mechanical engineering
graduate student, Clara.
We took an explanted pig heart.
Pig hearts are similar
sizes to human hearts.
And we removed all the
dead or stiffened muscle
from the heart, but preserved
all the intracardiac features.
So all the heart valves and
everything inside the heart
was kept intact.
And we used a very
specific dissection process
to kind of unravel the
muscle from around the heart.
And then we replaced that with
a synthetic, soft robotic muscle
that we could tune and control.
And then we could basically
make the heart beat again
on the bench.
And then you can put cameras
in and sensors on it,
and you can measure
flows and pressures.
But you can recreate the heart
motion, the pumping function,
the valve motion.
So really kind of
bringing the heart
back to life on the bench.
So that was where it
started, and we used
it to test a number of devices.
Some of the issues with that
are that it's real tissue,
so there's a certain
kind of shelf life.
We did some work on
coming up with methods
to keep it functioning
for longer,
but you still have
some limitations.
And then we thought, maybe we
can fully 3D print a heart.
So we take a patient scan
and get the exact anatomy,
and then we use
advanced 3D printers.
The technology has advanced
so much in recent years.
And we print in a
soft material so we
can match exactly the
anatomy of a given patient.
Diseased patients, some have
congenital heart defects that
are very different anatomies.
And then we can use our
soft robotic technologies
to make a sleeve
that goes around it
or to create a band that
goes around the vessel
so it can create narrowing.
And then we have this pumping
heart on the bench again,
but we can create
different disease types
and we can tune them.
We can use them to learn
more about the biomechanics,
to test devices with that.
Then we can print different
edge cases of anatomies.
We can look at various
different devices
and tune it depending on
what we're trying to test.
So now moving
forward, we think, how
about moving towards printing an
entire total artificial heart?
We're way away from
that now, but if we
can do that, you can
envision the people who
are kind of at end stage
heart failure that are waiting
for a transplant and
on these long list
could actually have a printed,
entirely synthetic, beating
heart that has active motion
and everything that replicates
their own native parts.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
pretty incredible.
So it seems then that in the
current state, for example,
if a patient needs a
particular assistive device,
you can see how it will interact
with their own physiology.
In your original
work, the sleeve
work that you did as
a graduate student,
was that ever actually
deployed clinically?
ELLEN ROCHE: Not yet, no.
I think for this type of class--
III is the highest
risk medical device--
the regulatory approval takes
a lot of time, as it should.
So I think that would
take quite a bit of work
to advance that to be
implanted in humans.
And part of the reason for the
pivot towards these benchtop
models was because you
can deploy them quicker
and they can be
used and translated
in industry a lot quicker
than a very high-risk device.
But we're still trying to
pursue both in parallel.
Some have kind of
nearer term goals
than the long-term implant.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You
know, I guess also--
correct me if I'm wrong-- but
the artificial hearts could be
used for--
models in particular patients
can be used by surgeons
to map out their approach,
for instance, if someone
has an unusual anatomy.
ELLEN ROCHE: Absolutely.
Recently, we were approached
by one of the local hospitals
to build some models
in the hospitals
to train their surgeons or
their attendings there to study
which type of pump to use,
which type of left ventricular
assist device, and to
tune the parameters
and vary them and see
that in real time.
And the surgeon that came
actually to visit the lab
had seen some of the
work, and his mom actually
had seen it [LAUGHS] and
called him and was like,
you need to meet these people.
So he came and was excited, and
we're trying to set that up.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: How fun.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
So if you succeed
in making an entirely artificial
heart that could actually
be implanted, what
sort of materials
do you envision
being used there?
ELLEN ROCHE: That's one of
the big challenges, of course.
They have to be
biocompatible, but they
have to be very robust
because the heart beats--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: A lot.
[LAUGHS]
ELLEN ROCHE: --72 times
a minute on average,
and a lot of the research
is going into that.
Of course, the material that
contacts the blood as well
has to be designed very
specifically because you
don't want to cause clotting.
We didn't have that
issue with the sleeve
because it was
nonblood-contacting.
But if it's a total
artificial heart, who will.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And then you
get fibrosis sometimes around.
That destroys the
blood flow, et cetera.
ELLEN ROCHE: Exactly,
yes, depending
on what part of
the device we may
have to functionalize
in different ways.
But there's a lot of
existing implants that
are proven blood contacting.
So the goal at the
moment is if we
can build the active
structure but use
approved prosthetic valves
that are already implanted
and have been implanted
in human hearts before
and haven't had issues.
And then if we can use materials
to line the internal surface
of the heart that have
been used in vascular
grafts or
blood-contacting devices,
we can kind of at least
de-risk parts of it,
and then we would be controlling
the pumping function.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow,
that's really interesting.
I've heard also that another
recent project in your lab
concerns hydrogels that
can repair or replace
diseased tissues.
Can you tell us about that work?
Maybe starting from
exactly what our hydrogels
for the audience and
kind of going through how
they might be deployed.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah, there's
a lot of advancements
in the overall hydrogel
field recently.
This particular gel that we're
working on, it's a biopolymer.
And it has these unique
mechanical properties
where it's shear thinning,
so we can deliver it
through a long tube.
But then when it comes out
of the tube or the catheter,
it kind of solidifies, so
it's like this phase changing.
It's called a granular
hydrogel, small little spheres,
basically.
And this is in collaboration
with Jennifer Lewis at Harvard
who does a lot of work in
bioprinting and soft materials.
My lab is interested
in implantable devices
for the heart.
So we thought, can
we use this material
and use a catheter
to deliver it?
So a catheter is a long tube
that's inserted into the body
so you can do minimally
invasive procedures.
And we thought, can
we use this material
to occlude part of the heart
where clots can form and cause
a stroke in patients that
have arrhythmia or atrial
fibrillation?
So there's this little tiny
part of the heart called
the left atrial appendage.
It's like a little outpouching
from the upper chamber
of the heart.
And if a patient has
atrial fibrillation
and their upper
chambers of their heart
are kind of quivering,
you get blood stasis
in that area and clots can form,
and 90% of stroke-causing clots
form there.
So if we can occlude
it, it prevents clots
from forming there,
from going to the brain
and causing a stroke.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You actually
are re-routing things.
You stop the blood from
actually going into that--
ELLEN ROCHE: This one kind
of cul-de-sac or a dead end.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Got it.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
So you can put the tube
up through the leg.
It's minimally invasive.
You cross the
septum of the heart,
and then you can
fill that heart.
And it basically just blocks
it off from the blood flow.
And the advantage
percentage of using
kind of a hydrogel
biological material
like that, first
you can deliver it.
It will stabilize.
And then the patient's
tissue will grow over it--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
ELLEN ROCHE: --so then the only
thing in contact with the blood
is the patient's own tissue
after a certain amount of time.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
How about babies who
are born, for instance,
with a congenital hole
between chambers, et cetera?
Could you envision using
it for something like that?
ELLEN ROCHE: Absolutely.
Yeah, that's one of the uses
we have envisioned for it.
And we have other work
in the lab, again, some
from my doctoral work
and some in the lab
where we design these
biopolymeric patches that
can be adhered to the septum of
the heart to close these holes,
either in babies, or
in adults sometimes
there is a defect
that isn't problematic
unless you're prone to clotting
because then you can get--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You can
also throw clots there.
ELLEN ROCHE: Right, exactly.
So we're working on these
kind of patches and adhesives
that can work.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
ELLEN ROCHE: We had a
light-activated adhesive
delivered by a catheter
that could cure this patch
onto the septum of the heart.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You would
laser cure it or something?
Is that--
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
Yeah, we used blue light.
And you could
activate this adhesive
to adhere to the septum.
So code a patch
with this adhesive.
And then two
balloons, and one was
reflective to reflect the light.
There was a fiber
optic in the catheter.
The light would reflect back and
cure the patch onto the septum.
And it was flexible
and elastomeric and
blood-compatible, and then
you'd take out the catheter.
So it would just be this patch.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
ELLEN ROCHE: Again, the
goal is the patient's tissue
grows over it.
So yeah, so that one we
licensed to a startup company
in France, in Paris.
And they were working
on it for a while,
and they're still pursuing
this defect closure as well.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
As I understand it,
earlier in your career
you worked in the
medical device industry.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: What
motivated you to make the jump
from industry to academia?
ELLEN ROCHE: I think when
I started in industry,
I was really eager to get some
experience after undergrad.
And there was a
program in Ireland
at the time, which kind
of was a graduate program
to do some time in
an Irish company
and then some time in a
sister company abroad,
so that brought me to the US.
When I started that,
I thought, I'll
do some industry
experience, but I always
knew I wanted to do further
study, a master's or a PhD.
So that program brought
me to California,
and I ended up getting
involved in a project
there in Abbott Vascular
where we were working
on a system for getting
regulatory approval for one
of their stents.
And then I ended up there four
years instead of six months.
Really enjoyed it.
Loved the work.
Then I still had that
desire to do further study
and learn new technologies that
could be applied to devices.
I was working in cardiac
devices in industry
and loved that part of
it, but I thought maybe
there is more I can learn
and different techniques
and approaches that
I could use, and have
this kind of open space
to be creative and try
different things.
So there was a
certain point where
I was employed still on
an expatriate contract
from Ireland, and they closed
one of the sites in Galway.
And at that point they
were like, oh, you
can either switch
to a US contract
or take a redundancy package.
And I was like, that's perfect.
This is a good chance to--
I traveled for a while and then
I started a master's first.
It was a master's I
could do while working.
So I worked in Medtronic.
And then I said, OK, I'm
into the research again.
And I applied for a
PhD through a Fulbright
Science and Technology program,
and then came to Harvard.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, fantastic.
So do you find--
I'm just curious, your
own PhD students now,
what's sort of the
split of students
who are going to industry
versus have aspirations
for an academic career?
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah,
that's a great question.
I'm six years here, so--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
they're just starting.
ELLEN ROCHE: They're starting.
My eighth graduate student
defended yesterday,
so that was exciting.
And to date, I
would say there is--
probably more of the students
have gone to industry,
but a couple have
stayed in academia.
And then a lot of the postdocs
that have been in my lab
have stayed in academia.
So overall, I would
say probably 50/50.
But I really do
encourage them all
to have some sort of industry
experience during their PhD
because I feel like we're
developing these devices that
are implanted in humans,
and it's really important
to understand all that
happens between designing them
in the lab and proving that they
work to actually getting them
into a person.
There's so much regulatory
things, clinical design,
the design of the trial,
the manufacturing.
There's so much that's very
hard to even imagine until you
spend some time in industry.
So most of my students
have done an internship.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, that's great.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
So one of my students,
Keegan, she actually
went to med school after
she defended her PhD.
But she spent time
in Boston Scientific,
setting up some of the
models she developed.
And other students
spent time working
with Dassault Systèmes who
do computer-aided design
and computational modeling.
We have quite a few
industry-sponsored projects
now in the lab.
So I think it's a good
opportunity for the students
to be in an academic setting,
but work very closely
with the industry
personnel as well.
And that can help them
to kind of figure out,
do I want to go the industry
route or the academic route?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And also
having realistic expectations.
As you were saying,
knowing that the steps
from conceiving an idea
and showing that it works
on a lab bench to actually
getting it into a human--
ELLEN ROCHE: There are so many--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
--is a very-- a lot
of hurdles in a very long path.
Speaking of students, I think--
I often hear from faculty
that what drew them to MIT
is the quality of the students.
So talk a little bit more about
your experience collaborating
with the students
here, how you found it.
ELLEN ROCHE: Oh, yeah.
It's amazing.
I'm so lucky to get to work
with such talented students.
They really just impress me
every day with how creative
they are and diligent and
collaborative because my work
is interdisciplinary.
I have students from
mechanical engineering,
and then I have a lot of
students from the HST program
because I'm core
faculty in IMES as well.
And they have very
different backgrounds,
but I love seeing how
they work together
to solve these problems.
It's just a privilege to work
with them, as well in teaching,
you know?
You teach these classes,
and the students
are so eager to
learn, and just ask
such smart,
intelligent questions,
and they want more
hours in the lab.
It's just fantastic.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
So for our listeners,
our HST program
in collaboration
with Harvard produces
future clinician scientists,
students who are doing MD PhDs.
And this area of research seems
like a perfect training ground
and future career
arena for students
who are really interested in
doing fundamental research,
but making a
clinical difference.
ELLEN ROCHE: Absolutely.
Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
some of your work
is actually
computational as well,
so computational modeling.
I'm wondering, first of all,
how AI affects what you're doing
and how it's
affecting the field,
but I'm also curious
how you personally
learned what you
needed to learn to be
able to apply these sort of
computational approaches.
ELLEN ROCHE: I did my postdoc
in computational modeling.
So we look at modeling the
motion of the heart, the fluid,
structure, interaction,
basically how the blood flows
in response to the
contraction of the heart,
and how when you
implant devices that
can change the
mechanics of the heart,
and how the devices are affected
by this three-dimensional
motion.
So I learned a lot of
finite element models
and different kind of
computational models
to study that.
And we have a
subgroup in the lab
that work almost exclusively
on computational models.
More recently, I
would say, we've
looked at using some AI methods
to take multiple patient
data sets' images
and try to make
these synthetic anatomical
models where we can parametrize
different parts of the heart
and look at different anatomies
and create these kind of
data-driven surrogates
so we can do finite element
models much quicker.
And I think that will
help us to use these
to inform clinical practice.
So you could imagine you
go for a scan, an MRI scan,
and then you have
this digital twin
that is your own beating heart.
And then you can say,
if there's an issue,
this will be how your
heart will perform
if you have this intervention.
Or if you are trying to
inform a patient about what
will happen if they don't make
certain lifestyle changes,
you could have this--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh.
[LAUGHS] You can show them what
will happen if their arteries
become occluded and--
ELLEN ROCHE: Right.
Here is your heart now, and--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Here's
your heart on donuts.
[LAUGHS]
ELLEN ROCHE: Exactly.
Because you could
have age-matched and
lifestyle-matched virtual twins.
And with our work in the lab,
we could also do physical twins.
So you know, here's your
heart beating right now.
And if we put in this LVAD,
you'll get this much more--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's fantastic.
ELLEN ROCHE: Or if you don't do
anything, it's going to remodel
and it's going to grow.
So a lot of the computational
work we were doing as well
is looking at how the
heart muscle adapts
to various pressure overloads
or volume overloads.
And over time the heart will
remodel, which is fascinating.
It'll grow and change shape,
and these computational models
can predict that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You know,
that's really interesting.
I would think also
people are obviously
sometimes hesitant to
undergo heart surgery
and wondering what the
ultimate benefit will be.
ELLEN ROCHE: Mm-hmm.
Of course.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: But if
you can say, as you said,
if you put in this device or you
make this surgical modification
or what have you, this
is what we predict
in terms of the heart output.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah, absolutely.
And as well as patient
education, and here's
why we're doing
what we're doing.
It can also help
surgeons to decide
if we use this
continuous flow pump
versus this pulsatile pump,
here's what it will look like,
or here's the way we can fit it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
I'm just curious--
and you may not have a
good answer to this--
I'm just curious whether
there are colleagues
in related fields that are in
a sense doing the same things
with other organs.
In other words, 3D printing.
It seems a little bit different
because so much of the heart
function is based on
large architecture
as opposed to filtration
capacity, let's
say, in a kidney or in a liver.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah,
there definitely is.
And even within my
group, we've thought
about, how can we translate
this technology to other organs
or tissues?
So we have actually developed an
assist device for the diaphragm
because--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
very interesting.
ELLEN ROCHE: --like
the heart, it's
a large, contracting muscle.
It's life-sustaining
it's mechanical.
So we have developed these
actuators or artificial muscles
that go above the
diaphragm and help
to augment the downward
motion of the diaphragm
to help with
inspiration in patients
that have muscular
dystrophy or disorders.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Or ALS or other
neurodegenerative disorders.
ELLEN ROCHE: Right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
really interesting.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
That was kind of another obvious
type of large, mechanically
[LAUGHS] driven
composite structure where
we could augment the native
function without overtaking it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
Very interesting.
ELLEN ROCHE: But
there are other groups
developing as well anatomical
models of various organs
and printing them.
I think what we are trying
to do a little bit different
is print them, but
also make them active.
So we can print and then
add on these actuators
or embed so that they're
dynamic and they're moving
and they're tunable
and controllable,
and we can mimic disease.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
So it's not the same as
printing a static part.
People are printing spine
components, for example.
ELLEN ROCHE: Right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Turning
a little bit to some
of your personal questions,
so you grew up in Ireland.
What was it like
growing up there?
ELLEN ROCHE: Oh, it was great.
I was so lucky looking
back, you know?
I think when you're a kid,
you don't really appreciate it
and take things for granted.
But I grew up in
Galway close to a place
called Salthill, which
is right on the ocean
there and close to
Galway City and walking
distance from the university.
So it was really
an ideal location
to be close to all that.
And went to school, you
know, right beside the sea.
And I was thinking
about it recently
during secondary school, which
is like equivalent to high
school here.
We would actually go and swim
in the ocean on our lunch break
and come back.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, wow.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
We were in-- it was
like a Catholic school.
We had uniforms and everything.
They didn't really
want us doing it,
so we'd be putting on the
uniforms over our wet--
[LAUGHTER]
--after the swim, trying to
hide our hair dripping wet.
But it was great.
It was a beautiful place to
grow up and close to Connemara.
Like you mentioned, you
can drive 20 minutes
and you're in this very
different landscape.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
No, that's a beautiful area.
As I mentioned before
our conversation here,
we were on vacation
there and it was great.
You wound up in a
career far removed
probably from what your
childhood was like.
And what sort of experiences
set you on this path?
ELLEN ROCHE: My dad
is a civil engineer,
and my mom passed away,
but she was a radiographer
and in the medical field.
So I had both of those sides.
My sister is a doctor.
I considered medicine
for a long time,
but really didn't
want to give up
the analytical, mathematical
kind of side of it.
So I ended up studying
medicine for a while,
but really to enhance
my own research.
I think as well, Galway is a hub
for medical device companies.
So a lot of the larger
multinational medical device
companies set up in Galway
for their manufacturing.
And now their R&D is
really strong there.
So huge employer in Galway City.
And that influenced some of
the courses in the university.
So the biomedical
engineering degree,
it was a four-year degree
that was introduced just two
years before I was choosing
what I would study in undergrad.
And it was a great
combination for me,
coming from high school.
In Ireland, you decide
when you're 17 or 18
what you're going to
study straight away.
So I felt like that was
just a great combination,
and that allowed me
then to do an internship
in a company, which
ended up being the one I
worked with after graduation.
And yeah, it was just
a great mix of the two.
And you know, I think
the university there
and the research in that
area has really grown,
and there's a good interaction
between industry and academics
there.
So that allowed me to
have a stepping stone
into industry in the US and
eventually academia in the US
as well.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's great.
What do you think you'd be
doing then if you weren't
doing this kind of work?
Do you think you would
have gone into medicine?
ELLEN ROCHE: I
think probably, yes.
I really enjoyed it
when I studied it.
It's fascinating to learn
about all the various aspects
of medicine.
And I really enjoy
the part of my job
when I think about
designing devices
that can ultimately help
patients and improve
patient outcomes.
I think I can do that
in the job I'm in now.
But if it wasn't
this, I would probably
be doing it in medicine.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So what do
you like to do outside of work?
ELLEN ROCHE: Well,
at the moment I am
very busy with a young family.
So I have three daughters, and--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
ELLEN ROCHE: Yeah.
They're two, five, and seven.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
you have no free time.
ELLEN ROCHE: So I
don't really have
a whole lot of time
for myself, but I
enjoy bringing them
to their activities
and hanging out with them
and spending time with them.
They're great fun.
I have started to get back into
doing some triathlons that I
used to do when I was pre-kids.
[LAUGHS] So just
gradually getting back
into that, which has been fun.
I used to play traditional
music as well when
I was in school in Ireland.
Yeah, I haven't managed
to do that for a while,
but maybe soon.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Do you find
while you're triathloning
or while you're practicing
for your triathlon you're
sort of running scientific
ideas through your head?
ELLEN ROCHE: Oh, yeah, totally.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Often, I think when
you're writing a proposal
or thinking about how
to frame something
and you're writing at your desk.
But if you go for a run
or a swim sometimes,
you can really clarify, oh,
this is how I want to frame it.
[LAUGHS]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You're
fit, so you don't have
to concentrate on breathing.
You can actually think
about other things.
ELLEN ROCHE: Right
now, I do [LAUGHS] have
to concentrate on breathing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Anything you really
want listeners to take
away from your experience?
In other words, if you were
advising current students
how to think about
their futures,
what sort of words of
wisdom might you impart?
ELLEN ROCHE: I
often get questions
from students who are
kind of considering
whether to go an industry
or academic route,
and maybe decide between medical
device engineering or medicine.
And I think my journey
wasn't linear, really.
I went from
undergrad to industry
in Ireland, then the US,
and then back to Ireland,
and then a PhD much later.
It was like five years
of industry in between.
And then I studied
medicine for a while,
and I did my PhD and then
a postdoc back in Ireland,
and then here.
So I think it's OK
to take opportunities
as they come up as
long as you're really
passionate about what you do.
And sometimes you go
one route, and it helps
you to get to another one.
And it's not like it's one
way and there's no return.
There's really great
ways now, I think,
to combine some aspects
of industry and academia.
Whether your primary appointment
is in an academic institution
or in industry, you can
really collaborate a lot.
And there's loads of jobs
at that intersection too.
And the same with different
fields of research,
mechanical engineering versus
kind of bioengineering.
I really enjoy being at
the intersection of both.
So I think it's very daunting
deciding which path to take,
but I think there are
always ways to figure out
and to craft your own niche.
And often, it's at the
intersection of many worlds.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
I mean, I think some of
the multidisciplinary work
that you've described in a
way required your nonlinear
journey.
ELLEN ROCHE: Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You
know, I think your point
about following your passions
is really important because I
think when people do something,
take a step because they think
it's going to be good for
them or they think it's going
to help their future
work, you just
don't know where
things are going to go.
ELLEN ROCHE: Exactly.
Yeah.
I mean, I would
never have guessed
when I was in California
that it would help me
in a job as a professor at MIT.
No way, you know?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah, exactly.
Exactly.
ELLEN ROCHE: But it
really has helped a lot.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
Well, I've really
enjoyed our conversation.
ELLEN ROCHE: Me too.
Thank you.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
To our audience,
I'd love to hear what you
think of these podcasts, what
you'd like to hear next.
Send your suggestions to
podcast@mit.edu or message @MIT
on any social media platform.
I look forward to
hearing from you.
And thank you all
again for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 5: Beyond words
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bp9e7pVTshw

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello.
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
President of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome
you to this MIT Community
Podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
Since I arrived at MIT,
I've been particularly
inspired by talking with
members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure
or who recently arrived here
at MIT.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they are pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and
their brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, my guest
is Joshua Bennett.
Joshua is a Professor
of Literature
and Distinguished Chair
of the Humanities at MIT.
He's also an accomplished
author and performer
who brings his poetry alive both
for his students and for those
who've experienced
his performances.
Joshua, I'm excited
to talk to you today.
Thank you for being here.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Of course.
Thanks for having me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You
wear multiple hats here.
You're a professor, you're an
artist, you're a performer.
Do you identify with one of
those more than the others?
JOSHUA BENNETT: It's
a great question.
I mean, the professor part
is the most recent addition
to my coterie of hats.
I love that image, that's great.
But I've been an
artist my entire life.
My mother still has a shoe
box full of my poems from when
I was four and five years old
under her bed in her new home
in Cortlandt Manor, New York.
And when I was a little
boy, my whole family
would gather around
me after church,
I would improvise these
sermons for 30 to 40 minutes,
and they would do the
whole thing, the whole sort
of congregational performance.
They would say "amen" and
clap and it was incredible.
And I knew from that
stage that I had a voice
and I had a critical viewpoint,
and that I could step out
in the world and perform
and still come out
on the other end alive, which
is a pretty incredible lesson
for a four-year-old.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
what kind of things
were you opining on
as a four-year-old?
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh, I mean,
Jonah was my favorite,
I think, figure from
the biblical tradition.
And I always loved
whales and animals.
I mean, my dissertation
was on animals,
and I realize now that bright
line has always been there.
So Jonah was a big one for me.
Sampson was big.
And then Joshua, my namesake--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: There you go.
JOSHUA BENNETT: --that music
could break down walls.
I thought it was
pretty incredible.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: There you go.
I always used to laugh
at my own children
doing very complicated skits.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Together?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Together, yeah.
Or with their friends.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Wow.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So same
idea, you manifest your traits
very early on.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
Sure, sure, sure.
And, I mean, my big
sister taught me to read
and she did that
through a dramatization.
So my grandmother
was a cosmetologist,
and so my sister would
take wigs from her salon
and have the wigs and the
costumes and the whole thing,
and that's how I
entered literature,
it was through performance.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's fantastic.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
That's always been a big part
of my life, the artistry.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Looking at your website,
your CV, your many,
many accomplishments,
what does success
feel like for you?
Do you feel like
you're successful now?
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh, Wow.
That's quite the
second question.
Let me mull that
over for a second.
Do I feel successful?
I feel like I've achieved
most of what I set out
to achieve
professionally, actually,
which is incredible feeling.
I just turned 35
over the weekend.
But honestly, I think I
measure success differently now
as a father and as
a community member.
I first came to MIT eight years
ago as a SHASS Predoctoral
Fellow, and I sort of
just fallen in love
with being here in
Massachusetts and I'm
trying to find new ways to
contribute to the community.
So I work with the South
Shore Conservatory,
which does creative arts
therapies with children,
particularly children
with disabilities.
I love teaching here at MIT.
My students, they keep me
on my toes and thinking
of inventive ways to
enter the classroom,
but yeah, I guess I'm
measuring success differently
these days in terms of how
do I impact the people I love
and the communities
that they're a part of.
My son is turning three, and I
think as soon as he was born,
I realized, oh yeah, he's part
of a world full of children
who have all sorts of
dreams for the future
that I have to help build.
And so I think maybe in this
next phase of my life, that's
really what I'm trying
to attend to the most,
is how to be successful
in that realm of things.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's really great.
If like that second
question, here's the one
that you'll really like.
Do you have failures that you're
proud of or that impacted you
or that changed your direction?
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh, 100%.
So the first time I got up
at an open mic in college
at the University
of Pennsylvania,
I completely forgot my poem.
I forgot the entire thing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Excellent.
JOSHUA BENNETT: I practiced
it 100 times in the mirror.
I got up-- I maybe remembered
the first two lines,
and then I think I improvised
maybe two or three more.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
You were rewriting
the poem in real-time.
JOSHUA BENNETT: I
just pretended that it
was a haiku the whole
time, and then I sat down.
And that taught me a great deal.
One, that maybe I
needed to actually
run the poems hundreds of times
in everyday situations, which
I have ever since.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
JOSHUA BENNETT: But it also
taught me a related lesson.
As to that lesson in the
dining room when I was little,
which was that I
didn't spontaneously
combust when I forgot the poem.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
JOSHUA BENNETT: I wasn't only
as good as my best performance.
And so in that way,
that failure taught me
that, OK, this is a part of my
life, but it's not everything.
And I don't have to measure
my human value, I guess,
against how good a
particular performance goes.
And so I perform at the White
House about two years later
and I'm glad I had that
lesson before I got there.
So yeah, that was an instructor
failure for me for sure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
Actually, speaking of that, that
was "Tamara's Opus," correct?
When you performed
at the White House?
And I did wonder,
watching it, how
you remember all of your
poetry and it does sound
like you just go through it
and through it and through it.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
And what I tell
my students who I
teach performance is
that if you can't do it
in an everyday situation,
you shouldn't necessarily
bring it on stage.
So if I can't recite a poem
while I'm making breakfast,
while I'm showering--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
JOSHUA BENNETT: --jog, then
I don't put it on stage.
And I think that's been a
really helpful lesson, thinking
about the habits of
your everyday life
and just bring the
poem into that.
And if you could do a poem
while you're doing a cartwheel,
you're good.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Once you learn it,
is it part of your
library in your mind?
Or do you have to--
if you're going
to perform the same
poem two years later,
is it still in there?
JOSHUA BENNETT: That's
a great question.
I mean, I've been on tour pretty
consistently now for 15 years.
And so there are old
poems that I'll sometimes
bring back into a show just
to see if I've still got it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
JOSHUA BENNETT: But even
those I run one or two times
before I get on stage
just because I think
the moment you're too
confident in it might
be the moment you lose it.
Maybe my parents
put that in my head.
I'll check in with them during
family therapy this weekend.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I like that.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah, I still
practice as much as I can.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So when you did
perform "Tamara's Opus," which
was a piece, as I understand
it, for your deaf sister
at the White House,
you used sign language
in a way that
punctuated the words
and really added to the
overall impact of the piece.
And you have a deaf
sister, and I understand
your father is a stutterer.
You've described
him as a quiet man.
So as a spoken
word artist, how do
these quiet, important
people in your life
actually impact your work?
JOSHUA BENNETT:
They've taught me
that there are many ways
into human language.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's interesting.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Both of my
parents are interpreters.
They started the deaf
ministry at our local church.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
JOSHUA BENNETT: My father
hosted a Bible study
at the US Postal Service for 40
years for both deaf and hearing
people.
And so I think my parents have
always taught me this idea
that there are many
ways to express oneself.
Sometimes it's
sign, sometimes it's
symbols on the written page,
and sometimes it's your voice.
And that voice can
be a quiet voice,
that voice can be
a booming voice,
but all of those voices
and modes of expression
are valuable.
I'm writing a children's
book at the moment
called The World is Full of
Beautiful, Quiet Things--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, nice.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
The whole premise
is that there are so many
quiet moments we take
for granted, maybe like a
handshake between friends,
like the grass between
our feet, the mountains.
The world is full
of quietness and it
deserves to be cherished.
So that was a major
childhood lesson for me,
that quietness is OK.
We can meditate in quiet,
we can learn in quiet,
we can read quietly, but when
it's time to sing or to shout,
we can let that out, too.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
So you're also doing
a children's book.
So you're multi-talented,
and I'm wondering,
do you also do visual arts?
Are you the artist of the
book or are you collaborating?
JOSHUA BENNETT: I'm working
with an Illustrator,
so it's coming out
with Little, Brown.
I'm also writing a
new nonfiction book
with Little, Brown which maybe
we can talk about a little
later.
But no.
I mean, I started with drawing.
So I drew and I was an actor
first and occasional preacher,
as you heard.
But the poetry came
a little bit later.
And I got away from drawing.
Maybe I should get back to it,
but my students here at MIT,
I think, would put me to shame.
They're quite talented visual
artists, I found, actually.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
There's some amazing,
amazing students here.
It's really amazing.
So talking about
creativity, what's
your opinion of
AI-assisted creativity?
People use-- or try to use
ChatGPT to write poetry,
they generate images that folks
use in performance visuals,
and I'm sure we'll see them
in publication, illustrations,
et cetera.
I'm just curious
what you think of it
and have you come in
contact with this at MIT?
Because there's so many people
that are specializing in AI.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Sure.
I mean, I've thought quite a bit
actually about AI and poetry,
in part because I've had
mentors reach out to me,
that have had folks
contact them and say,
oh, now I can write a poem
in your style in seconds.
And so I think there is this
understandable fear among some
of the artist
communities I'm a part
of that there will be a
citation without payment.
That the large
language models are
pulling from our poems on the
internet and our YouTube videos
in order to create these
poems and scripts and things
like that.
So I understand that fear.
But at the same time,
I do think that there's
a really radical potential,
actually, for human-centered AI
practice where we can think
about AI as an apprentice
and collaborator as
opposed to as an adversary.
So that's actually some of
what I'm writing about now,
is thinking about the
right to one's own voice
in the age of AI and
these historical issues.
Think about someone
like Bessie Smith
who had songs sold by Columbia
Records after her death
that she wasn't paid
for during her life.
And so in that case,
the argument made
was that her voice was
separate from her person,
and I think in the
age of AI, we need
to actually think about how a
voice is an inextricable part
of one's personhood.
So how do we negotiate
that together
and find ways to work with the
AI to just enhance our reach
and enhance our breath and
bring more people in rather
than thinking about it as
an instrument of exclusion.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
really interesting.
And as a side comment, your
remarks on what part of us
do we have ownership of make
me think of the recent lawsuits
and settled in favor of the
plaintiffs on HeLa cells.
Henrietta Lacks'
cells, in other words,
that are still being
used that were derived,
I believe, from a
cervical cancer line,
but they were her cells.
And that seems to me no
different from your voice,
your ideas, et cetera.
So that's really interesting.
Is this the nonfiction
work that you alluded to?
JOSHUA BENNETT: So
the nonfiction book
is called The Orbit
of our Dreaming,
and it's about prodigious gifts
and prodigies in the Black
expressive tradition.
So Aretha Franklin,
Stevie Wonder,
Phillis Wheatley from right
here in Massachusetts.
And I guess what
I've been trying
to think about is
on the one hand,
how these sort of Black
communal institutions
trained up students to
think about giftedness
in a very capacious way.
So promise wasn't just
a promissory note.
It wasn't just what you
could trade in on later
to get a good job, but
we all had gifts that
were worthy of celebration.
That could manifest in you being
a child preacher like Baldwin
or a stellar
vocalist like Aretha.
Or it could just
manifest in you being
really good in that church play
and everyone's sort of standing
up and clapping for you.
So I'm thinking about that.
And then the second major
argument of the book
is that there's a temporal
constraint on prodigy
that I think we
should let go of.
And there are artists
like Bill Traylor who--
it wasn't until the '80s
that he really started
committing to visual art
and then created 1,500
stellar works of art in a row.
And so I'm trying
to think about that.
How do we think about
prodigious gifts
across the course of one's life?
And maybe open it
up a bit to say,
well, there are prodigious
gifts all around us.
Maybe we should expand
our version of giftedness
so we can have a bigger
beloved community.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
And there are people who have an
inflection point in their lives
that may be gifted in one arena
and suddenly completely change
modalities.
JOSHUA BENNETT: That's right.
And that there's
this blurred line,
too, I think between
madness and virtuosity
or impairment and brilliance.
So I think, too, in the book
about artists on the autism
spectrum, and people
like Alonso Clemons
who can just see a photograph
and completely create
an anatomically
accurate sculpture.
And he's had that talent--
he's expressed it
since he was a toddler
and had a severe head injury.
So thinking, too,
about how tragedy
becomes a transcendent
beauty in ways that we
can track and learn from.
So that's a lot of the new book.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's interesting.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I
remember, actually,
when I was an
undergraduate at Williams,
the daughter of a faculty
member, who's now an adult,
she's probably close to my
age, named Jesse Park who
just was an exceptional artist.
She was autistic, and I'm just
still very taken by her art.
I've come upon it years
later and it's just--
the detail and the precision
that's part of the other
aspects of autism--
JOSHUA BENNETT: That's right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Is just remarkable.
JOSHUA BENNETT: It means
a great deal to me.
My younger brother is
on the autism spectrum.
So growing up, to answer
this question of language
once again, and really
seeing Levi's gifts
manifest in all
these different ways.
So in the beginning,
it wasn't speech,
it was drums and his knowledge--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, interesting.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
--memorizing the credits
at the end of television shows.
It just forces you to really
reckon with both the opacity
and breadth of the human
mind, and to be patient.
It changes the way
you think about time.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
That's very--
JOSHUA BENNETT: --not talking
now, but maybe he will later,
and maybe we don't see
his strengths here,
but we see it over here.
We just have to
look a lot closer.
So that's a lot of
what the book is about,
what would it mean to be
more patient with ourselves
and with our precious children
in order to create a world
that has more room for
all of us to thrive.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
So how does that
impact your teaching
in the classroom
and how you sort of treat
your individual students?
Because presumably
in your area, there's
obviously a lot more room
for individual creativity--
JOSHUA BENNETT: That's right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: --in the
classroom than there might be
in--
especially at the
introductory level,
in an area where
students really are just
learning the principles
learning the facts.
Later they may be able to
riff variations on the theme,
but I would assume from
the very beginning you're
seeing all sorts
of manifestations
of creativity in your students.
JOSHUA BENNETT: oh, sure.
So any student who's ever
taken a college class with me
has written poetry
because I set aside
about five to seven
minutes at the beginning
of each session for us to
write from a shared prompt.
You don't have to share it out.
It's not graded.
But you spend time,
I don't know, away
from the velocity of
everyday campus life
and you just have to
sit with your thoughts.
And you write from the
perspective of a number 2
pencil or a rain
cloud or a rhinoceros.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Perfect.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
--you find yourself
in that imaginative space.
And so that's one way.
But also, I think,
during office hours,
I've really been taken aback
by how many of my students
should have confessed
to being an artist
and talk about this real
tension that they feel
between the job that will pay
the bills that they're well
set up for here at MIT and
these often prodigious gifts--
I mean, these incredible talents
that they have in other arenas
and how they negotiate that.
And that's been a question,
I think, of my own life--
not in quite the same way,
but my mother, I think,
always reassured me that--
sorry, you're taking me
back to this one moment.
I was up for this job that I
didn't get, and my mom said,
don't worry about it, honey.
You can always come back home
and work at the post office
with us.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh my God.
JOSHUA BENNETT: And I
think about that a lot.
In part because she pushed me
so hard in school my whole life,
and I thought, well mom,
if I could have came back
to the post office,
why did I do all this?
But on the other
hand, it was that--
it wasn't about a dominant
vision of excellence.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
JOSHUA BENNETT: She just
thought I liked school a lot.
So she said, OK,
well, we're going
to send you to the best
schools you get into
and you're going to work
really hard because that
has its own merits, but it
wasn't about social cachet.
It wasn't about elite status.
It was about her son
pursuing his gifts
and living a certain
kind of life.
And so I think with my
individual students,
I've tried to just share
that lesson with them.
It's like, you're not reducible
to your grades or the job
you get after MIT.
We're here to explore, I think.
That's why I'm here.
This is why I'm not
doing something else.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I mean, that's
a really important lesson
for all of our students, because
obviously, getting into MIT,
many of them have been climbing
and climbing and climbing
their whole lives.
And they get here,
and we want them
to grow personally
and intellectually
and to really reap all the
benefits of being an MIT
student without always
feeling like you've got
to keep your eye on the prize.
JOSHUA BENNETT: That's right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And so I
think it's an important lesson.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: One of the
courses you teach here at MIT
is called Reading Poetry--
Social Poetics.
And I also know that you're
involved in this new African
Diaspora Studies program.
And I'm wondering
what social function
you think about poetry
serving for African Americans,
both historically and now.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Ah.
You asked this question
at the perfect time.
So with my colleague at
Harvard, Jesse McCarthy,
we added a book series
for Penguin Classics
called Minor Notes.
And essentially what
we're doing is going back
in time to dig in the crates
and find minor poets--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
very interesting.
JOSHUA BENNETT: --tradition.
And that's part
and parcel of what
I want to bring here to MIT.
I think we have such incredibly
talented students, faculty,
and staff here, and I'm trying
to just reach back into history
and say, well, what are
these voices we can recover
who haven't been held up?
Who, besides Dunbar, Langston
Hughes, Gwendolyn Brooks--
we know some of their names,
but what about George Moses
Horton, Angelina Weld Grimke?
These poets we're
coming back to now
and finding that they
had incredible work
and incredible stories.
I mean, George Moses
Horton was enslaved.
He was on the campus of
the University of North
Carolina at Chapel
Hill, and he composed
these poems in his head.
He never wrote down anything.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
JOSHUA BENNETT: And he
would just stand out there--
and we're talking about
spoken word, right?
He was out there proclaiming
these poems every day.
And they eventually got
written down into collections,
including a book titled Naked
Genius, which I think about--
I mean, in the 19th
century, Naked Genius
as the title of a book written
by an enslaved Black person
in America.
And so part of what's
been on my mind
here in both teaching
Reading Poetry--
Social Poetics, but also
thinking about the African
Diaspora Studies program here
that we're trying to build
is how can we look to history
to shape our vision of a more
capacious future?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
JOSHUA BENNETT: What sort of
moral, ethical, and practical
lessons do we gain
from folks like Horton,
folks like Angelina Weld
Grimke, a queer Black woman who
was also a high school
teacher and a very invested
in her students and
wrote a beautiful poem
for Dunbar High
School, which was
a remarkable educational
institution in Black History?
That's really what
I'm trying to get
at every week in the classroom
because my students are
brilliant, but many
of them have not
had African-American
history at any point
in their careers as high school
students before they get here.
Many of them don't know
the Black national anthem,
"Lift Every Voice and Sing."
Whereas for me, I knew
that before I knew
the "Star-Spangled Banner."
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
I didn't know the
"Star-Spangled Banner"
until I was five or six years
old because I went to this
mostly Black independent school
in Harlem called The Modern
School.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Ah.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
And the woman who
founded it, Mildred Johnson,
her uncle and her father
had co-written "Lift Every
Voice and Sing" together.
So that's a gift I try
to share with my students
whenever I can.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Well, that's
OK because all the four
and five-year-olds
in this country
mangle all the words to
the song anyway, right?
JOSHUA BENNETT:
That's exactly right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: But no,
that's really interesting.
So-- I mean, you talk about--
thinking back to your poems
in the shoebox,
et cetera, do you
have any recollection
of either why
you were interested
in poetry or, really,
as you were getting older, how
you continued to develop that?
Because that's not the pastime
of your typical 10-year-old
boy.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
Yeah, fair enough.
I think I was always trying
to find language to express
the world that was in my head.
I think that's part of the
reason people turn to poetry
now.
So I would turn to poetry
when people get married,
when people die, and
when children are born.
It's because there are
words beyond the words
we have readily available to
us that we nonetheless need.
And I had that sense as a
very young person, part of it
was I grew up around poetry.
I grew up around
Motown and gospel.
And these preachers who
just were 50 tall to me,
and they would talk in
these just beautiful tones
about the grass and
the trees clapping
their hands and the
mountains, and the idea
that the infinite was out there
and that it spoke back to us.
I mean, I was riveted
by this even as a four
or five-year-old.
And my dad, who was quite
quiet, was a deacon.
But he wasn't quiet
when he would pray.
And so even seeing that modal
shift was very interesting.
My dad would pray,
people would cry.
They would come up to him after
church and say, Deacon Bennett,
that prayer really moved me.
And that took me aback.
I said, this guy barely talks.
We're at home, quiet
Southern man from Alabama,
but there's something that comes
upon him when he has to enter
this other rhetorical form.
And I think I just
thought, well,
I want something like that.
If words can do that, if
they can do what preachers do
and what my father does
and what my big sister does
when she sings in
the alto section,
then I have to pursue that.
And I think that just stuck
to me for my whole life.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's interesting,
in listening to and
actually watching
your performance, the
distinction between reading
poetry on the page
versus hearing it, to me,
is pretty stark.
I think that the oral
performance really
brings poetry to life.
And do you write
differently when
you think about your
writing for performance
as opposed to something
that you think
will primarily be
on the written page?
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh, for sure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Or do
you have that-- yeah.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh, I do, yeah.
I mean, I think of them
as different technologies
in a way theoretically.
And also, just my
process is so different.
It feels like different
parts of my brain,
I leave different space
for play on the page.
And in performance, because in
performance, you can't see it.
You can't see the words.
And so I often
switch the words out.
So if you see a printed
copy of any of my poems
that I pull out in
my spoken word shows,
it'll look different
from what you're probably
going to hear on stage
because I'll often improvise.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
JOSHUA BENNETT: I'll change
two whole lines, maybe,
even given the day, given what's
worked earlier in the show.
I try to treat it like
this dynamic entity
because more fun that way.
You do poetry like
this for 15 years,
you gotta find space, I
think, to riff a little bit
and to improvise.
It's more fun.
And on the page, you're
having a private experience
that you're describing.
You hear it differently
in your mind.
And so I'm trying to bury
different Easter eggs there
for people to track
down and follow.
And the form is different often.
The words are
usually a bit longer.
I think I'm a bit less
polysyllabic on the stage
just because it's not as much
fun, that it takes longer.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
You've already told us
all these things you're
doing professionally, your
service to the community,
you've got your family.
I hate to ask what you
do in your free time
because you may not have
any free time, but--
JOSHUA BENNETT: It's
running out quickly.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
I was going to say,
do you have-- do you have
hobbies our listeners should
know about?
JOSHUA BENNETT:
Yeah, sure, sure.
I still love to run.
I have a colleague now, Tevin,
who's a professional basketball
player in Italy and
we hoop once a week,
which has been a lot of fun.
Yeah, he just comes out
to suburban Massachusetts
and we play basketball for an
hour and a half every week,
which is a lot of fun.
Honestly, catching
up with my sister
and just talking about what
we're dreaming about at a given
moment, what we're working on.
We've had that practice for
as long as I can remember.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's lovely.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
Since-- yeah, she
was translating my
toddler Esperanto back
when I was young.
Ever since then, we've had
that practice, so that's good.
Play Madden.
Video games are
very calming for me.
And hang out with my wife Pam
and watch Love Island, too.
That's a lot of fun, too.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Perfect.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
Those are my practices
outside of work.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So I hate
to put you on the spot,
but I'm wondering--
I'm sure that our
listeners would
love to hear just a
few lines of something
you're working on now.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh, sure, sure.
I can pull something out.
Let me see.
I can read you one of the
poems from my most recent book
of poetry, which was all
about becoming a dad.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, fantastic.
JOSHUA BENNETT: And how-- and he
asked me what I was working on.
I was not working on
anything for about--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Sleep
deprivation you're working on.
JOSHUA BENNETT: You know it.
Six months in a row.
And yeah, this should take
about a minute, if that's OK.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Perfect.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Yeah.
So this is "Dad Poem--
The New Temporality."
No poems, not even one, since
the minute you were born.
Now I live the thing that was
the writing more intensely
alongside you each day.
Hours blur and are
measured only in feedings.
Naps just quick
enough to not subtract
from your later dreaming.
Mom and I divide the
night into shifts.
Dance through the
fog of sleep deficits
doctors say we won't feel the
weight of until winter time.
So what?
Our home glows like
a field of rushes.
Moonlight ensnared in
their flaxen heads.
Most early mornings
with you are mine.
We play the elevator game
and improvise lyrics,
rhyming August with
raucous, florist, flawless.
As I write this, you
rest in a graphite,
gray carrier on my chest.
Your thinking
adorned with language
that obeys no order my
calcified mind can express.
Tomorrow, I will do the thing
where I make my voice sound
like a trombone, and
I hope you like it
as much as you did today.
There is no sorrow
I can easily recall.
I have consecrated my life.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that is wonderful.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Thank you.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That
gives lovely insight
into the kind of work
you do and translating
your emotional experience
into something that the reader
or audience can see.
It's wonderful.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Thank you.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I've really
enjoyed this conversation
hugely, and I really am
grateful for your time,
and I'm looking forward to
seeing your spoken word--
work going forward.
JOSHUA BENNETT: Oh,
thank you so much.
I appreciate that a ton.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Fantastic.
JOSHUA BENNETT:
This was awesome.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
And to our audience,
I'd love to hear what you
think of these podcasts
and what you'd
like to hear next.
Please send any
suggestions you have
to podcasts@mit.edu or message
@MIT on any social media
platforms.
I look forward to
hearing from all of you.
And thank you all
again for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.
[MUSIC PLAYING]

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 4: Build your own superpower, then share it with the world
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SKOZSHATYo

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello.
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
president of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome
you to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
In my first few
months at MIT, I've
been particularly
inspired by talking
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they are pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity,
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, my guest is Fadel
Adib, associate professor
in the MIT Media Lab
and in the Department
of Electrical Engineering
and Computer Science.
As you'll hear, Fadel is
passionate about creating
wireless and sensor
technologies that
connect the world in new ways
with potentially powerful
impact on a wide range of
questions from climate change
to food security to
space exploration.
Fadel has an incredible
journey that's
taken him from
Lebanon to MIT, where
his work as a graduate student
led to his first startup
and where he's now been an
associate professor since 2017.
Fadel, welcome to the podcast.
FADEL ADIB: Thank you
very much for having me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I'm going
to get started by having
you briefly describe your work.
But I know you've done
many interviews before.
So this time, I wonder
if you could describe it
as if you were trying
to inspire sort
of future scientists,
those young teenagers who
are thinking about
what they want
to do, to get excited
about what might
be possible in the future.
FADEL ADIB: Absolutely.
I like to start by asking them
a question, which is, what
superpower do you want to have?
Or what superhero do
you wish you could be?
For example, different people
answer in different ways.
If someone says, oh, I want
to be like Superman because he
can see through walls, then
I answer, well, actually we
build this technology that
can give you x-ray vision.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
[LAUGHS] That's great.
FADEL ADIB: On the other hand,
many of the teenagers today
are very societally
minded or climate minded.
So they might say,
oh, my superpower
is that I want to be able
to solve climate change.
And if that is what they
answer, then I tell them,
well, we have a
solution for that
as well because we're building
these new technologies
for the ocean that
would allow you
to address some of the
biggest problems that
are facing climate change.
And the reason I like
to ask these questions
and answer them in
this way is this
is also what inspired
me personally
in order to become a scientist.
What I wanted to do is
I wanted to do things
that are impossible, to
make sci-fi a reality but,
at the same time, to build
new technologies that help
us solve real-world problems.
And so by asking
these questions,
I'm channeling my own
motivation to them,
and pitching it in a way that
I know that we can connect on,
and showing them how
science and technology is
an amazing pathway to
solve real-world problems.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I love that
because there's a lot of things
that we see in the movies, we
see on television that are not
yet quite reality, that
people think are just
part of the way things work.
So for example, you'll watch
a law enforcement program
as if they can see every
motion of every individual
inside a building.
But from what I
understand of your work,
that is pretty close to reality.
FADEL ADIB: That is true.
But that's because the
research that we've done at MIT
made it close to reality.
What's interesting
is when we started
working on this research
on seeing through walls,
people were like,
oh, can you use
infrared to see through walls?
And the answer is like, no,
unless you're in a movie
or in some cartoon.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah, exactly.
FADEL ADIB: In
reality, you actually
need to use radio
signals, or RF signals,
to see through walls because
they can go through walls,
which is why, for example, you
can get Wi-Fi from another room
but not infrared.
But also what is
interesting is that a lot
of the research
that we do sometimes
is inspired by sci-fi.
I remember once watching,
I think, maybe a James Bond
movie, and they showed
that they can communicate
from underwater to the air.
And I realized, wait,
I know that is not
something that is possible.
And that led us to
thinking about how
we can build
technologies that enable
direct underwater-to-air
communication, which
has been an open
problem for a long time.
And other times, they're like
documentaries, for example,
like Blue Planet.
I was watching Blue Planet.
And I realized, oh my
God, most of the ocean
has not been
explored, and that's
why scientists haven't
discovered even most
marine animals and
hence most probably
organisms that are
on this planet.
And how can we
build technologies
to help in these discoveries?
So what's fascinating is that
science and technology inspires
sci-fi, but in turn,
that also re-inspires--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
FADEL ADIB: --science.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
FADEL ADIB: And it keeps going
in a nice reinforcing loop.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I
actually have a friend
who's always posing these
superpower questions.
But he always puts practical
constraints on them.
In other words, you
could fly but only
at four miles an hour--
[LAUGHTER]
--et cetera, so it's a little
different from science fiction.
But I like the notion
that, when you come up
with practical solutions,
there will always
be some constraints that you
have to take into account.
What really surprised you about
your work when you were first
getting started?
In other words, thinking
back to as you first
started to get things
moving, did things
proceed as you anticipated?
What were the kind of surprising
things that came up or came
around the corner?
FADEL ADIB: As a
scientist, we also operate
between the technology, and
science, m invention realm.
This is the type
of work that I do.
And you're surprised
when something
works for the first time.
I remember, for example,
when we were doing the work
on seeing through walls, the
first time I got it to work,
it was in lab after midnight.
I was the only one who
was running experiments,
so I was running an
experiment with a robot
on the other side of a door.
And it worked.
And I remember emailing my
advisor, I think, at 12:30 AM.
And I was like, we
can see through walls.
OK, not exactly
walls and not exactly
see, but we can track
this Roomba that is moving
on the other side of a door.
But we've just discovered
that we can do that.
But I think there's
also sometimes
other things that
happen almost by chance.
I remember before
one of the deadlines,
we originally thought
we could see people
moving because of mobility.
You can detect them or track
them because they are moving.
So we thought that we
need to walk around.
And we had a paper deadline.
And I asked my
collaborator at the time
to stay still so that I can
start the system and then so
that I can start tracking him.
And I realized that, even
though I started the system,
I could see him.
I could locate him
using our system.
And I was like, why am
I able to locate you?
There must be something wrong.
And as we dug deeper
into it, I realized
that he was appearing and
disappearing, appearing
and disappearing in these
images that we were creating.
And then I realized
it's actually
associated with his breathing.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, fantastic.
FADEL ADIB: So it
turned out that,
by digging in and trying to
understand what the problem is,
we discovered that you can
actually not only detect people
based on their breathing.
But you can even
monitor their breathing
using wireless signals on
the other side of the wall.
And that led us
then, afterwards, we
realized you can even
detect their heartbeats
using wireless signals.
And sometimes you
discover something,
and you're trying
to understand why.
So this is happening,
and then we
started looking into
the medical literature.
And we're not
medical researchers.
And we realized, actually, it's
related to this concept called
ballistocardiography, which
is that, when your heart pumps
blood, it creates a force that
acts on different body parts.
And it causes them to vibrate.
And these vibrations
are so tiny.
But we had refined our
hardware and algorithms
to be able to detect--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
So you can actually
detect anxiety through walls.
FADEL ADIB: So we
actually demonstrated
that you can discover
human emotions
by relying on wireless signals,
not all types of emotions.
But at MIT, there's
this new field
that came out that is called
affective computing, which
uses vital signs to
discover human emotions.
And we created bridges between
that and what we were doing.
And we showed that
you can build a device
to discover different
human emotions.
And interestingly, that became
the plot of a whole episode
of The Big Bang Theory--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
[LAUGHS] Fantastic
FADEL ADIB: --an
American sitcom.
And then, again, this goes
back to how science, again,
inspires popular culture.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yes, absolutely.
You talked a little bit here
about sensing human beings,
extending that to
physiological sensing.
But your sensing work goes
in many directions-- oceans,
health care, robot
sensing and manipulation.
Is there an area
of your work where
you think, at least
in the short term,
you might have the
biggest impact?
FADEL ADIB: On one
hand, I would say
our health work has
already had impact
because we started a company.
It's deployed in thousands
of homes and hospitals
to monitor patients
continuously,
to help in discovering
new diseases, and so on.
But currently, what I'm
very excited about is
the work in the ocean
because it can really
transform so many things.
More than 95% of
the ocean has never
been explored or observed.
This has significant
implications
for climate change, which
is why, for example, we only
hear about the big problems,
like an iceberg broke
off and left in the ocean.
Why?
Because it's very
difficult for us
to do long-term
underwater observations.
And the reason is more than 95%
of the ocean is hidden from us,
so we don't know in what way
climate change is impacting it.
But there's other
applications why
enabling large scale underwater
sensing is important.
For example, food
production-- according
to the United Nations, the
world's fastest-growing food
sector is aquaculture, which
is the production of seafood.
And over there,
it's very important
to be able to monitor
these aquafarms,
protect them against
environmental hazards,
detect diseases early.
And there is no easy
solutions to do that today.
And there is, of course,
other applications
in robotics, disaster response.
One other area I'm super excited
about is space exploration.
A NASA scientist, for example,
discovered subsurface oceans
in Saturn's moon Enceladus
and Jupiter's moon Europa.
Over there, it's even more
difficult to do sensing.
And so we're starting to work
with them on incorporating
our technologies as part
of future space missions
so that we can
search for alien life
and extraterrestrial oceans.
The reason why I
love this is it truly
changes how we're going to be
doing sensing and monitoring
of the underwater
world, on one hand.
So there's amazing
elegant technology,
but it could also
have a lot of impact
from climate to
food production to
extraterrestrial exploration.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Back
to the oceans a minute,
do you see this as part
of early warning systems?
FADEL ADIB: Absolutely.
Absolutely.
It could be early warning
systems for weather
and disaster response.
For example, with sea
levels, you have a hurricane.
But it could also be
early warning system
for like a harmful
algae bloom that
happens in an aqua farm,
which could wipe out
tons of food that could--
like an entire season.
So you want to create
sustainable food sources,
and you want to create early
warning systems for that
so that you can safeguard them.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: In the
nonscientific realm,
are any of your discoveries
of utility for, for instance,
archeologists?
FADEL ADIB: Well, that's a
very interesting question.
The ocean stuff can
have applications there.
Underwater archeology
is a big open problem.
You can help search for
things, understand what
has been submerged over time.
We have not explored that yet.
Another area could be
somehow related to archeology
but also is, when you
have an earthquake
and people are
buried under rubble,
being able to use wireless
signals to detect life signs--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, interesting.
FADEL ADIB: --in a
cheap and accessible way
can help you save
people's lives.
But also it has
applications maybe in some
like underground archeology.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
So you can actually
see first responders
armed with mobile wireless
devices and detectors.
FADEL ADIB: And they could even
use the Wi-Fi that is already
in their phone--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, Wow.
FADEL ADIB: --because
that's what we showed.
We showed that you
could use Wi-Fi to doing
these types of detection.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's amazing.
Talk a little bit more
about climate change, maybe,
and how you see the
applications because,
obviously, that's an
existential threat
that we're trying to
mobilize all corners of MIT.
And I know that's true at
many other institutions
to address in as expeditious
a way as possible.
FADEL ADIB: Yeah.
I will start with
my journey with it.
So when I started
as a faculty, I
thought to myself,
what is an area that I
can try to address where it can
have a big impact on the world
and solve some of the
world's biggest problems?
And of course, climate change
has been around for a while.
But I started around 2016.
And around that
time, clearly there's
been even more momentum,
which is great because it
led me to think more about it.
And as I dug deeper
into it, I realized
that the part that plays the
largest role in the world's
climate is the ocean, and it
is also the part of our world
that has been most
impacted by climate.
Now, my mind as a
scientist and an engineer
started thinking, how
much have we measured?
What have we observed?
What have we not observed?
What are the big problems?
And for example,
there is many concerns
of like the temperature
rises by a certain amount,
and the CO2 that is
stored in the ocean
suddenly gets released.
This is not a linear effect.
It's not like we're
going to wait,
and suddenly, we can backtrack.
So this is a big
problem because it's not
like you're gradually
approaching a tipping point,
and then you reach it.
No.
What happens is you're
gradually approaching,
and then you're
going to accelerate.
And that becomes a big problem.
And I realized that
we've measured so little.
A lot of what scientists,
and climatologists,
and oceanographers are
concerned about in the ocean
are nonlinear impact.
And for nonlinear,
you can't use what
is called sparse sampling,
where you deploy samples--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Or
historical data to express--
FADEL ADIB: Or historical data.
You need real-time measurements.
You need them at high
spatial temporal resolutions.
And that led me to
start thinking about how
we can deploy sensors at scale.
And deploying sensors at
scale faces problems because,
how do you power them?
How do you make
them communicate?
How do you collect
the data from them?
And how do you use them
for continuous monitoring?
And I realized there is
no good solutions to that.
Now, I am not coming from the
background of an oceanographer.
I'm coming from the background
of using Wi-Fi to see through
walls or even some of the
health care applications.
So we started
thinking about how you
can build these sensors that use
wireless signals of some form
and allow them to
work in the ocean.
And it was a learning curve.
But that's the beauty of
being at a place like MIT.
People embrace the fact that
you're coming from one field
and going into another
field, and creating bridges
with this other
field, and trying
to solve the problems because
we're all in this together.
We're all trying to solve
the world's biggest problems.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
How you place something
in the deep ocean
and be able to generate
continuous power
so you don't lose strength of
signal over time, et cetera,
but there are a lot of
people around here working
on power generation,
and long-term battery
storage, and everything else.
So I'm sure there are many
interested collaborators.
FADEL ADIB: It ended up being
a much more interesting problem
even than we started.
We started with the goal of
deploying sensors at scale.
And then we realized one
of the biggest challenges
is, how do you reduce
the energy consumption
of underwater communications?
Turns out that's an
area that we know
and we understand from
the wireless networking
world and IoT because you
had to reduce the energy
consumption of
internet of things
devices or wireless devices so
that people don't need to keep
charging them the whole time.
But also then it
turns out that there's
problems in energy harvesting.
Well, how do you harvest energy?
For example, we're
starting to work
with some collaborators
on microbial fuel cells
so that they can harvest
energy from the ocean floor.
And then it turns out there's
problems in robotic navigation.
And then it turns out
there's problems of,
how do you now build
machine learning models
that can fit on these tiny
sensors that are very energy
and compute
constraints so that you
can do some inference
locally and then only send
the data that you need to send?
It ended up being a
much richer problem
space than when
we went in and one
that has potentially much
more areas of impact.
Of course, climate
is how we started.
And it's one of the
biggest drivers.
But food security, which is
also somehow related to climate,
is also a big problem.
And then there's the human
desire of exploration,
and this allows us
to touch as well.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I was actually
surprised by your comment
on the large, large, large
fraction of the ocean that
is unexplored.
We think about there not being
many places on Earth that still
have exploration potential.
So that's fascinating.
The other thing is the notion
of microbial fuel cells
as a source of powering
undersea exploration
is really fascinating.
FADEL ADIB: And to be honest,
we were thinking first
of harvesting energy, for
example, from sound underwater
because sound travels
over longer distances--
and that's how we were
doing it-- or maybe
even putting a small battery.
But then researchers
reached out to us,
and they were like we've been
building these microbial fuel
cells for a long time.
Maybe we can combine efforts.
But we're only able to generate
maybe up to 1 or 10 milliwatts
from them, and you cannot
communicate with this.
And I told them we only need
a few microwatts, so that's--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Exactly, so we're good.
FADEL ADIB: --more than enough.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's excellent.
Let me turn this a little bit
to some more personal comments.
You grew up in a very
poor area of Lebanon
and have said your
exposure to conflicts
there played a part
in the problems
that you tackle in your work.
Can you tell me a
little bit about that?
FADEL ADIB: Yeah, absolutely.
I grew up in Lebanon
after the civil war ended.
I remember-- it didn't make
sense to me at the time,
but I learned it afterwards.
People who are in the
generation of my parents,
they would tell us,
may God send you
good days or beautiful days.
It's a very spiritual
environment.
And the reason I did
not understand that
is because they witnessed
a lot of wars growing up.
And they saw what was a
beautiful country fall apart.
The unfortunate thing is I
grew up in a very nice time.
But then war started
happening again.
I remember, when I was taking
the baccalaureate exams,
which you take at the
end of your high school,
a battle started by
a terrorist group
literally one block
away from my apartment.
So we could see
them a block away,
and then we'd see
an explosion happen.
And it was supposed
to be a month where we
were studying for these exams.
And instead, we were sitting
in the middle of the house
and trying to study
or maybe stay alive.
I also witnessed
the war in 2006.
When you grew up in these
environments as a kid,
you go to sleep and wonder, am
I going to wake up tomorrow?
For me, one, it
taught me that, no
matter the conflicts that are
around you, if you persevere,
you can always make it out.
And so that is great
preparation for the world.
But it also makes you realize,
what are the big problems?
Why are these
problems happening?
And there's a number of them.
For us, for example, education
was always a big part.
There's this culture
of education.
And if you educate
people, then you
can steer them away
from terrorist groups.
And you can also give them
the resources that would
allow them to survive and grow.
But also food
security is a problem.
And that relates to
climate because, if you
have a bad season, then
these farmers who are out
there are not able
to make a living.
And if they cannot
make a living,
then they cannot send
their kids for education.
And that, again, starts
creating these cycles.
I grew up also in
a coastal city,
so we were always worried
about the sea level rise
or about changes in climate.
All of these things you
realize they're interconnected.
There is a political
aspect of everything.
But also you realize that, if
you can build solutions that
will have a long-term
impact, then you
can mitigate a lot
of these challenges,
whether it's climate
change, or food insecurity,
or lack of education
leads to these conflicts
further down the line.
And so you want to be able
to preempt them early on
and, ideally, also try to
stop them at a later stage.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah.
I think those are
really great points.
The global
interconnectedness, I think,
is particularly important
for us to think about
in climate change.
I was joking that, if we solve
climate change in Cambridge,
it's not going to get the
world very far, in other words,
just for Cambridge.
We can solve it in
Cambridge for the world.
And I think a lot of the impact
of climate change, if you will,
is inflicted on
less-privileged countries
by the wealthier
countries in the world.
I think we have a responsibility
to think about how we devise
solutions that really impact
everyone in all sectors
and in all corners of the world.
As we work locally on
climate change problems,
I think many people
don't appreciate
the reverberating
impacts globally.
And when we think
about solutions,
they have to be affordable.
They have to be scalable.
And they have to be
deployable in areas
of the world that don't have
the infrastructure that we
have here.
And if we want to affect
global climate change,
we have to be thinking
much more broadly.
FADEL ADIB: I will
add to that, actually.
For example, think about solar
energy harvesting or solar
as a source of electricity.
There's other reasons why
building solar is good
that people here
might not realize.
So in Lebanon, there's
a lot of corruption.
And what that leads
to is, for example,
my parents get electricity
maybe four hours
a day from the
central electricity
that comes from the government.
So for a long time, they used
to use gasoline motors, which
are bad for the environment.
But even those were
not able to keep up.
So my parents recently did--
and this is a trend
in Lebanon is they
installed solar cells
and solar batteries.
And now, they're powering
more than 18 hours a day,
their apartment, using the
solar powering technology.
And the reason
this is possible is
because of advances in
solar energy harvesting,
in battery storage, and so on.
And what that led is it also
led to this democratization
of the ability to
generate power.
So making things affordable
has this other aspect
of giving people more
control over their lives
and over their
destinies and making
them less dependent on
corrupt governments.
And when you do
that, then the people
have enough resources to live,
flourish, educate themselves.
And then that would lead
to better generations
of future politics
and governments.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
really interesting.
I think also the
democratization of technology
allows the innovation by
individual entrepreneurs.
In other words, we're actually
more effectively harnessing
the collective in that way
whereas, if innovation is only
in the hands of institutions
or groups of people that
have vast resources,
you're only going
to go in an individual
direction whereas, if you put
the ability to generate power
in a lot of individual hands,
how that's deployed,
how that might scale
is open to innovation by many.
FADEL ADIB: I agree to that,
and I think that also goes even
beyond climate.
For example, if you think about
politics, the Arab Spring 2011,
around 2011, people think
of it now as a failure.
But I think this is a
very shortsighted approach
to think about politics.
Where did the Arab Spring start?
It started in Tunisia.
And if you think about
it there, they also
used a lot of the tools
both there and in many
of the other countries.
They used a lot of the tools on
like peer-to-peer networking.
These are areas that
I'm familiar with.
I remember in Lebanon, when
there was a mini revolution,
people used these tools.
They were doing ad hoc networks
to do these communications.
And these are very
important tools
that made them much more
resilient to government
intervention.
So you're empowering the people.
And if you actually look
at it, the Arab Spring
started in Tunisia.
Tunisia now is a fairly
advanced democracy
if you look at
their constitution.
The reason it might
not have picked up
in some of the other
places is because they
tried to almost
reproduce the same thing.
But each of them is different.
But this does not say that,
in 20, 30, 40 years from now,
whatever happened 10 years
ago or 12 years ago is
going to have the repercussions
because what we also don't
realize is that the young
people who are growing up
and saw these tools,
they're empowered.
Their mind is different now.
And these things will come back.
So we should keep building
them and democratizing tools
because it we'll empower
people, hopefully,
towards more democracy
and towards the ability
to define their own
destinies and futures.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Actually,
coming back to our earlier
conversation about health
care, some of your tools
are also going to be
critical for democratization
of health care.
When we think about
monitoring for conditions
that might be picked up
in a routine physical,
if you were really visiting
doctors offices routinely,
that could really be detected
through continuous monitoring
by Wi-Fi signals.
And even in very poor countries,
as you know, many, many,
many people have phones.
FADEL ADIB: Absolutely.
And Wi-Fi is pervasive.
When you take something and put
it on a pervasive technology,
you democratize it.
When you do that, you can do, as
you said, long-term monitoring.
And you can also
detect diseases early.
And many diseases are
associated with changes
with mobility or vital signs.
You'd be able to bring those
technologies to people rather
than bringing people to a
high-end research centers--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
FADEL ADIB: --in order
for them to be tested.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
I've heard you speak about that.
Your grandmother was
widowed at a young age,
raised her children alone,
and instilled in all of them
sons and daughters the
importance of education.
Thinking about your role at
MIT, then, how do you view--
you're doing all
this innovative work.
How do you view your
responsibility as an educator?
Both to students
here, but also how
do we extend that beyond
the borders of MIT?
FADEL ADIB: That's
a great question.
Education is, of
course, a big thing.
And as I mentioned
before, in Lebanon,
we think of it as the
key to any success.
If you want to succeed--
in my family but also
there's this general belief
that education is power.
There are some things
that we can do locally.
There are things that we
can do locally to globally,
and there are other
things that we could
do at the individual level.
For example, speaking
about my grandma,
when my grandfather died-- that
was in the late 1950s or early
1960s--
her oldest child
was seven years old.
My mother was three.
And at that time, most
places in the world
but definitely in
the Middle East,
they would want to try to marry
off the kids very quickly,
especially the females.
And my grandma said,
nobody is getting married
until you at least get
a bachelor's degree
and preferably a doctorate.
And I remember, when
she passed away,
I remember looking around the
room and telling my family,
she was the matriarch
of the family.
She was such a big thing.
And I looked at
her CV, and I saw
12 bachelor's degrees, seven
doctorates, two MDs, two
professors, three MBAs.
She instilled that in all of us.
One of the other things that
I realized and also I realized
that after she passed away--
I saw this Facebook post.
There was this
school principal that
said that she just found out
that my grandma passed away
and that she will miss her.
And the reason is
that my grandma,
at the beginning of every year,
she would go to that school.
She would ask about a
list of female students
whose parents could
not afford the tuition.
And she would just
pay their tuition--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
FADEL ADIB: --so that they
could get the education.
And I only found out after
my grandma passed away.
The only hint I had-- and
that was not even a hint.
I figured it out in hindsight--
is a few times she asked
me to drive her to that school.
And I was like, what is
my grandma doing there?
And she would just not say.
So there are things
that you do locally
that is part of our culture.
And there is also things that
we do locally here at MIT.
So for example, I came
from Lebanon to MIT.
For me, that's a
huge opportunity.
I came right out
of my undergrad,
and I did my PhD here.
And it opened so
many doors for me.
So today, when I'm looking
at doing graduate admissions,
I'm looking at
people's trajectories,
not just what they've
achieved but what is
the slope of their achievement.
And so that's why
my group ended up
being super diverse with people
from all around the world,
sometimes almost from
countries that there's
very small number
of people at MIT,
because I'm looking at who
stood out in their environment.
And then maybe, if
we bring them here,
they will be able to shine in
ways that when they were not
given the resources
they couldn't.
But even when I'm looking
at admitting students
from within the US,
my group is also
very diverse in that
respect in the sense
that you're looking, again,
at people's trajectories.
How did they stand out
in their environments?
What we can do globally-- one
of the things that I like to do
is, for each project, we try to
create some form of video that
is public facing.
And the reason for
that is we're clearly
excited about this
for broader reasons.
Yes, the technology
and the science,
there's all of that
amazing curiosity.
But there is an important thing
in exposing the world to this.
And similar to how
writing papers takes time,
creating these broader
educational videos take time.
But then they also get
seen and shared a lot.
And while there is
many ways of expanding
the reach of education, for
me, I personally enjoy it.
And I also go and read
some of the comments
that people put there.
And it's interesting because
sometimes these comments
make us think about
problems in different ways.
And that feeds back
into our research.
It's like getting
community feedback,
but you're getting it
from the broader public.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
What's interesting--
I'm sitting here listening
to you and thinking,
you are so MIT.
Your comments about the
diversity of your group really
resonate with the notion
of potential over pedigree,
identifying those people who
really have potential that
have thrived in whatever
environment they're in
but, if you moved them to
this incredible environment,
they're going to do even more.
And then the notion of
how what we're doing here
that's really curiosity driven,
always keeping in mind how
that's going to impact
the larger world
and how we're going
to attract more
people to this
curiosity-driven mission.
You've had a fantastic
journey from Lebanon to MIT.
And I can sense that you're
super excited about the vistas
ahead.
Maybe give us one last
comment on something
you're really excited about
coming up down the road.
FADEL ADIB: I'll say two things.
When I came first to
MIT, I was thousands
of miles away from home,
but somehow I felt at home.
And I remember it almost
felt like this place
that I've been looking for a
long time and finally I found.
Of course, the challenge was
like my family was in Lebanon.
But you're sort of surrounded
by people who are so curious.
I remember my advisor.
I would go and tell her for
example, oh, we can't do this.
And she's like, why not?
This fearlessness of thinking
about the impossible for me
is amazing.
And being driven by
curiosity-- like this podcast
is Curiosity Unbounded.
We have intellectual
conversations
that are driven by curiosity.
I find this to be amazing.
And I think that's one of
the things that attracts also
students to my group, this
ability of doing the impossible
but also this fun
culture, where people
are coming from very
different backgrounds
and exchanging them.
One thing that I
really care about
is also that the technologies
that I'm building
see the light of day.
This is why, during my PhD,
I worked with my advisor
to launch our startup, which
is in the health care space.
This is why now I'm actually
on sabbatical, working
on a second startup that aims
to solve problems in the supply
chain sector and retail
sector with seeing
all of the inflation
happening, how do you cool this
down using technologies
and create resilient supply
chains, which we realized was
a big problem during COVID.
And I also love channeling
that into my group.
For example, MIT this has
the 100K entrepreneurship
competition.
My students who are
working on oceans
just participated
in it because they
want to commercialize
our research there
in food production.
And for example, they
want a runner-up prize.
As much as I love the curiosity,
it's very important for me
to see this impacting the world.
And I feel that,
in the beginning,
we have to be in the
driver's seat and push it.
So that's what excites me
now, and especially being
on sabbatical, and
working on a startup.
This is something
that I hope that we
can keep doing, being
inspired by curiosity
but then driving it to
action at the end of the day.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That was fantastic.
I enjoyed the conversation so
much and all of your insights.
So thank you for joining us
today on Curiosity Unbounded.
FADEL ADIB: Thank
you for having me.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
To our audience,
thank you for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 3: Decoding the tree of life
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ujgCZHxigw

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello, I'm
Sally Kornbluth, president
of MIT, and I'm
thrilled to welcome you
to this MIT community
podcast Curiosity Unbounded.
In my first few
months at MIT, I've
been particularly
inspired by talking
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues
in every field here,
they are pushing the
boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity,
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today my guest is Greg
Fournier, associate professor
of geobiology.
Greg's work centers on
the microbial world.
He and his team study
microbial evolution
to further our understanding of
the evolution of life on Earth.
Greg, I've been looking
forward to this.
Thanks so much for being here.
GREG FOURNIER: Well,
thank you for inviting me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I heard
that, as a child growing up
in rural Connecticut,
you liked to wander
in the woods with
your friends and would
come upon signs of life,
human life from years
earlier, barbed wire embedded
deep within a tree, crumbling
stone foundations.
And I understand that it was
these early discoveries that
helped fuel your interest in
the evolution of life itself.
So how did that interest lead
you to become a geobiologist?
GREG FOURNIER: Well, I think
when you have the opportunity
to really explore in the natural
world, especially a place that
doesn't have trails
or a guide, that when
you are 10 or 12 years
old, as far as you know,
you're the first person
to ever discover it.
And that leads you to genuine
exploration experiences.
And in a way, you always want
to get back to that feeling.
It's a bit different than
the adventures you can have
when there's already a trail,
or there's already a mountain
peak, or there's
already a list of things
you're supposed to see.
I think I've always been drawn
to that kind of exploration.
And the work we do looking
at the evolution of microbes
and genes and genomes
over billions of years
is not only new as a
discipline, but it's also still
a place where you
can really explore,
you can reconstruct the
histories of these large data
sets, and you can
discover something
that no one else has
really put together before.
And in a field that's as
old as evolutionary biology,
it's exciting to be able
to bring a new perspective
and still be part of
that kind of tradition.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah I
can imagine that, as a kid,
you don't have a sense of the
long, long history of time.
And when you come
upon things that
are completely different from
your day to day experience,
and you see no evidence
of immediate human touch,
you sort of have that
wonder of, wow, I'm
seeing something
that someone who
maybe lived 100 years ago
or 1,000 years ago has seen
and no one's seen it since.
And when you think
about evolutionary time,
it's even more abstract, right?
Like, it's something
that's happened eons ago
and you're like picking
up the fingerprints of it.
GREG FOURNIER: Yeah, I
think that's exactly right,
and it's something
that even when
you study this
for 20 years, it's
hard to wrap your head around,
just how much time we're
talking about.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
I've heard kids talk about--
they'll look at some
old book and say,
wow, this book must
be 10,000 years old,
not really understanding
what the actual history
of human time is.
Never mind the history
of microbial time.
It's really interesting
to think about that.
So I'm told you just
came back from a sort
of a geological road trip
to some incredible sites
out west including one
called Craters of the Moon.
What were sort of the
impressive and exciting things
you saw out there?
GREG FOURNIER: I had a chance to
do some driving around out west
a few weeks ago.
I went to a few
national parks and got
to see some really amazing
geology and geomorphology.
I had been to
Yellowstone before,
so I skipped that
one on this trip.
But that let me go to
some of these much less
frequently visited parks,
like Craters of the Moon.
It's one of the few places
in the United States
where you can just still see
lava fields and cinder cones
and this volcanic landscape.
And then, right
around the bend, there
will be just grasslands and
mountains and fields and deer,
some very ordinary things.
So the abrupt changes of the
landscape you see out there
were really amazing.
I was able to go to
a few other parks,
like Wind Cave, which
is in the southwest
corner of South Dakota.
And that has one
of the largest cave
networks in the United States.
But aside from that, it also
has a really great landscape
of hills and fields
and hiking trails.
And on one of the loop
hikes I was planning to do,
I went around a corner
and there was a bison.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Wow.
GREG FOURNIER: And it
wasn't going anywhere,
so I just had a chance to
have a nice staring contest
with a bison for
a while, and then
I decided to turn around
and go back the way I came,
which is always the
right thing to do.
But those kind of unplanned
experiences or encounters
were just great, and the
trip was full of them,
so it was really a
nice opportunity.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Do you
use your geologists mind
when you're doing
this sort of hiking?
You know, I might
go out and say,
that's kind of a
pretty rock, you know?
But I'm not thinking
about the origins,
and how things got there, and
what sort of seismic forces
might have led to the landscape.
And so do you reflect
on these things?
And how do you think
about some of the things
that you saw in that respect?
GREG FOURNIER: So
in some ways I do.
For me, especially
out west, it's
always interesting to
think about the fact
that this used to be at
the bottom of an ocean.
Coming back to Wind Cave, if
you go into the cave network
and you look on the
ceiling, you can
see little shells and fossils
of little sea creatures
just everywhere.
And that's all in the
limestone of the cave, which
has been dissolved
away over time, leaving
behind all of these structures.
And in some cases, you
can see the fossils
that were on the bottom of this
ocean during the Mesozoic era.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's really cool.
That's really cool.
I have to go visit there.
I've never been there.
GREG FOURNIER: Yeah,
you really are just
surrounded by direct evidence
that there's a continual set
of changes happening on Earth.
And this was not always
the top of a mountain.
This was not always a plain.
There were not
always bison here.
Intellectually, it's one
thing to understand that.
But to be 300 feet
underground in South Dakota
and say, oh, yeah,
that's a seashell,
is really an amazing experience.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
that's really interesting
because I think we tend to think
of the ground we're standing on
as a solid, immutable thing.
And obviously, over geological
time, that's not true.
It's really interesting
to reflect on that
and having really visual,
clear markers of change
we don't notice it
in our everyday life.
But the notion of
seeing seashells
on the ceiling of a cave
is a great illustration.
Some of your stories here
recounting your trips
and your interest in long
scales of time and evolution
bring me to ask how that
relates to your own work.
So when you look, for
instance, at microbe evolution,
how does that impact our
understanding of Earth's
history, of mass extinctions?
You know, what do we learn
from the science of microbes
and the history of genomes that
actually relates to the bigger
picture that we see?
GREG FOURNIER: Even in
talking about how ancient
all of these geological
features are,
they're all quite young compared
to the age of the Earth itself.
So whether we're talking about
the Rocky Mountains, which
are relatively young
in terms of mountains,
or the Inland Sea that used to
cover a lot of North America,
these are all Mesozoic.
And when we reconstruct
the evolutionary history
of microbes, we can
go far beyond that.
In fact, we probably
are reaching
earlier than there are any
rocks at all on the Earth.
So the very oldest
rocks, deposited
sedimentary rocks
on Earth are maybe
3.8, 3.9 billion years old.
The very oldest scraps
of material we have
are little crystal zircons
that are a little older
than 4 billion years old.
But we don't know when
life originated on Earth.
But it was very likely at
least as old as 3.8 billion.
And so when we reconstruct
the relationships of genomes
between all of the groups
on the tree of life,
we're actually
creating these threads
that are reaching back to
even before the oldest rocks.
So in a way--
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's so interesting.
GREG FOURNIER: Yeah.
Yeah.
And so in a way it's
the oldest record
we have of processes or
events on the early Earth.
And trying to figure out what
tiny scraps of information
might still be in
there and how we
can use that to understand the
history of life in the Earth
is, really, one of the
most important things
that I think we work on.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Tell me a little bit
about your sort of work studying
the Permian-Triassic mass
extinction.
I think people also have a real
trouble wrapping their minds
around the notion
of mass extinctions.
You know, aside from
the sort of movie hype.
How do you think about this
and what have you learned?
GREG FOURNIER: Moving
forward in time
from thinking about the
earliest origins of microbes,
all the way into the Phanerozoic
era, so the quote "modern era."
But still before the
dinosaurs, before the Mesozoic,
you had one of the largest
of the five mass extinctions
of complex life
in Earth history.
And that happened at
the end of the Permian
about 250 million years ago.
It was definitely by far
the largest catastrophe
that complex marine
and terrestrial life
has ever faced on Earth.
We've understood this from
the paleontological record
for some time.
And it's correlated with the
emergence of large igneous
provinces in Siberia,
huge lava fields that
cover thousands of square
miles that are associated
with the tectonic
events that likely
caused this mass extinction.
And also, we see evidence
in the fossil record
of the vast majority of
species just vanishing.
And the organisms that
do survive and diversify
in many cases are quite
different afterward.
And that's the beginning
of the Mesozoic era.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I guess I never
thought about tectonic changes
as instruments of
mass extinction.
In other words, in
the popular lore,
it's always a meteor
or something like that,
rather than sort of intrinsic
forces, volcanic activity,
et cetera.
So that's really interesting.
GREG FOURNIER: Yeah.
I think it's
especially interesting
when you realize just how
large these forces are.
Over tens of thousands
of years, when the Earth
releases a tremendous amount
of volcanic material in terms
of magma and gases, and
especially carbon dioxide,
what you see is a radical
change of the climate.
Processes that we
observe happening today,
like ocean acidification
for example,
were the main drivers of this
greatest mass extinction.
What our work was
trying to do is
examine the causes
in a different way
by looking at the evolutionary
history of microbes
that may have evolved in
response to these changes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So if I
extrapolate from that--
not to be doomsday,
but if we think
about on a much
longer time scale
the impact of climate change and
changing CO2 in the atmosphere,
et cetera, we could imagine
some of the gradual extinctions
we're seeing.
If you play that out
over much longer time,
it's like it was sped up
with these massive events.
Is that a correct way
to think about it?
And if the answer is
no, say no, and I'll
ask a different question.
GREG FOURNIER: I think,
interestingly, it
seems to be the opposite.
And the changes that
we're seeing now
are likely much faster.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Really?
OK, so this is really
interesting and scary.
GREG FOURNIER: It is scary.
And at the same time,
there's so much uncertainty
because we understand these
mass extinctions looking back
over millions of years at
the accumulated consequences.
But, during the
event itself, it's
very hard to say what those
future consequences are
going to look like.
We don't know how
much disruption
the climate or biogeochemical
cycles or food webs
can take before you
have, perhaps, run
away collapses that look
like a mass extinction.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
your comment that it's
faster is based on
some snapshot of time,
the time we've seen in
terms of species extinction,
versus what we can extrapolate
from the fossil record?
In other words, how do
you compare those rates?
GREG FOURNIER: It's
especially tricky
because the fossil
record is very sparse.
The sampling of organisms that
we see in the fossil record
is biased by what tends to
die in an environment that
is likely to be preserved.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
GREG FOURNIER: And organisms
that are the most sensitive to
extinction may already be ones
that have smaller population
sizes, so less
likely, statistically,
to be preserved in the record.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Oh, interesting.
GREG FOURNIER: But
what's concerning
is more about the rate of the
change in the carbon cycle.
So the increased rate
of CO2 production
through anthropogenic
processes is much faster
than the modeled increased
rate of CO2 production
during these mass
extinction events.
But still, it accumulates over
a very long period of time.
And we've only been really
doing this for 200 years.
That's where the
uncertainty comes in.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see.
That's really,
really interesting.
I've heard that you like to use
the local landscape to educate
your students on
environmental diversity.
Where does that take you
here in Massachusetts?
I hear there's a place
called purgatory chasm, which
I want to assure our
listeners is not at MIT.
Maybe you can tell me a
little bit about that.
GREG FOURNIER:
Purgatory chasm is
a rock formation in
Sutton, Massachusetts,
so about an hour
southwest of here.
And it is likely formed by
glacial meltwater, which
tore a hole through this
part of the landscape
and resulted in about this
mile long miniature cnayon
that you can hike
and explore in.
And you can still
see the scrape marks
of boulders that
were likely moved
by these glacial meltwaters, and
some rock formations that just
show you the force with which
these very recent processes
occurred that shaped our
landscape here in New England.
So it's just a really nearby
dramatic accessible example
of those kinds of processes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh very cool.
I'm definitely going to
have to go and take a look.
That sounds really interesting.
Are you seeing
artificial intelligence
as a tool in your work at all?
Does that impact any of the
things that you're doing now?
GREG FOURNIER: Interestingly,
it did for the very first time
only about a month ago.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
really, interesting.
Tell me about that.
GREG FOURNIER: One
of the projects
we've been working on for some
time is reconstructing the most
ancient evolutionary events
within protein families
that are conserved across
the entire tree of life.
And we're specifically
interested in these proteins
called aminoacyl
tRNA synthetases.
So these enzymes are responsible
for enforcing the genetic code.
These proteins are
found in every cell
across the whole tree of life
and two main groups of them
are related to each other.
But if they're
present in all life,
it means that they must have
diversified from one another
before the single
last common ancestral
lineage of all life on Earth.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's interesting.
GREG FOURNIER: So when we
reconstruct their relationships
we're actually reaching back to
before the last common ancestor
of all life on Earth to look
at the evolutionary events that
were likely directly
involved with establishing
the rules of evolution
as we understand them.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: When you say
that this divergence occurred
before sort of
life as we know it,
you're saying that they were
evolving in cellular life forms
that are no longer known to us.
GREG FOURNIER: In a way, yes.
So the way to think
about it is life evolves
by this branching
tree where species
give rise to other species
and then go extinct.
So if we work
backwards by looking
at living things that exist
today, we create this tree.
But we can only go as far
back as the common ancestor
of all of the groups that
survived until the present day.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: OK.
GREG FOURNIER: But we know
by comparing the similarities
of all of this diversity of life
that this last common ancestor
was already a
modern looking cell
that had all of the machinery
that modern cells have.
But that machinery
itself must have evolved
from even simpler states.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yes And presumably,
if you compare tRNA
synthases to other molecules,
other families,
you can see things
that also might have diverged
before common ancestors,
or that things that had
much later divergence
will give you
insight into the fact
that those organisms
must have existed.
GREG FOURNIER: Yes.
There are similarities between
very distantly related proteins
in terms of how their
secondary structures fold.
And we can see those
superclasses of protein
families being very diverse.
So that must have been
established at some time.
But the aminoacyl
tRNA synthetases,
if we trace back to
their common ancestor,
it was likely involved
in the same thing
that synthetases
are today, which
is making sure the correct
amino acid goes on to tRNA
so that the genetic
code can be translated
in a faithful manner.
The difficulty with recovering
this history is proteins,
in a way, are like
rocks, in that,
over billions of years, so many
processes and forces can change
them that they get altered.
And more recent
evolutionary events
can overprint and
replace older changes.
And over time, the
distance, the dissimilarity
between these proteins
becomes so great
that it becomes very
difficult to determine
what parts share a common
ancestry with what other parts.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I see,
because it may have been
overwritten many, many times.
GREG FOURNIER: Exactly, almost
certainly, in many cases.
This is a problem that
we call alignment.
And for more closely
related proteins
or proteins that
evolve very slowly,
it's more or less a
solved trivial problem.
But for highly
divergent proteins,
we have to use some
special tricks.
And one of those special
tricks is to compare structure
because the three dimensional
structure of the proteins
changes much more slowly than
their particular amino acid
sequence.
And these structures
are understood
by X-ray crystallography.
But the problem is not all
proteins can be crystallized.
And even for proteins that can--
for example, there are hundreds
of aminoacyl tRNA synthetase
proteins in protein
structure databases.
But if you look
at them, there are
regions of those proteins
that are not in the crystal
structure because they're
the floppy parts, usually
on the end of the protein,
that probably contain
a lot of information
but are so variable
and they don't crystallize well.
So usually, you just
cut those parts off.
And coming back to AI, we wanted
to extract as much information
as we could out of these protein
sequences so that we could get
a robust evolutionary
signal to align and generate
their deepest evolutionary
relationships.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I
see, interesting.
GREG FOURNIER: So If we can't
do it on sequence alone,
and we don't have the
crystal structures because
of those limitations,
it turns out
that there are
AI-based tools now
that will solve protein
three dimensional structures.
And so we applied
some of those tools
to these proteins that had
uncrystallizable regions,
and they gave us structures
that were conserved
across different versions
we tried, and allowed
us to detect and extract these
very divergent aligned sequence
regions.
And in one case,
one protein, it's
involved in loading
valine onto tRNA,
we discovered that there's
actually a duplication
in this protein region.
And that duplication
was confusing
all the alignment programs.
So in a way, we use AI to fill
a gap in our understanding
so that we could apply more
traditional established methods
to extracting as
much information
as we can from this very,
very ancient signal.
And it works fantastically.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's cool.
So basically you're using the
similarities in 3D structures
without having to go through
the step of crystallizing
the proteins.
And AI can essentially
extrapolate the 3D structure
and then make the comparison.
GREG FOURNIER: In
this case, yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I know
it's not that simple,
and we're not putting all
X-ray crystallographers out
of business, but that's
really interesting.
Coming back to sort of
an earlier thing that
occurred to me then,
when you look at,
let's say a protein family,
and you, as you said,
believe the common ancestor
is before sort of the cells
that we know of now,
I guess these proteins
are too complex to make
the claim that there would
have been independent origin.
Correct?
In other words, they had to have
come from a common ancestor.
GREG FOURNIER: Yes.
Even for relatively
small proteins.
So there are 20
different amino acids.
And so--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
the combinatorial--
GREG FOURNIER: Oh, it
explodes to the point
where, if you take the
average size protein,
the probability of two of
those arising by chance
is like 1 over the number
of subatomic particles
in the universe
squared by itself.
It's just-- it's
hyper astronomical.
There are no numbers.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Fair enough.
Fair enough.
I asked that as a naive question
or sounding naive question.
I kind of knew that but I
wanted to tease that out
for the audience because that
kind of question does come up,
particularly when people
are discussing evolution,
which sometimes can be hard to
think about on the long time
scales.
GREG FOURNIER: In a way
it is a trick question
because the reality
is evolution doesn't
need to find an exact
sequence to do something.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's exactly right.
You also, I think, when you
think about microbial evolution
and how things might move over
time, thinking about things
like horizontal gene transfer
and how microbes sort of pass
genetic information
back and forth,
maybe you can sort
of tell our listeners
a little bit about
what that is and how
that helps you
understand evolution
of the microbes around us.
GREG FOURNIER: Sure.
It's really important.
For the most part
complex life acquires
this genetic information
through parent cells
and then it passes
them on to progeny.
However, microbes
don't necessarily
need to rely on that.
They don't need to only rely
on mutations or changes that
were acquired by their direct
ancestors and passed on.
They can acquire
genetic material, DNA,
directly from the environment.
Sometimes this happens
through viruses.
Sometimes this happens just
through taking up pieces of DNA
as food.
And microbes are prokaryotes.
They don't have a nucleus.
So their DNA is
just floating around
in a tightly packed bag of
proteins and everything else.
So some of that DNA can
recombine into their genome.
And if it's not particularly
harmful, it won't be removed
and it won't kill the cell.
And if you're
especially lucky, it
may actually be expressed and
have a function that increases
fitness in the long run.
And it doesn't matter if this
is an incredibly rare event
because there are
a lot of microbes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
Right.
So you've been at
MIT for a while.
I understand that in
your academic career
you somehow kept
circling back to MIT.
And it may not have been
totally intentional,
but can you talk a little
bit about your experience
at MIT, the intellectual
community, how
that's influenced your work.
GREG FOURNIER: It
is true that I seem
to keep on ending up back here.
I was a technician for a few
years in a few different labs
right after undergrad.
And then I went
to graduate school
at the University
of Connecticut.
And then afterwards got the
NASA postdoctoral fellowship
and ended up being hosted by a
lab here in course one at MIT.
And then was fortunate enough
to get a position in the EAPS
Department.
I think one of the
best things about MIT,
and why it works so well for
the kind of work I want to do,
is people here,
first and foremost,
want to study
interesting problems
and come up with
interesting solutions.
And that matters a lot more
than discipline or department
or field or methodology
or approach.
And if you have an idea and you
reach out and talk to somebody,
they will likely be
excited about it.
And if they don't want to work
on it or can't work on it,
they will certainly help
you find someone that does.
And that kind of collaboration
and interdisciplinary
or cross-disciplinary
approach or vision
is, I think, fantastic for the
kind of work that I want to do.
And I also think it's
really good for students.
Because in the real world,
this is how things get done.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Every time I think
of some sort of interesting
question or something
that strikes me
while I'm here, and I
look to see if anybody
at MIT is doing
whatever it is, the answer
is pretty much always yes.
You can find somebody
who's working
on almost any area of
science and engineering
and that, with your example,
you could-- if I were in a lab,
I could reach out to
for help with a project
or to think about things,
it's really kind of amazing.
GREG FOURNIER: It really is.
And I think people
here really do care
about helping each other
do the best work they can
and about exploring things that
they really care about and are
excited about.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: If someone's
like just starting a career
in m I think the impression is
that PIs who are here really
had success at every
step of the way.
And from my own experience, I
know that's not true, right?
You're always taking turns.
Like, I'll give you an
example from my sort
of own career, which is when I
was originally working on cell
proliferation and cell cycle.
That's what I started my lab on.
And we set up this really
incredibly complicated
experiment.
Every time we set
up this experiment,
the nuclei would
essentially explode.
OK?
And we were looking under
the microscope, what is that?
What is that?
And then we suddenly
realized from some pictures
I'd seen elsewhere in a journal
that we had, essentially,
been looking at apoptosis or
cell death in the microscope.
And someone else had
actually reported an in vitro
reconstitution of that as well.
But we had been looking at
completely different stimuli.
And I was like, oh,
that's why the way
we set up this
experiment happened.
And it actually led
to more than half
of my lab working on cell death.
But it started out as months
of failed experiments,
and then the light
bulb went off.
Oh, when you do x, y,
and z, the cell dies.
So when you do x, y, and
z, the nuclei falls apart.
It looked like an error.
It was just all
really frustrating.
And then you go,
well, maybe there's
actually an intelligent
interpretation of this.
So there are any
moments you might
share where you had
any doubts, or when
something went wrong
in an unexpected way,
or opened new doors?
GREG FOURNIER: That's
a good example.
So there's a project that
we're still currently working
on that is about the
evolutionary history of genes
and microbes that get
energy by oxidizing iron.
All living things use iron.
It's one of the most
abundant elements on Earth.
But it is actually found in
very, very low concentrations
in the ocean.
Most environments are hard to
get reduced iron because we
have oxygen everywhere.
And so if there's iron
and oxygen, you get rust,
and that precipitates out.
So hanging on to
iron is something
that life had to evolve
and learn how to do.
And it's very, very
good at doing it.
So we were hoping
that we could just
find the genes involved in
metabolisms for oxidizing iron,
and they would reach
back billions of years
and tell us about how iron
worked in the Archean ocean
before there was oxygen and
iron was freely available to all
for energy metabolism.
But every time we reconstructed
the histories of these genes,
they didn't reach
back deep in time.
They were only found within
relatively narrow groups
on the tree of life.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yet you
knew other organisms had
to be handling iron somehow.
GREG FOURNIER: Right.
And we probably looked
at 30 or 40 genes.
We tried so many different
enzymes and functions
that are even tangentially
related to these iron
metabolisms.
And no matter what we looked
at, it was the same answer.
Like, there was no record.
And so this is not
what we hoped to find.
And it's a bit frustrating.
And after discussing it with
our students and postdocs
in the lab and
thinking about it,
we're like, well, OK, maybe
if we flip this on its head,
it's actually telling us
something very interesting,
which is maybe there are some
ancient metabolic processes
and microbes that are invisible
because what's happening
is evolution is throwing
them out and replacing them
so frequently.
Or different groups
on the tree of life
are replacing one another.
Which is something that we know
is the case for complex life,
but really isn't how we think
of microbes for the most part.
But if that's the
case, then we're
only seeing the snapshot
of relatively modern
microbial life that's
doing iron oxidation.
And this niche was probably
way bigger 3 billion years ago,
but the microbes
doing it have either
changed jobs or the genes
have been replaced or changed.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Interesting.
GREG FOURNIER: So
maybe there's some kind
of instability in
this niche where
it's being overwritten
or overprinted with more
recent diversity, the way we
see after a mass extinction,
or the way we see
in complex life.
So maybe this is a hint
that, in some ways,
microbial life actually
works a little bit more
like complex life than we
really previously appreciated.
Where there are turnovers
or faunal successions
of different eco types
that replace, even down
to individual enzymes,
older lineages,
even though they were
doing the same job.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's funny.
My PhD thesis advisor
used to always say,
you can learn as much
from the experiments that
didn't work if you really
think about them-- now,
of course, that assumes
you didn't, like, mess up
the experiment.
But when you've done something
legitimately correctly
and you get a really
unexpected result, or a failure
in what you anticipate,
it can sort of
open up whole new doors in terms
of how to think about things.
And I think students,
when they're
doing their graduate
work, that can just
be seen as a long frustration
because, obviously, it
can take a long time.
But sometimes it
really does open
really interesting new doors.
GREG FOURNIER: It
really does, and it also
helps teach us how to formulate
hypotheses instead of we
fail to prove the
hypothesis or we did not.
Instead think of it as, well,
here are multiple scenarios,
and then we'll see what
the data and analysis says
which one of these
scenarios is more likely.
And ideally, all of them are
interesting in their own way.
So instead of accepting
or rejecting a hypothesis,
it's about, do our observations
and data and analysis support
one narrative over another one?
And then tell that story.
Because there's always
an interesting story.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
I still remember
this really well
because there's,
actually, a friend of mine
who's at University
of Connecticut--
Bruce Mayer, he was
across the bench from me
in graduate school.
And we had been working--
all the lab had been working
on cancer causing genes that
were part of a family called
tyrosine kinase that attach
phosphates to tyrosinase.
And he had just been sequencing
this cancer causing gene,
and we assumed it
was going to be
another one of these enzymes.
And it had the same
structure at the n-terminus
but then there was
no kinase domain.
And it turned out to be a whole
new class of signaling proteins
that he had not anticipated.
You know?
And at first it was like,
what's wrong with this sequence?
And then it was
like, ha ha, there's
nothing wrong with the sequence.
This is what it looks like.
So that was kind of cool.
GREG FOURNIER: Well,
that's really interesting
considering how conserved
those domains are.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right.
So it was sh2 sh3 domains
and no kinase domain.
These little modular sh2
and sh3 signaling molecules
are known to be modular.
I think if you think
about long term evolution,
a lot of these little
pieces of protein
find themselves in lots
of different contexts.
Just maybe the last
thing, when you're
training new young
scientists, do
you have any kind of important
words of advice for them?
GREG FOURNIER: I
think the advice
I find myself giving
students repeatedly
is to try a lot of
different things
and then follow up on the ones
that seem to be going somewhere
and that you're excited about.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You have
just talked about evolution.
In other words, try a whole
bunch of different things
and then the selective pressure
of your experimental findings
should force you along
a pathway that leads
to your successful outcome.
Anyway, thank you so much
for being with us here today.
GREG FOURNIER:
Thank you very much.
It was a pleasure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
To our audience,
thanks again for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope
you'll join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep. 2: Bureaucracies, dictatorships, and the power of Africa’s people
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLEGe4UhKqM

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello,
I'm Sally Kornbluth,
president of MIT.
And I'm thrilled to welcome you
to this MIT community podcast
Curiosity Unbounded.
In my first few
months at MIT, I've
been particularly
inspired by talking
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues,
they are pushing
the boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, my guest is Mai
Hassan, Associate Professor
of Political Science and faculty
co-director of MIT Africa.
Mai's work looks at bureaucracy,
public, administration
and the state in Africa,
and more recently,
how people mobilize against
repressive dictatorships.
Mai and her family came
to the United States
from Sudan when she was young.
Shortly after this podcast
was originally recorded,
violence broke out in Sudan.
We invited Mai back
into the studio
to offer insight
on the situation.
Stay tuned to the end
of our conversation
to hear what Mai has to say
about the current situation
in Sudan.
So Mai, I'm really
pleased to meet you.
What led you to
this field of study,
either personally
or professionally?
MAI HASSAN: Thanks so
much for that question.
And thanks so much
for having me.
I started getting really
interested in African politics,
in part, because
of my background.
So my family immigrated from
Sudan back in the 1990s.
And we kept visiting Sudan even
though we lived in the States.
But as I got older, and I was
starting to read more newspaper
accounts of politics
on the continent,
and as I got into college
reading more accounts of how
academics talked about
politics on the continent,
I just started noticing
a disconnect, almost,
between how Africa was portrayed
in popular and academic
accounts on one hand, and then
on the other, how I experienced
Africa, and how I thought
many processes were happening
on the ground, that a lot of
academic and popular accounts
really missed.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So
how old were you when
your family came to the US?
MAI HASSAN: I was almost five,
so it's about four and 1/2,
yeah.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: And
so when you think
about how Africa
sort of portrayed
in the public consciousness,
what struck you
as you came to learn
more about the reality
versus the depiction?
MAI HASSAN: So one of the
ideas that really stuck with me
and that ended up becoming
a focal point of my book
is the idea of how strong or
weak the African state was.
We always get these depictions
about how the African state
is so weak that it can't
provide for its people,
that it can't provide
basic goods and services,
that it can't govern over
the country's territory.
And that's something
that stuck with me
because at the same
time, based off
of my reading and my
understanding of how
the African state operated
on the ground, in many cases,
it was able to do quite a bit,
was able to do a lot of things
that many of its leaders
really pushed it to do.
And so that was a disconnect
that really pushed me down,
especially political
science, and thinking
about public administration,
and bureaucracy,
and administrative
state in Africa.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: One thing I
think is interesting, really,
as a layperson approaching
this, my last direct touch
on political science was
as a major at Williams
a long time ago, and I see
some of your scholarship,
really, is thinking about
repressive regimes, et cetera,
is the extent to which
the populace will accept
and obviously, sometimes
it's not in their power
to accept or not
accept the governance
of a repressive regime,
if the sort of services
and daily lives are
served by those regimes.
And then as things
progress, how that
comes in conflict with their
wanting more self governance.
And we see this at countries
around the world, sort
of the emergence to try
to have a democracy,
but that sometimes succeeds,
sometimes re-repressed.
And I'm just wondering how you
think about those dynamics,
in general, and with respect
to what you see in Africa.
MAI HASSAN: That's a really
interesting question, Sally.
So one of the things that
I keep thinking about
is there's like a base level
of public goods and services
that people need to
subsist to survive.
And many governments,
if they can even
come close to meeting that bare
minimum during regular times,
then they can kind of fend
off lots of popular protests,
can kind of fend off
calls for democratization.
But then you have these
really, really tense moments
where maybe there's
an economic crisis,
or maybe there's an oil crisis,
thinking back to the 1970 oil
crisis, or what happened
very recently with COVID
that really stretches people
to the breaking point.
And at that point, people start
to connect that yes, I have
all these economic problems.
And maybe I could go
and start protesting
or start demanding
higher salary.
Or I could start demanding
that the government actually
provide the water
services that they
said that they were going to.
Or, and this is what
generally happens
in these moments
of crisis, people
start connecting the
dots and recognizing,
well, the reason why we're
not getting all the services
that we need is because
the government is really
corrupt, because
it's dictatorial,
and all of the money
and all the resources
are not spent on
providing for its people,
but are instead spent on
keeping leaders in power,
fattening up their
wallets, helping
them buy seventh or eighth
mansions in Dubai or Paris.
And so these moments
of crisis, I think,
are really important focal
points for helping push people
out onto the streets.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
One thing that's
always been sort of
fascinating to me
is how people can get behind
someone in a sort of cult
of personality.
In other words,
in many countries
where they're
repressive regimes,
people are aware of
what you're talking
about, the leaders living
in a mansion when they're
scrambling for food, et cetera.
But then, as you say, when it
comes to a real crisis point,
there's some kind of
ignition and the tide
can turn pretty
quickly, even if people
have learned to live under
these conditions for a very
long time.
MAI HASSAN: Yeah, definitely.
There are some sparks
for popular protest
or for uprisings that are
more salient in a country's
consciousness than others.
And so, for instance, in a
lot of academic literature
on popular protests
or collective action,
we think about how
there might be protests
around really big important
anniversaries of a country,
important founding moments,
maybe the country's
Independence Day
or maybe if there
was an uprising against
a dictator in the past,
then the anniversary
of those riots.
Or if there is a funeral of
a really important martyr
of the movement, for
instance, then those often
become focal points
that people don't even
have to really discuss
beforehand and say,
hey, I'm thinking about
protesting on this.
You don't really do that
because you just kind of know,
well, I have a sense
that stuff is really bad.
And you get a sense from seeing
people out on the streets.
Or I remember one
of my neighbors,
last time I was in Sudan, was
like, oh yeah, stuff in Sudan
is really bad and you can
tell because the soldiers
in our neighborhood are
no longer buying meat.
That means that they
don't have enough money,
that the regime isn't
paying them well enough
such that they can buy meat.
And so these people start
picking up on these cues.
And then when it's like, OK, I
feel like things are bad enough
that people are going to
go out into the street,
sometimes you don't even have
to coordinate on a specific day.
You just kind of know which big
anniversaries are coming up.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's almost
as if the big anniversaries are
emblematic of how the
idealism in which countries
or governments may have been
formed versus the reality.
In other words,
it's like emblematic
of the conflict between
what people thought
and the reality as you
see, things getting
really bad on the streets.
MAI HASSAN: I really,
really like that
point that what are the ideals
that our government should
be living up to?
You see a lot of protests
on Independence Days
and so much hope
around the birth
of many post-colonial countries.
And when it doesn't
come to fruition,
really, really comes in stark
contrast on certain days,
more than others.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Is
there a critical goal
now that you're striving
for in your work?
What impact do you hope to have?
Tell us a little bit about
some of your current projects.
MAI HASSAN: I have a really
big interest in bureaucracy
and the administrative
state in Africa.
And I think part of
the reason for that
is because the African state
has always just kind of been
shunned off precisely because
people are like, well,
it's too weak to do anything.
And so we shouldn't
even study it.
And I think that's
a real mistake.
And I think that we should give
the African state just as much
understanding and research as
the administrative state here
in the US.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So maybe
tell me a little bit
about the nature
of the bureaucracy
in a place like Sudan or other
places in sub-Saharan Africa.
Are there issues, in terms
of resources, efficiency?
Is it, as you say,
corruption coming in?
And are they, it's funny to
say, under bureaucratized, it's
probably not that, but are
there sort of key points,
in terms of the efficiency, of
their bureaucracies that you
think could really
make a difference
in the lives of the citizens?
MAI HASSAN: This is
a question, Sally,
that I think about a lot.
What would make bureaucracy in
many African countries better?
And so I'm going to
talk a little bit more
about the Kenyan
bureaucracy, which
was the focus of my first book.
And what I found
really interesting
there is well, like in many
countries in the continent,
and quite honestly
around the world,
the executive, so the
president of the country,
wields a lot of control
over bureaucratic agencies.
The agencies fall
under the executive.
And so can wield them
as he, often he, wants.
And so going back
to that idea that I
was saying at the beginning
that each agency or each state
has some kind of fixed amount
of capacity, what I find really
interesting is where
that limited capacity
is being channeled and
how it's being channeled.
And so in many
Kenyan bureaucracies,
or in the Kenya
bureaucracies that I studied,
something that I
found interesting
was that bureaucrats were
managed in such a way as
to incentivize them to engage
in certain types of behaviors
over others.
If you think about
personnel management,
you, as President of MIT or
like CEO of an organization,
tries to affect the
culture of that place
and tries to put into place
different types of incentives
and constraints for the
workers so that perhaps they
move towards the larger
goal of the organization.
And we can think about African
leaders doing the same thing
in bureaucracies.
In some cases, and in
some parts of the country,
particularly leaders
stronghold areas,
there are core bases of support.
Bureaucrats were
really incentivized
so that they personally had
interests in providing the best
goods and services.
In many cases, providing
part of their own salaries
to help their communities
build a new irrigation well
or to help with
bursaries for school
scholarships for some
of the students there.
But those really good
bureaucratic incentives
weren't always in place
around the country,
and in particular, in many
places that presidents feared,
that presidents saw
as opposition zones,
or were core bases of
support for the opposition.
Those places saw
bureaucrats incentivized
to, in a sense, do
the exact opposite,
provide fewer
goods and services.
And in some cases,
creating the conditions
so that bureaucrats,
if they were
asked to engage in violence or
engage in some kind of coercion
or repression against these area
citizens, were more likely to
do so.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: One thing
you said that I hadn't really
thought about before, which is
a bureaucracy could be subverted
for the enrichment of
a president or dictator
and in a concrete way.
Part of its being corrupt
and siphoning things
from the bureaucracy, part of
its letting the bureaucracy
serve them and their
compatriots directly,
but the other thing, I
think the bureaucracy
as an avenue to make sure
that they stay in power.
In other words, providing
goods and services
in a very targeted
way to continue to
empower them, even if it's
not money in their pocket.
It's another interesting way
that things can be subverted.
MAI HASSAN: For sure,
so if bureaucrats
are doing a good job and helping
some citizens procure the goods
and services that
they are entitled to
and that they expect,
then if the president,
if a leader asks for shows
of support, for instance,
they will be there.
Or if there's an
upcoming election,
then it's no need to
even rig the polls.
These people are just going
to go out and turn out
for the leader anyways because
the president has served them.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
You know, I often
wonder if people start out
idealistic and actually
intending to serve their
country and the power
corrupts kind of thing.
And I mean country presidents,
not University presidents.
Let me make that crystal clear.
MAI HASSAN: I didn't really
interview Kenyan presidents
for this project, but I talked
to a whole host of bureaucrats.
And I remember
bureaucrats either
they would start off
their conversation with me
or they would end their
conversation with me
by saying, Mai, we serve Kenya.
We got into this job because
we want to serve Kenya.
And these bureaucrats are very
idealistic, very patriotic,
and very much care
about their country,
but then you can see how some
elements of agency culture
can either wear
them down or they
recognize the political
maneuverings that
are happening.
They recognize how
political their job can be
and how engaging in certain
actions might be politicized
or engaging in certain
actions might not
be as well rewarded for their
own bureaucratic progression
as other ones.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
I think there may well
be some lessons for the
United States there,
too, when we think about
politicians taking actions
to honestly serve the
community versus trying
to ensure their own reelection
and secure power or retain
power.
So that's quite interesting.
MAI HASSAN: That's something
that I think about a lot
because growing
up, my grandfather
was in politics in Sudan.
And I remember the
way that he would
talk about the state and the
state's responsibilities.
It was always so neutral,
that the state should do this.
It can do this and so it
should, without thinking
too hard about what
it actually does.
And to his credit,
he only served
in government for a
few years before he
was kicked out by one of
the Sudanese dictators.
His politics didn't gel with
the dictator for too long.
And so his idealistic
approach didn't really
match the dictator's ideas
about how to stay in power.
I think that's telling
that those of us who,
when we think about what
government should do,
it's very distinct
from what it actually
ends up doing if those in power
aren't properly constrained.
I think that's a lesson
that's relevant for Sudan,
for Kenya, the US.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Very interesting.
So as a political scientist,
what drew you to come to MIT?
MAI HASSAN: Oh, so many things.
One, the amount of resources
here is just beyond belief.
And I'm not just talking
about monetary resources
to do my field research abroad,
but the political science
department is, in my view,
the best in the country.
It's really doing
cutting edge work.
The people that it's cultivated
and its vision for what
political science
should be is something
that has been really
attractive to me ever since I
started my academic career.
I also really appreciate the
policy focus that MIT has.
And to see so many
scientists working
on some of the biggest
issues of our age,
this is an engineering school.
And so a lot of people are
working on the engineering
of climate change.
There are parallels within
social sciences, as well.
How is it that we can
better engineer democracy?
How is it that we can better
engineer administrative states
in sub-Saharan Africa?
And so these are ideas that
I'm hoping to draw from.
This is only my
first year at MIT,
but ideas that I'm
hoping to draw on
given the culture and
the ethos of this place.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: No,
I think it's great.
I mean every corner
I turn around,
there's something brilliant
going on in all areas.
It's kind of mind blowing.
It's interesting,
too, I think something
you said about a
policy impact, MIT
can impact the world
in many different ways.
And if the MIT political
science department
has things to say, for
instance, about nuclear energy,
or about emerging genetic
engineering technologies,
et cetera, in the
regulatory domain,
they're the scientific
underpinning that informs it
and a kind of virtuous circle
where the policy can then
inform the further development
of the science and technology.
So it really is quite something.
And this is only my first year,
too, and I really seen that.
So was there a sort
of road not taken?
In other words, was
there some other area
you were interested in
before you decided to become
a political scientist?
MAI HASSAN: I was actually
an Econ undergrad RA,
but I remember talking to
different economists or people
in had gotten PhDs in Econ
and asking them about what
that profession was like.
And it didn't seem as
though they actually
did as much field research on
the ground talking to people
as I thought was important.
And I think political science
is a much better fit for me.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's so interesting
because I think there's
such a robust culture here
of undergraduates
doing research.
And it's so important
in terms of them really
thinking about what their
future is going to be like.
Because I think about this.
So I was a political
science major
before I got into biology.
And I think if I had understood
political science as a research
area, in other words, you
can ask important questions,
and you can do the
sort of field research
you're talking about
to find the answers,
I probably would have viewed
it very differently than I
did in the end when I went to
biology, and it was very clear,
you ask questions, you do
experiments, you get answers,
you ask new questions.
And I think it's great
that a place like MIT
that students in all
areas of interest
can get early
exposure to research
and understand
these fields as they
may ask different
questions, there
may be different methodologies.
But fundamentally,
there are ways
to think about how you
understand the world
and how you impact the world.
MAI HASSAN: And that's
something that I really
appreciate that sentiment and
something that at MIT Africa
were really hoping to channel
to a lot of these undergrads.
That, as you were saying, a
lot of students here at MIT
do get really practical
research experience.
But they get practical
research experience
in Kendall Square,
high tech, biotech,
in many OECD Western countries.
And to give MIT
undergrads the opportunity
to use their skills
somewhere on the continent,
I think gives them a new
ideas about what engineering
can do all across the
world, and hopefully, maybe
inspire them to spend some time
or spend their mental capacity
to work on problems that are
more relevant to the continent
than elsewhere.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Being new here, I
don't know the
dimensions of this.
I assume, then, there are
various programs for students
to actually travel to
Africa, work there, work
with local communities,
NGOs, et cetera.
MAI HASSAN: For
sure, MIT Africa,
I'm the co-faculty director
with Evan Lieberman.
And then Ari Jakupovic
is the managing director.
It's a really fabulous team.
And MIT undergrads
have the opportunity
to do internships, either during
IAP term for like three or four
weeks in January or
during the summer.
There are programs all
across the continent.
And the biggest countries
that we send students to
are South Africa,
Ghana, and Kenya,
but there are other
countries, too.
This year we sent some to
Botswana to Cote d'Ivoire.
I think in the past,
students have gone
to Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's
an amazing opportunity.
MAI HASSAN: For sure.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: I'm sure
it's great, too, in country
because the students
are so incredibly
smart and hardworking.
So it's kind of a nice energy.
What kind of things do you
like to do outside of work,
outside of the world
of political science?
MAI HASSAN: So I just gave birth
to my new daughter, Nadine.
But before Nadine came into this
world, when I had a little bit
more free time, one of the
things that I really like to do
was read a lot of
African fiction.
And so before she was born,
I was finishing up a book
actually by Nadine Gordimer,
The Conservationist,
one of her earlier pieces.
I really got into reading
African fiction while I
was doing my field research.
And it sounds kind of
silly, but like discovering
this huge and beautiful literary
world of African fiction that's
really been taking off I feel
like in the past decade or two,
though, obviously,
Nadine Gordimer his work
dates to much longer than that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yes.
MAI HASSAN: So I'm finishing
up a book by Nadine Gordimer,
and I also just started a
book by Abdulrazak Gurnah, who
won the Nobel Prize years ago.
This was also a book on
Obama's must read list of 2022,
Afterlives, very
much enjoying that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Excellent, excellent.
Well, don't worry
it'll be like 20 years
and you'll have more
reading time again.
That's great.
Well, congratulations.
And then there's the whole era
of doing things that your child
or children will enjoy.
And then it opens up
a whole other vista
of things you hadn't
thought about.
MAI HASSAN: So I will really
be enjoying the literature
works of Llama, Llama.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, you got it.
You got it.
Absolutely.
Actually, it's funny,
just as a digression,
I was thinking about
that the other day.
It was just a hard day.
And I remembered I used to read
my kids a book called something
like, Alexander and the
No Good, Very Bad Day.
And I thought, you know, I
need to open that book, again.
So if you think about
your aspirations,
are you thinking that
you'll continue to sort of--
I know it's early--
to pursue the lines
of investigation,
do you foresee opening up
new areas you might pursue
or you're just going to
follow the breadcrumbs
and see where they lead?
MAI HASSAN: Something I'm
really excited about doing
moving forward is letting
the research interests
of my graduate students really
shape the kind of research
that I end up doing.
Graduate students
are much better
plugged into what's happening
in the world and on the ground
to a much larger
degree than I do.
And they're the ones
who are actually
able to spend
months in the field
or can spend a lot of time in
the nitty gritty of research
in a way that, given the
increased responsibilities
of an Associate Professor, I am
not able to do as much anymore.
And so following their
lead is going to be--
I'm really excited about that.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's actually,
I think, a big secret
ingredient of MIT,
which is that the
students are so brilliant.
And they come up with
so many great ideas.
I look back at my own
scientific career,
and some of the best lines of
investigation that we pursued
weren't my ideas.
They were the students' ideas.
You have to recognize the
good idea and encourage it.
But beyond that,
really smart people
can do fantastic things
as long as you give them
the environment to flourish.
MAI HASSAN: Yeah, I'm
really looking forward
to growing into that
element of my role.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's terrific.
What's the best advice
you've ever been given?
MAI HASSAN: There is
that political scientist
that I know, a more senior
political scientist,
and one piece of
advice that she gave
me is from RBG that
when you are at work,
you should just be
fully present at work.
And when you're at home,
be fully present at home.
That's something
that I've been trying
to do a bit more of
to really, really
enjoy on my maternity
leave and recognizing
that these moments with
my daughter are precious,
and they're fleeting, and then
be rejuvenated for when I'm
back in the office and
get to really think
about these problems that have
been motivating me for so much
of my life.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It's funny because
on another podcast
interview, we were talking
about how that can
be so difficult to do
and how many of us live our
lives completely intertwined,
whereas the work, and the
play, and the family life,
and the friendships, et
cetera, are really together.
And I think both
strategies can work,
but I still remember being in
my office in between students
showing me experimental
data and trying
to get the summer camp
booked or whatever.
And sometimes,
the world will not
cooperate with you're
trying to keep it neatly.
And particularly in this era
of the continual onslaught
of email, and text messages,
and everything else,
it can be so hard to
disaggregate that.
But--
MAI HASSAN: You
can turn them off.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: --it is true.
You can turn them off.
That's right.
Oh right, you can turn them off.
And I forgot about that.
MAI HASSAN: Maybe
you can't, Sally.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Exactly, exactly.
Well, I really enjoyed
our conversation, Mai,
getting to know
you a little bit,
getting to hear about the
fantastic work that you do
and opening my
eyes to some things
that I really just
didn't know about.
So you have helped to
unbound my curiosity.
So that's really been terrific.
MAI HASSAN: I've really
enjoyed this conversation.
Thanks so much for
having me, Sally.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Mai, can you give us
any insight on the
current violence in Sudan
and what that may mean for
the country and its people?
MAI HASSAN: Yeah, Sally,
the situation in Sudan
right now is really tragic.
Hostility and conflict
broke out on April 15.
On the one hand, we have
the Sudan Armed Forces,
the conventional army.
It's led by General
Abdel Fattah al-Burhan.
And then on the other side,
we have a paramilitary group,
known as the Rapid
Support Forces,
or the RCF, led by
Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo,
but everyone calls him Hemedti.
And what I was talking
about in our prior podcast,
what my research
had been focused on
was thinking about the
role of popular uprising
and how people can come
together to overthrow
these repressive dictatorships.
And that's what
happened in Sudan.
They overthrew this 30-year-old
military dictatorship.
And so you can imagine in the
Democratic transition that
ensued, there's a
lot of uncertainty
and a lot of instability
about what the new Democratic,
hopefully, country is
going to look like,
what the new rules
of the game are.
Who is in, who is out.
What do the political
institutions look like?
So you can imagine
a situation in which
a post-democratic
Sudan probably doesn't
have place for military
leaders, and especially
ones that are in charge of
forces that have committed
atrocities to their population.
Both men had very strong
political ambitions,
and wanted to run the
country, and probably
weren't going to get there
through Democratic means.
And so as negotiations
were coming
to a head to actually transition
power over to civilians,
that really brought
up the temperature
and then really brought
things to a head.
And on top of that,
one of the things
that was supposed to happen
with the civilian transition
is security sector
reform in which
their armed forces,
the SAF and the RCF,
were both supposed to be
placed under civilian rule.
And as you can imagine,
both men didn't
want to give up that power.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's
interesting in our earlier
conversation, you
discussed how often
people who are actually
part of the bureaucracy
really do want what's
best for the country.
And then the leaders can
come in and basically,
try to co-opt the bureaucracy
and not really want
what's best for
the country, really
want to consolidate
their own power.
This is an extreme
version of this
where it's using the whole
security or military system
as an instrument, not
to protect the country
against external aggressors,
but really to consolidate power
in their own camp.
MAI HASSAN: 100%.
And something
that's so upsetting
that so many young
Sudanese men have
joined these forces,
in part, because there
aren't that many opportunities.
There's so much
unemployment in the country.
And so these forces,
especially at the lower ranks,
the enlistees is
really representative
of the Sudanese population.
And many of these
men join precisely
because they want a better
life for their families.
And now, they're being
pitted against each other
for the egos, pretty much,
of their two generals.
That's something that's
deeply, deeply tragic.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
It sounds like they
have no remorse about destroying
the country in pursuit
of their own personal gain.
MAI HASSAN: It's so upsetting to
see how quickly the country has
fallen.
And so I know Khartoum
best, the capital city,
and it was this thriving city
that so many refugees and IDPs
had migrated to because
of all the conflicts
in neighboring countries and
all the conflicts in Sudan,
internally, in the
peripheries of the country.
And that hostility has
been strongest in Khartoum.
It's a really sad reversal
where people are just
fleeing the capital city.
All the reports that I'm getting
are that it's a complete ghost
town, that people are traveling
hundreds of kilometers
north to the border with Egypt.
Other people are fleeing to
Chad, going to Port Sudan
so that they can cross
over to Saudi Arabia.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
You know, I think
we've been in a very long
established democracy.
And it's hard for
us to think back
to the origins of
our own democracy
and all the struggles that went
on in terms of establishing
norms and writing the rules.
And now we fast forward
to other democracies,
which are trying
to emerge, which
are in a much more fragile
world, in many ways,
and layer on top of
that, news coverage,
the influence of external
forces that can lead
to outcomes that
would, potentially,
be very much against what the
majority of the population
wants.
How do you see that in
the context of what's
happening now in Sudan?
MAI HASSAN: Definitely in the
case of the United States,
as you were referring
to, but something
that your comments
made think about
is that Sudan wasn't
a democracy, yet.
And we were just
still in the process
of writing the
rules of the game.
And we forget how
important this rule-making
and this institution making is.
The fighting broke out
precisely because they
wanted to shape what the
institutions would look like,
means that
institutions do matter.
That they wanted to make
sure that the institutions
and the rules were
set up in such a way
that it would favor them.
I think it really places
power on these institutions,
but at the same time, makes the
creation of these institutions
a really important
process as well.
The hope that I
have is that when
this conflict does
start abating,
and new rules are
starting to be written,
and Sudan gets back on the
democratization process,
that everyone is going
to be really, really
insistent that Democratic
groups, that civilian groups
are the ones who are placed in
charge of writing these rules.
We've seen what happens when we
have these military men writing
these institutions.
They are going to write
it in such a way that
will benefit them, or
they're not actually
going to be staunch
supporters of the process,
or they're going to pull the
rug out from everyone's feet
when the rules are about
to be signed in a way
that they don't like.
And so how is it that we can
get actual civilian groups
into this process
and empower them
so that we don't have this
type of situation again?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
you know, your comment
about empowering them does
make me think, though,
that a lot of the population
must feel sort of hopeless
at this point.
In other words, you're about
to tip into a better society
and, again, you can
see how fragile it is
and how easy it is to
reverse the course,
even with the will of the vast
majority of the people moving
in the opposite direction.
MAI HASSAN: For sure.
In my mind, it just cements
how important security sector
reform is and that
the men with guns
that these institutions
are actually
placed under civilian
rule because they
are very, very powerful.
As soon as the fighting
starts, then talking stops.
So then how do we
place these guns
in the hands of
responsible people?
That sounds so naive,
but it's important.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: As soon as you
have no control over military,
than when things
don't go the way
they want, and they can
do whatever they like,
the individuals who
have the physical force
are going to prevail.
So I really appreciate
your insight into this.
I think we've all seen the
news, in the newspaper.
In fact, it was only
a few days after we
taped the original podcast
that I saw this and thought
it would really be
helpful to our listeners
to have an update from you
that gave us a little insight
into what's going on.
And I really appreciate that.
So thank you, again.
And I hope we'll have a
chance to talk further.
MAI HASSAN: Thanks
so much, Sally.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: To
our audience, thanks
again, for listening
to Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope you'll
all join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.

---

### Curiosity Unbounded, Ep 1: How a free-range kid from Maine is helping green-up industrial practices
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcujt6l3UyM

Idioma: en

[MUSIC PLAYING]
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Hello, I'm
Sally Kornbluth, President
of MIT, and I'm
thrilled to welcome you
to this MIT community
podcast, Curiosity Unbounded.
In my first few
months at MIT, I've
been particularly
inspired by talking
with members of our faculty
who recently earned tenure.
Like their colleagues,
they are pushing
the boundaries of knowledge.
Their passion and brilliance,
their boundless curiosity
offer a wonderful glimpse
of the future of MIT.
Today, I'm talking
with Desiree Plata,
associate professor of Civil
and Environmental Engineering.
Desiree's work is
focused on predicting
the environmental impact
of industrial processes
and translating that research
to real world technologies.
She describes herself as
an environmental chemist.
So tell me a little
more about that.
What led you to this work either
personally or professionally?
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah, I guess,
I always loved chemistry.
But before that,
I was just a kid
growing up in the
state of Maine,
and I like to describe
myself as a free range kid.
I ran around, and
talked to the neighbors,
and popped into the
local businesses.
And one thing I observed
in my grandparents' town
was that there were a whole lot
of sick people, not everybody,
but maybe every other house.
And I remember being about
seven or eight years old
and driving home with my
mom to our apartment one day
and saying, it's got to be
something everybody shares,
the water, maybe something
in the food or the air.
And that was really my first
environmental hypothesis.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You
had curiosity unbounded,
even when you were a child.
DESIREE PLATA: That's right.
I spent the next several
decades trying to figure it out
and ultimately discovered
that there was something
in the water, where
my grandmother lived,
and in that time, I had
earned a chemistry degree
and came to MIT to do my grad
work at MIT in the Woods Hole
Oceanographic in environmental
chemistry and chemical
oceanography.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
You saw a pattern.
You thought about it,
and it took some time
to get the tools to actually
address the questions.
But eventually, you were there.
That is great.
As I understand it, you have
two distinct areas of interest.
One is getting methane
out of the atmosphere
to mitigate climate
warming, and the other
is making industrial processes
more environmentally sound.
Do you see these two
as naturally connected?
DESIREE PLATA: Well,
I'll start by saying
that, when I was young and
thinking about this chemical
contamination that I
hypothesized was there
in my grandmother's
neighborhood, one
of the things, when
I, finally, found out
there was a superfund site
there, one of the things I
discovered was that it was
owned by close family friends.
And they were our neighbors.
The decisions that
they made as part
of their industrial
practice were just
part of standard
operating procedure,
and that's when it kind of
clicked for me that industry
is just kind of going along,
hoping to innovate to make
the world a better place.
And when these
environmental impacts occur,
it's often because they
didn't have enough information
or know the right
questions to ask.
And I was in graduate school
at the time and said, you know,
I'm at one of the most
innovative places on planet
Earth.
I want to go knock on
the doors of other labs
and say, what are you
making, and how can I
help you make it better?
If we all flashback
to around 2008
or so, hydraulic
fracturing was really
taking off in this
country, and there
was a lot of hypotheses
about the number of chemicals
being used in that process.
It turns out that there are
many hundreds of chemicals being
used in the hydraulic
fracturing process,
and my group has done an
immense amount of work
to study every
groundwater we could
get our hands on
across the Appalachian
region of the Eastern
United States,
which is where a lot
of this development
took place and is
still taking place.
And one of the
things we discovered
was that some of the biggest
environmental impacts
are actually not from
the injected chemicals,
but from the released
methane that's
coming into the atmosphere.
Methane is growing
at an exorbitant rate
and is responsible for
about as much warming
as CO2 over the next 10 years.
And I started realizing that
we as engineers and scientists
would need a way to get
these emissions back,
to take them back from the
atmosphere, if you will,
to abate methane at very
dilute concentrations,
and that's what led to my
work in methane abatement
and methane mitigation.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Interesting, and am
I wrong about when we think
about the impact of agriculture
on the environment, that methane
is a big piece of that as well?
DESIREE PLATA: You are
certainly not wrong there.
If you look at
anthropogenic emissions
or human derived
emissions, more than half
are associated with
agricultural practices,
so the cultivation of meat
and dairy in particular.
You know, cows
and sheep are what
are known as enteric
methane formers.
So part of their
digestion process
actually leads to the
formation of methane,
and it's estimated that about
28% of the global methane cycle
is associated with
enteric methane
farmers and our agricultural
practices as humans.
And there's another 18% that's
associated with fossil energy
extraction.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: That's
really interesting.
So thinking about
your work then,
I mean, particularly
in agriculture,
part of the equation has
got to be how people live,
what they eat, and
production of methane
as part of the sustainability
of agriculture.
And the other part
then seems to be
how you actually, if
you will, mitigate
what we've already
bought in terms
of methane and the environment.
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah, this
is a really important topic
right now.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Tell me
a little bit about maybe
in semi-lay terms about how you
think about removal of methane
from the environment.
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah,
recently, over 120 countries
signed something called the
Global Methane Pledge, which
is essentially a pledge to
reduce 45% of methane emissions
by 2030.
And if you can do that, you
can save about a half a degree
centigrade warming by 2100.
So that's a full third of
the one and a half degrees
that politicians speak about.
Now, we can argue about
whether or not that's really
the full extent of the warming.
We'll see, but the point is
that methane impacts near term
warming in our
lifetimes, and it's
one of the unique greenhouse
gases that can do that.
It's called a short
lived climate pollutant,
so what that means
is that it lives
in the atmosphere for about
12 years before it's removed.
That means, if you take
it out of the atmosphere,
you're going to have
a rapid reduction
in the total warming of planet
Earth, the total radiative
forcing.
So your question
more specifically
was about how do we
grapple with this.
We've already emitted
so much methane.
How do we think about, as
technologists, getting it back?
It's a really hard
problem actually.
So in the air in the
room in front of us
that we're breathing, only
two of the million molecules
in front of us are methane.
417 or so are CO2.
So if you think direct air
capture of CO2 is hard,
direct air capture of
methane is that much harder.
The other thing that makes
methane a challenge to abate
is that activating
the bonds in methane
to promote its
destruction or its removal
is really, really tricky.
It's one of the smallest
carbon based molecules.
It doesn't have what we call
van der Waals interactions.
There are no handles
to grab onto.
It's not polar.
That first destruction
in that first CH bond
is what we as chemists
would call spin forbidden.
It's hard to do, and it takes
a lot of energy to do that.
So one of the things
we've developed in my lab
is a catalyst that's based
on Earth abundant materials.
There are some
other groups at MIT
that also work on these
same types of materials,
and it's able to convert
methane at very low levels down
to the levels that we're
breathing in this room
right now.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's fascinating.
How do you see that as
being something that will
move to practical application?
DESIREE PLATA: So
one of the things
that we're doing to
try to translate this
to meaningful applications
for the world is
to scale the technology.
We're fortunate to have funding
from several different sources,
some private philanthropy
groups and the United States
Department of
Energy, and they're
helping us over the
next three years
try to scale this in places,
where it might matter most.
And perhaps, a counterintuitive
place is coal mines.
So coal mines emit
a lot of methane,
and it happens to be
enriched in such a way
that it releases energy.
And it might release
enough energy
to actually pay for
the technology itself.
Another place we're really
focused on is dairy.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Right,
really interesting.
So you mentioned,
at the beginning,
that you were at MIT.
You left.
You came back, and
I'm just wondering.
You know, I'm new to
MIT, and obviously, I'm
just learning it.
But how do you think about
the MIT community or culture
in a way that is particularly
helpful in advancing your work?
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah,
I mean, for me,
I was really excited
to come back to MIT,
because it is such
an innovative place.
So if you're someone
who says, I want
to change the way we invent
materials and processes,
it's one of the best places you
could possibly be, because you
can kind of walk down the hall
and bump into people who are
making new things, new
molecules, new materials,
and say, how can we
incorporate the environment
into our decision
making process?
So as engineering
professors, we're
guilty of teaching our
students to optimize
for performance and cost.
So they go out into their
jobs, and guess what?
That's what they optimize for,
but we want to transition.
And we're at a point in our
understanding of the Earth
system that we
could actually start
to incorporate environmental
objectives into that design
process.
So engineering
professors of tomorrow
should say optimize
for performance,
and cost, and the environment.
That's really what made me very
excited to come back to MIT,
not just the great
research that's
going on in every nook and
corner of the institute,
but also, thinking about how
we might influence engineering
education, so that
this becomes part
of the fabric of how
humans invent new practices
and processes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: If you
look back in your past,
you talked about your
sort of childhood in Maine
and observing these patterns.
You talked about your training
and how you came to MIT
and have really been,
I think, thriving here.
Was there a path not
taken, a road not taken?
If you hadn't become an
environmental chemist,
was there something else
you really wanted to do?
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, that's
such a great question.
You know, I have a lot of loves.
I love the ocean.
I love writing.
I love teaching,
and I'm doing that.
So I'm lucky there.
I also love the beer business.
So my family is in the
beer business in Maine,
and I thought, as
a biochemist, I
would always be able to fall
back on that if I needed to.
And my family's not
in the beer business,
because we're particularly
good at making beer,
but because they're
interested in making
businesses and creating
opportunities for people.
And that's been an
important part of our role
in the state of
Maine, and MIT really
supports that side
of my mind as well.
I love the entrepreneurial
ecosystem that exists here.
I love that, when
you bump into people
and you have a crazy idea,
instead of giving you
all the reasons it won't
work, an MIT person gives you
all the reasons it won't
work, and then they say,
and this is how we're
going to make it happen.
And that's really
fun and exciting,
and the entrepreneurship
environment that exists
here is really very supportive
of the translation process that
has to happen to get
something from the lab
to the global impact
that we're looking for.
And that supports my
mission just so much.
It's been a joy.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's excellent.
So you weren't actually
tempted to become a yeast cell
biologist in the service
of beer production?
DESIREE PLATA: No.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: No?
DESIREE PLATA: But I do joke.
They only call me when
something goes really bad.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's really funny.
So you experienced
MIT as a student.
Now, you're experiencing
it as a faculty member.
What do you sort of wish there
was one thing about each group
that the other knew?
DESIREE PLATA: I wish that,
speaking with my faculty hat
on, the students knew just
how much we care about them,
and I know that some of them
do and really appreciate that.
But when I send an email
at 3:00 in the morning,
I get emails back
from my colleagues
at 3:00 in the morning.
We work around the
clock, and we don't do
that for ourselves, you know?
We do that to make great,
sustainable systems for them
and to create
opportunity for them
to propel themselves forward.
So to me, that's one of the
common unifying features
of an MIT faculty member.
We care really deeply about
the student experience,
and as a student, I think
that we're hungry to learn.
We wanted to really see the
ins and outs of operation,
how to run a research
lab, and I think,
sometimes, faculty try to
spare their students from that.
And maybe it's OK to
let them know just
what's going on in all those
meetings that we sit through.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Yeah,
no, that's interesting.
I think there are definitely
things you find out
when you become a faculty
member, and you're like,
oh, so this is what they
were thinking, you know?
With regard to the passion of
the faculty about teaching,
it really is remarkable here.
I really think some of
the strongest researchers
here are so invested
in teaching,
and you see that
throughout the community.
DESIREE PLATA: It's
a labor of love.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
So you talked a little
bit about the passion
for teaching, et cetera.
Were there teachers
along your way
that you really think impacted
you and sort of changed
the direction of
what you're doing?
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah, absolutely.
I could name all of them.
I mean, I had a
kindergarten teacher
who would stay after
school and wait for my mom
to be done with work.
I was raised by a single
mom and her siblings,
and that was amazing.
I had a fourth grade teacher
who helped promote me
through school and taught
me to love the environment.
If you ask fourth graders, if
they saw any trash on the way
to school, they'll all say no.
And you take them outside
and give them a trash bag
to fill up, and it'll be full by
the end of the hour, you know?
And this is something I've
done with students in Cambridge
to this day, and this
was many years on now.
So she really got me
aware and thinking
about environmental problems
and how we might change systems.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
You know, I think
it's really great
for faculty to think
about their own experiences,
but also to hear people
who become faculty
members reflect
on the great impact
their own teachers had.
I mean, I think the things
folks are doing here
are going to reverberate
in their students' minds
for many, many years.
It also is interesting in terms
of thinking about the pipeline
and when you get students
interested in science.
You talk about your own
early years of education
that, really, ultimately had
an impact, and it's funny.
When I became
president at MIT, I
got a note from my
second grade teacher,
and I remembered her,
like it was yesterday.
These are people that
really had an impact,
and it's great that we
honor teaching here at MIT.
And we acknowledge
that this is going
to have a really big impact
on our students' lives.
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah,
absolutely, and it's a privilege
to teach these top talents.
At many schools
around the country,
it's just young people that
have so much potential,
and I feel like, when we
walk into that classroom,
we've got to bring
inspiration with us
along with the tangible,
practical skills.
And it's been great to
see what they've become.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: So tell
me a little bit about what
you do outside of work.
What are your sort of--
when you ask faculty hobbies,
sometimes, they go, hobbies?
But there must be something
you spend your time on.
I'm just curious.
DESIREE PLATA:
We're worried we're
going to fail this
part of the Q&A.
Yeah, I have four
children, and--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh, you
don't need any hobbies then.
DESIREE PLATA:
Yeah, but I've had--
and it's been the good graces
of the academic institution,
I think, just for those people
who are out there thinking
about going into academia
and say, well, it's too hard,
I couldn't possibly have
the work and life that I
seek if I go into academia.
And I don't think
that's true anymore.
I know there are a lot of
women who paved the way for me
and men for that matter.
I remember my PhD advisors
being fully present
for their children,
and I've been
very fortunate to be able
to do the same thing.
So I spend lots of time
taking care of them right now,
but we love being
out in nature, you
know, hiking, skiing, and
kayaking, and enjoying
what the Earth gives us.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: It's also
fun to see that a-ha moment
in your children when
they start to learn
a little bit about science,
and they get the idea
that you really can discover
things by observing closely,
et cetera.
And I don't if they
realize they benefit
from having parents
who think that way,
but I think that also stays
with them through their lives.
DESIREE PLATA: Yeah, my son is
just waiting for the phone call
to be able to be part of
MIT's toy design class--
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Oh,
that's fantastic.
DESIREE PLATA: --as an
official evaluator, yes.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Yeah, excellent.
So in the last five
years or so, we've
been through the pandemic.
In practical terms,
how you think
about your work
and your life, what
do you do that has
improved your life?
I always hate the words
of work life balance,
because they're so intermeshed.
But just for the
broader community,
how have you thought about that?
DESIREE PLATA: I think that
I've been thinking about my Zoom
world and how I am still able
to do quite a bit of talking
to my colleagues, and
advancing the research mission,
and talking to my
students that I
wouldn't have been able to do.
Even pre-pandemic, it would
have been pretty hard.
So we're all really trained
to interact more efficiently
through these media and
mechanisms, you know?
I know how to give a good talk
on Zoom for better or worse,
so I think that that's been
something that has been great.
And in the context
of environment,
I think a lot of us-- this
might be cliched at this point.
--but realize that there
are things that we don't
need to get up on a plane for.
And perhaps, we can work on
the computer and interact
in that way.
So I think that that's
awesome, and there's not much
that can replace real,
in-person, human interaction.
But if it means that you
can juggle a few more
balls in the air and have
your family feel valued
and yourself feel valued, while
you're also valuing your work,
that thing that is
igniting for you,
I think that that's
a great outcome.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: No,
I think that's right.
Unfortunately, though,
your kids may never
know the meaning of
a snow day, you know?
DESIREE PLATA: You got it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: They
may be on remote school
whenever we would have been
home, building snow forts.
DESIREE PLATA: As a Mainer,
I appreciate this fully,
and I almost had to
write a note this year,
just let them go outside.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
Exactly, exactly.
So as we're sort of
wrapping up, just thinking
about the future of climate work
and coming back to the science,
I think you've thought a
lot about what you're doing
and impact on the climate.
I'm just wondering, as
you look around MIT,
where you think we might have
some of the greatest impact.
How do you think about what some
of your colleagues are doing?
Because I'm starting to
think a lot about what
MIT's real footprint in
this area is going to be.
DESIREE PLATA: The first
thing I want to say
is that, I think,
for a long time,
the world's been looking for a
silver bullet climate solution.
And that is not how we
got into this problem,
and it's not how we're
going to get out of it.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Exactly.
DESIREE PLATA: We need the 1,000
bb's, and fortunately, at MIT,
there are many thousands
of minds that all
have something to contribute.
So I like to impose, especially
on the undergraduates
and the graduate researchers,
our student population
out there, think, how
can I bring my talents
to bear on this really most
pressing and important problem
that's facing our
world right now?
So I would say, just
whatever your skill is
and whatever your
passion is, try
to find a way to marry
those things together
and find a way to have impact.
The other thing I would
say is that we think really
differently about problems, and
that's what might be needed.
If you're going
to break systems,
you need to come at it from
a different perspective
or a different angle.
So encouraging people
to think differently
as this community
does so well, I think,
is going to be an
enormous asset in bringing
some solutions to the
climate change challenge.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Excellent.
So if you look back over
your career, and even earlier
than when you became
a faculty member,
what do you think
the best advice
is that you've ever been given?
DESIREE PLATA: There's so much.
I've been fortunate to have a
lot of really great mentors,
and what is the best
piece of advice?
I think this notion of
balancing work and not work,
and I've gotten two really
key points of advice.
One is about travel,
and I think that ties
in to this concept of
COVID and whether or not we
can actually go remote
for a lot of things.
And it was from
an MIT professor,
and he said, you know,
the biggest thing
you can do to protect
your personal life
and your life with your family
is to say no and travel less.
Travel eats up time on
the front and the back,
and it's your family that's
paying the price for that.
So be really judicious
about your choices,
and that was excellent
advice for me.
Another female
faculty member of mine
said you have to
prioritize your family,
like they are an appointment
on your calendar.
And it's OK when you do that.
So I think those have
been really helpful for me
as I navigate and struggle with
my own very mission oriented
self, where I want to keep
working and put my focus there,
but know that it's OK
to maybe go for a walk
and talk to real people.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: Go wild.
DESIREE PLATA:
Yes, that's right.
SALLY KORNBLUTH: You know, this
issue actually of saying no,
not only to travel, but
thinking about where you really
place your efforts,
and when there's
a finite amount of time,
and when I think about this
and advising junior faculty
in terms of service,
every faculty member is
going to be asked way
more things than they're
going to want to do.
Yet, their service
to the department,
service to the
institute is important
not only for their
advancement, but in how
we create a community.
So I always advise
people to say yes
to the things they're
truly interested in
and they're passionate about,
and there will be enough
of those things.
DESIREE PLATA: I have a
flowchart for when to say yes
and when to say no,
and having interest
is at the top of the list,
and then feeling like you're
going to have an impact.
And that's something, I think,
when we do this service at MIT,
we really are able
to have an impact.
It's not just the oldest
people in the room
that get to drive the bus.
They're really listening and
want to hear that perspective
from everybody.
SALLY KORNBLUTH:
That's excellent.
Well, thanks, again, Desiree.
I really enjoyed
that conversation,
and to our audience,
thanks, again,
for listening to
Curiosity Unbounded.
I very much hope you'll
all join us again.
I'm Sally Kornbluth.
Stay curious.
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