Faces of Invention

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  • Engineering for Impact

    Engineering for Impact

    Five Invention-Based Businesses Addressing Development Challenges with Hardware-Led Solutions From COVID to climate change, the world has recently witnessed mounting global challenges that have hindered progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In particular, this year’s report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the COP26 UN Climate Change Conference have shownMore

  • As Earth Heats Up, This Inventor is Focused on Keeping Cool

    As Earth Heats Up, This Inventor is Focused on Keeping Cool

    As the climate heats up throughout much of the globe, more and more people are dependent on air conditioning to live comfortably. But the very technology that helps them stay cool is contributing to the rising temperatures it’s trying to combat. MIT lecturer and engineer Sorin Grama is focused on trying to break that cycle,…

  • How One High School Teacher and an Invention Project Made All the Difference

    How One High School Teacher and an Invention Project Made All the Difference

    Now a satellite orbital analyst, Ford Grundberg used to intentionally blow off his schoolwork. Then an invention education experience changed his life trajectory. Ford Grundberg was a sophomore in high school in Natick, Massachusetts, when he met Doug Scott. It was during a study hall, and Mr. Scott was the teacher overseeing the students. “At…

  • These Inventor Entrepreneurs Are Solving Global Health Challenges

    These Inventor Entrepreneurs Are Solving Global Health Challenges

    From better neonatal care to affordable and accessible diagnostics, invention-based businesses are addressing health disparities and spurring economic growth. Whether COVID-19 or pneumonia, blindness or jaundice, many health conditions can be improved or even prevented when people have access to the right care. But according to the United Nations, less than half of the global…

  • Microtechnology, Medicine and Mentoring: One Inventor’s Formula for Success

    Microtechnology, Medicine and Mentoring: One Inventor’s Formula for Success

    Sangeeta Bhatia is a leader in advancing human health care — and a role model for other women interested in STEM. At her lab at MIT, Sangeeta Bhatia is singlehandedly inspiring a new generation of inventors through a combination of humor and pragmatism. “One thing I like to tell the students, just to set their…

  • Meet the Woman Who Forged an Entirely New Scientific Field

    Meet the Woman Who Forged an Entirely New Scientific Field

    Chemical biologist Carolyn Bertozzi is blazing a trail in the way cancer and other diseases may be diagnosed and treated.

  • From Nature to New Materials: This MIT Professor’s Inventions Are Rooted in Biology

    From Nature to New Materials: This MIT Professor’s Inventions Are Rooted in Biology

    An abalone shell inspired Angela Belcher to pursue a career in engineering and cancer research.  Angela Belcher likes to make things. Her medium of choice? Atoms.  “When you take a couple of atoms and you arrange them in different ways and build them into different shapes,” she says, “it changes their properties.”  In nature, those…

  • 2021 Women’s History Month: Three Women Who Are Blazing a Trail in Medicine

    2021 Women’s History Month: Three Women Who Are Blazing a Trail in Medicine

    To celebrate Women’s History Month, we’re spotlighting the groundbreaking accomplishments of three women whose work is helping advance human health care. The good news: The number of women inventors is increasing. The not-as-good news: Only about 17% of inventors worldwide are women, according to a report published by World Intellectual Property Indicators. In the United…

  • Engineer and Children’s Author Arlyne Simon Breaking Barriers for Female Patent Holders

    Engineer and Children’s Author Arlyne Simon Breaking Barriers for Female Patent Holders

    Simon describes her own invention journey and how she works to inspire other young women and girls to enter STEM fields. At first, biomedical engineer, inventor, and author Arlyne Simon didn’t consider the possibility of becoming an entrepreneur or patent holder. “I don’t think I really associated those terms with something that I would have,…

  • Invention Roundup: Three Inventors Who Are Designing a More Inclusive World

    Invention Roundup: Three Inventors Who Are Designing a More Inclusive World

    To commemorate International Day of Persons with Disabilities, we’re spotlighting inventors whose work is redefining what it means to be included and reshaping the world so it’s accessible to all. Millions of people live with some form of disability. According to the World Health Organization’s World Report on Disability, 15 percent of the global population…

  • How Adversity Led to a Lifetime of Engineering and Invention

    How Adversity Led to a Lifetime of Engineering and Invention

    Dr. Rory A. Cooper is a veteran, an athlete and the holder of more than 20 groundbreaking patents in wheelchair and other assistive technology.

  • Solving the Food Supply Chain Through Chemistry

    Solving the Food Supply Chain Through Chemistry

    The New Frontier of Combating Food Waste Chemist Aidan Mouat has created a sustainable product that could save a quarter of a billion pounds of produce from going bad this year alone. Next time you pop a grape into your mouth, consider its path from the field to your palate. From harvest to packing to…