Search-and-rescue algorithm identifies hidden “traps” in ocean waters
Method may help quickly identify regions where objects — and missing people — may have converged.
Understanding how fluids heat or cool surfaces
Textbook formulas for describing heat flow characteristics, crucial in many industries, are oversimplified, study shows.
Staring into the vortex
MIT researchers describe factors governing how oceans and atmospheres move heat around on Earth and other planetary bodies.
Intelligent Towing Tank propels human-robot-computer research
A novel experimental facility integrates automation and active learning, illuminating a path to accelerated scientific discovery.
Antarctic ice cliffs may not contribute to sea-level rise as much as predicted
Study finds even the tallest ice cliffs should support their own weight rather than collapsing catastrophically.
Oobleck’s weird behavior is now predictable
MIT engineers develop a model that predicts how the cornstarch-water mixture turns from liquid to solid, and back again.
Researchers solve mystery of how gas bubbles form in liquid
Findings show how to make confined bubbles develop uniformly, instead of in their usual scattershot way.
A droplet walks into an electric field …
Researchers have found a simple formula that could be useful for air purification, space propulsion, and molecular analyses.
Study demonstrates seagrass’ strong potential for curbing erosion
Ubiquitous marine plants dissipate wave energy and could help protect vulnerable shorelines.
Ken Kamrin seeks fundamental behaviors in sand
Mechanical engineering professor’s models of granular flow shed light on agriculture, soils, and geology.
Machine learning identifies links between world’s oceans
Maike Sonnewald adapts a method that identifies areas of the global ocean with similar physics, revealing global dynamical regimes.
Engineers make clear droplets produce iridescent colors
Optical effect could be harnessed for light displays, litmus tests, and makeup products.
New climate model to be built from the ground up
Scientists and engineers will collaborate in a new Climate Modeling Alliance to advance climate modeling and prediction.
Building the ultimate record of the ocean
Carl Wunsch continues to expand his foundational framework for understanding the behavior of worldwide oceans as a whole.
Bursting bubbles launch bacteria from water to air
Study illuminates new mode of bacteria dispersal.