Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT is a three-letter acronym that can mean: Manipal Institute of Technology, an engineering college in Manipal, Karnataka, India Massachusetts Institute of Technology Maharashtra Institute of Technology Madras Institute of Technology Mapua Institute of Technology methylisothiazolinone, a preservative Murder Investigation Team, a British television program which is a spin...
Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ...
Motto	"Mens et Manus" (Latin for "Mind and Hand")
Established	1861 (opened 1865)
Type	Private
Academic term	4-1-4
Endowment	US $9.98 billion [2]
Chancellor	Phillip Clay
President	Susan Hockfield
Provost	L. Rafael Reif
Faculty	998
Undergraduates	4,127
Postgraduates	6,126
Location	Cambridge, Mass., USA
Campus	Urban, 168 acres (0.7 km²)
Athletics	Division III 41 varsity teams
Colors	Cardinal Red and Gray
Mascot	Beaver
Nobel laureates	63[1]
Website	web.mit.edu

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private, coeducational research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing 32 academic departments,^[3] with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological research. MIT is one of two private land-grant universities as well as a sea-grant and space-grant university. A motto (from Italian) is a phrase or a short list of words meant formally to describe the general motivation or intention of an entity, social group, or organization. ... The date of establishment or date of founding of an institution is the date on which that institution chooses to claim as its starting point. ... A private university is a university that is run without the control of any government entity. ... An academic term is a division of an academic year, the time during which a school, college or university holds classes. ... A financial endowment is a transfer of money or property donated to an institution, with the stipulation that it be invested, and the principal remain intact. ... ISO 4217 Code USD User(s) the United States, the British Indian Ocean Territory,[1] the British Virgin Islands, East Timor, Ecuador, El Salvador, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Palau, Panama, Turks and Caicos Islands, and the insular areas of the United States Inflation 2. ... One thousand million (1,000,000,000) is the natural number following 999,999,999 and preceding 1,000,000,001. ... A Chancellor is the head of a university. ... University President is the title of the highest ranking officer within a university, within university systems that prefer that appellation over other variations such as Chancellor or rector. ... Susan Hockfield, a molecular neurobiologist, became the first woman President of MIT on December 6, 2004 Susan Hockfield was announced as MIT’s sixteenth president on August 26, 2004. ... Provost is the title of a senior academic administrator at many institutions of higher education in the United States and Canada, the equivalent of Vice-Chancellor at certain UK universites such as UCL, and the head of certain Oxbridge colleges (e. ... L. Rafael Reif is a professor of Electrical Engineering and the current Provost of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ... A faculty is a division within a university. ... In some educational systems, undergraduate education is post-secondary education up to the level of a Bachelors degree. ... Degree ceremony at Cambridge. ... Location in Massachusetts Coordinates: , Country United States State Massachusetts County Middlesex County Settled 1630 Incorporated 1636 Government  - Type Mayor-council city  - Mayor Kenneth Reeves (D) Area  - City  7. ... This article is about the U.S. State. ... Crowded Shibuya, Tokyo shopping district An urban area is an area with an increased density of human-created structures in comparison to the areas surrounding it. ... Division III (or DIII) is a division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association of the United States. ... In the United States and Canada, varsity sports teams are the principal athletic teams representing a college, university, or high school or other secondary school. ... School colors are the colors chosen by a school to represent it on uniforms and other items of identification. ... Cardinal is a vivid red, which gets its name from the cassocks worn by Catholic cardinals. ... Gray or grey is a color seen commonly in nature. ... Millie, once mascot of the City of Brampton, is now the Brampton Arts Councils representative. ... The Nobel Prizes (pronounced no-BELL or no-bell) are awarded annually to people who have done outstanding research, invented groundbreaking techniques or equipment, or made outstanding contributions to society. ... A website (alternatively, Web site or web site) is a collection of Web pages, images, videos and other digital assets that is hosted on one or several Web server(s), usually accessible via the Internet, cell phone or a LAN. A Web page is a document, typically written in HTML... Image File history File links MIT_logo. ... A private university is a university that is run without the control of any government entity. ... Coeducation is the integrated education of males and females at the same school facilities. ... A university is an institution of higher education and of research, which grants academic degrees. ... Location in Massachusetts Coordinates: , Country United States State Massachusetts County Middlesex County Settled 1630 Incorporated 1636 Government  - Type Mayor-council city  - Mayor Kenneth Reeves (D) Area  - City  7. ... This article is about the U.S. State. ... Land-grant universities (also called land-grant colleges or land grant institutions) are institutions of higher education in the United States which have been designated by Congress to receive the benefits of the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890. ... The United States of America National Sea Grant College Program encourages wise stewardship of marine resources through research, education, outreach and technology transfer. ... The U.S. Congress established the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program in 1988. ...

MIT was founded by William Barton Rogers in 1861 in response to the increasing industrialization of the United States. Although based upon German and French polytechnic models of an institute of technology, MIT's founding philosophy of "learning by doing" made it an early pioneer in the use of laboratory instruction,^[4] undergraduate research, and progressive architectural styles. As a federally funded research and development center during World War II, MIT scientists developed defense-related technologies that would later become integral to computers, radar, and inertial guidance. After the war, MIT's reputation expanded beyond its core competencies in science and engineering into the social sciences including economics, linguistics, political science, and management. MIT's endowment and annual research expenditures are among the largest of any American university.^[5] William Barton Rogers (1804-1882) is best known for incorporating the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1861. ... Apollo 11 launch. ... Institute of Technology is also the name of a vocational school in California. ... Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs) conduct research for the United States Government. ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000... The Whirlwind computer was developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ... For other uses, see Radar (disambiguation). ... An inertial navigation system measures the position and altitude of a vehicle by measuring the accelerations and rotations applied to the systems inertial frame. ... ‹ The template below is being considered for deletion. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language, which can be theoretical or applied. ... The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Political Science is the field concerning the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behaviour. ... For other uses, see Management (disambiguation). ...

MIT graduates and faculty are noted for their technical acumen (63 Nobel Laureates, 47 National Medal of Science recipients, and 29 MacArthur Fellows),^[6][7] entrepreneurial spirit (a 1997 report claimed that the aggregated revenues of companies founded by MIT affiliates would make it the twenty-fourth largest economy in the world),^[8] and irreverence (the popular practice of constructing elaborate pranks, or hacking, often has anti-authoritarian overtones). The following list provides information on nobel laureates and their affiliation to academic institutions. ... National Medal of Science The National Medal of Science, also called the Presidential Medal of Science, is an honor given by the President of the United States to individuals in science and engineering who have made important contributions to the advancement of knowledge in the fields of behavioral and social... The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is a private, independent grantmaking institution. ... An MIT hack is defined as a clever, benign, and ethical prank or practical joke at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ...

History

Main article: History of MIT

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology was founded in 1861 and has played pivotal roles in the many scientific and technological developments since then. ...

Initial years and vision

MIT's Great Dome and Killian Court.

In 1861, The Commonwealth of Massachusetts approved a charter for the incorporation of the "Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Boston Society of Natural History" submitted by William Barton Rogers. Rogers sought to establish a new form of higher education to address the challenges posed by rapid advances in science and technology during the mid-19th century with which classic institutions were ill-prepared to deal.^[10] The Rogers Plan, as it came to be known, was rooted in three principles: the educational value of useful knowledge, the necessity of “learning by doing,” and integrating a professional and liberal arts education at the undergraduate level.^[11][12] William Barton Rogers (1804-1882) is best known for incorporating the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1861. ... A liberal arts college is an institution of higher education found in the United States, offering programs in the liberal arts at the post-secondary level. ...

Because open conflict in the Civil War broke out only a few months later, MIT's first classes were held in rented space at the Mercantile Building in downtown Boston in 1865.^[13] Construction of the first MIT buildings was completed in Boston's Back Bay in 1866 and MIT would be known as "Boston Tech." During the next half-century, the focus of the science and engineering curriculum drifted towards vocational concerns instead of theoretical programs. Charles William Eliot, the president of Harvard University, repeatedly attempted to merge MIT with Harvard's Lawrence Scientific School over his 30-year tenure: overtures were made as early as 1869^[14] with other proposals in 1900 and 1914 ultimately being defeated.^{[15][16][17][18]} Combatants United States of America (Union) Confederate States of America (Confederacy) Commanders Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee Strength 2,200,000 1,064,000 Casualties 110,000 killed in action, 360,000 total dead, 275,200 wounded 93,000 killed in action, 258,000 total... Aerial view of Back Bay, Boston including the Charles River, Prudential Center and John Hancock Tower Back Bay is an officially recognized neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. ... Prof. ... Harvard University (incorporated as The President and Fellows of Harvard College) is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA and a member of the Ivy League. ...

Expansion

A plaque of George Eastman, founder of Kodak, in Building 6. His nose is rubbed by students for good luck.

The attempted mergers occurred in parallel with MIT's continued expansion beyond the classroom and laboratory space permitted by its Boston campus. President Richard Maclaurin sought to move the campus to a new location when he took office in 1909.^[19] An anonymous donor, later revealed to be George Eastman, donated the funds to build a new campus along a mile-long tract of swamp and industrial land on the Cambridge side of the Charles River. In 1916, MIT moved into its handsome new neoclassical campus designed by the noted architect William W. Bosworth which it occupies to this date. The new campus triggered some changes in the stagnating undergraduate curriculum, but in the 1930s President Karl Taylor Compton and Vice-President (effectively Provost) Vannevar Bush drastically reformed the curriculum by re-emphasizing the importance of "pure" sciences like physics and chemistry and reducing the work required in shops and drafting. Despite the difficulties of the Great Depression, the reforms "renewed confidence in the ability of the Institute to develop leadership in science as well as in engineering."^[20] The expansion and reforms thus cemented MIT's academic reputation on the eve of World War II by attracting scientists and researchers who would later make significant contributions in the Radiation Laboratory, Instrumentation Laboratory, and other defense-related research programs. Plaque of George Eastman at MIT Photograph taken by Jackson Frakes. ... Plaque of George Eastman at MIT Photograph taken by Jackson Frakes. ... A 1954 U.S. stamp featuring George Eastman. ... Eastman Kodak Company (NYSE: EK) is a large multinational public company producing photographic equipment. ... Richard Cockburn Maclaurin (1870 - 1920), was a U.S. educator and physicist. ... A 1954 U.S. stamp featuring George Eastman. ... The neoclassical movement that produced Neoclassical architecture began in the mid-18th century, both as a reaction against the Rococo style of anti-tectonic naturalistic ornament, and an outgrowth of some classicizing features of Late Baroque. ... Please wikify (format) this article or section as suggested in the Guide to layout and the Manual of Style. ... Karl Taylor Compton (1887-1954) was a prominent American physicist and president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (1930-1948). ... Provost is the title of a senior academic administrator at many institutions of higher education in the United States and Canada, the equivalent of Vice-Chancellor at certain UK universites such as UCL, and the head of certain Oxbridge colleges (e. ... Vannevar Bush (March 11, 1890 – June 30, 1974) was an American engineer and science administrator, known for his political role in the development of the atomic bomb, and the idea of the memex—seen as a pioneering concept for the World Wide Web. ... For other uses, see The Great Depression (disambiguation). ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000... The Radiation Laboratory or often RadLab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology was in operation from October 1940 until December 31, 1945. ... The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, Inc. ...

MIT was drastically changed by its involvement in military research during World War II. Bush was appointed head of the enormous Office of Scientific Research and Development and directed funding to only a select group of universities, including MIT.^[21][22] During the war and in the post-war years, this government-sponsored research contributed to a fantastic growth in the size of the Institute's research staff and physical plant as well as placing an increased emphasis on graduate education.^[23] In June of 1941, the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) superseded the committee structure [of the National Defense Research Committee (NDRC)]. The OSRD projects gave the United States and Allied troops more powerful and more accurate bombs, more reliable detonators, lighter and more accurate weapons, safer and more... Research funding is a term generally covering any funding for scientific research, in the areas of both hard science and technology, and social science. ...

As the Cold War and Space Race intensified and concerns about the technology gap between the U.S. and the Soviet Union grew more pervasive throughout the 1950s and 1960s, MIT's involvement in the military-industrial complex was a source of pride on campus.^[24][25] However, by the late 1960s and early 1970s, intense protests by student and faculty activists (an era now known as "the troubles")^[26] against the Vietnam War and MIT's defense research required that the MIT administration to divest itself from what would become the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory and move all classified research off-campus to the Lincoln Laboratory facility. Sputnik 1 The Sputnik crisis was a turn point of the Cold War that began on October 4, 1957 when the Soviet Union launched the Sputnik 1 satellite. ... President Dwight Eisenhower famously referred to the military-industrial complex in his farewell address. ... Combatants Republic of Vietnam United States Republic of Korea Thailand Australia New Zealand The Philippines National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam Democratic Republic of Vietnam People’s Republic of China Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea Strength US 1,000,000 South Korea 300,000 Australia 48,000... The military funding of science has had a powerful transformative effect on the practice and products of scientific research since the early 20th century. ... The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, Inc. ... MIT Lincoln Laboratory, also known as Lincoln Lab, is a federally funded research and development center managed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and funded by the United States Department of Defense. ...

Challenges and controversies

Ellen Swallow Richards, first female student and professor at MIT.

MIT has been nominally coeducational since admitting Ellen Swallow Richards in 1870. (Richards also became the first female member of MIT's faculty, specializing in sanitary chemistry.)^[27] Female students, however, remained a tiny minority (numbered in dozens) prior to the completion of the first wing of a women's dormitory, McCormick Hall, in 1963.^[28][29] By 1993, 32% of MIT's undergraduates were female and in 2006, the number had increased to near-parity (47.5%).^[30] Image File history File links Ellen_S_Richards. ... Image File history File links Ellen_S_Richards. ... Coeducation is the integrated education of males and females at the same school facilities. ... Ellen Swallow Richards (December 3, 1842 — March 30, 1911) was the foremost female industrial and environmental chemist in the United States in the 1800s, pioneering the field of sanitary engineering and founding the field of home economics. ... Environmental health is the branch of public health that is concerned with all aspects of the natural and built environment that may affect human health. ... Katharine Dexter McCormick (August 27, 1875 – December 28, 1967) was a U.S. biologist, suffragette, philanthropist and, after her husbands death, heir to a substantial part of the McCormick fortune. ...

In 1998, MIT became the first major research university to acknowledge the existence of a systematic bias against female faculty in its School of Science and supported efforts toward corrective measures although the study's methods were controversial.^[31][32] A 2003 MIT news release cites various statistics suggesting that the status of women improved during the latter years of President Vest's tenure.^[33] Susan Hockfield, a molecular neurobiologist, became MIT's 16th president on December 6, 2004 and is the first woman to hold the post. While the student body has become more balanced in recent years, women are still a distinct minority among faculty. A systemic bias is a bias which is endemic in a system – especially a human system – making it tend to err consistently in a certain direction. ... Susan Hockfield, a molecular neurobiologist, became the first woman President of MIT on December 6, 2004 Susan Hockfield was announced as MIT’s sixteenth president on August 26, 2004. ... Drawing of the cells in the chicken cerebellum by S. Ramón y Cajal Neuroscience is a field that is devoted to the scientific study of the nervous system. ... December 6 is the 340th day of the year (341st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Mapúa Institute of Technology (MIT, MapúaTech or simply Mapúa) is a private, non-sectarian, Filipino tertiary institute located in Intramuros, Manila. ... Mapúa Institute of Technology (MIT, MapúaTech or simply Mapúa) is a private, non-sectarian, Filipino tertiary institute located in Intramuros, Manila. ...

The 1984 dismissal of David F. Noble, a historian of technology, became a cause celebre about the extent to which academics are granted "freedom of speech" after he published several books and papers critical of MIT's and other research universities' reliance upon financial support from corporations and the military.^[34] David F. Noble is a critical historian of technology, science and education. ... Cause c bre is a French phrase, literally meaning famous case, referring to events, frequently famous legal cases, that attract public attention and controversy. ... This article is about the general concept. ...

In 1986, Professor David Baltimore, a Nobel Laureate, became embroiled in an investigation of research misconduct that led to Congressional hearings in 1991. David Baltimore (b. ... List of Nobel Prize laureates in Physiology or Medicine from 1901 to the present day. ... Scientific misconduct is the violation of the standard codes of scholarly conduct and ethical behavior in professional scientific research. ...

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, many American politicians and business leaders accused MIT and other universities of contributing to a declining economy by transferring taxpayer-funded research and technology to international — especially Japanese — firms that were competing with struggling American businesses.^[35] The Scapegoat by William Holman Hunt, 1854. ... The recession of the late nineteen-eighties was an economic recession that hit much of the world beginning in 1987. ... Technology transfer is the process of developing practical applications for the results of scientific research. ... // [edit] Introduction [edit] Definition If we were to take snapshots of an economy at different points in time, no two photos would look alike. ...

In 1991, the Justice Department filed an antitrust suit against MIT and the eight Ivy League colleges for holding "Overlap Meetings" to prevent bidding wars over promising students from consuming funds for need-based scholarships. While the Ivy League institutions settled, MIT contested the charges on the grounds that the practice was not anticompetitive because it ensured the availability of aid for the greatest number of students. MIT ultimately prevailed when the Justice Department dropped the case in 1994.^[36] The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) is a Cabinet department in the United States government designed to enforce the law and defend the interests of the United States according to the law and to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans. ... John Sherman The Sherman Antitrust Act (Sherman Act[1], July 2, 1890, ch. ... For other uses, see Ivy League (disambiguation). ... DECREE - The judgment or sentence of a court of equity which corresponds to the judgment of a court of law. ...

In 2000, Professor Ted Postol accused the MIT administration of attempting to whitewash potential research misconduct at the Lincoln Lab facility involving a ballistic missile defense test, though a final investigation into the matter has not been completed. Theodore Postol is a Professor of Science, Technology, and International Security at MIT and a prominent critic of the effectiveness of missile defense. ... This article is for the meaning of censorship. ... A payload launch vehicle carrying a prototype exoatmospheric kill vehicle is launched from Meck Island at the Kwajalein Missile Range on Dec. ...

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, a number of student deaths resulted in considerable media attention to MIT's culture and student life.^[37] After the alcohol-related death of Scott Krueger in September 1997 as a new member at the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity, MIT began requiring all freshmen to live in the dormitory system.^[38] The 2000 suicide of MIT undergraduate Elizabeth Shin drew attention to suicides at MIT and created a controversy over whether MIT had an unusually high suicide rate.^[39][40] In late 2001 a task force's recommended improvements in student mental health services^[41] were implemented, including expanding staff and operating hours at the mental health center.^[42] These and later cases were significant as well because they sought to prove the negligence and liability of university administrators in loco parentis.^[43] This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Elizabeth Shin (1980 - April 14, 2000) was an MIT student who died from burns inflicted by a fire in her dormitory room. ... Mental health is a term used to describe either a level of cognitive or emotional wellbeing or an absence of mental illness. ... The term in loco parentis, Latin for in the place of a parent, refers to the legal responsibility of a person or organization to take on some of the functions and responsibilities of a parent. ...

In April 2007, Dean of Admissions Marilee Jones resigned after she "misrepresented her academic degrees" when she applied to an administrative assistant position in 1979 and never corrected the record despite her subsequent promotions.^[44][45] Marilee Jones (born June 12, 1951) is a former dean of admissions at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the co-author of the popular guide to the college admission process, Less Stress, More Success: A New Approach to Guiding Your Teen Through College Admissions and Beyond (American Academy...

Organization

See also: List of Massachusetts Institute of Technology departments and laboratories

MIT is "a university polarized around science, engineering, and the arts."^[46] MIT has five schools (Science, Engineering, Architecture and Planning, Management, and Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences) and one college (Whitaker College of Health Sciences and Technology), but no schools of law or medicine.^[47] This list of Massachusetts Institute of Technology departments and laboratories covers the universitys diverse and interdisciplinary research interest. ... It has been suggested that MIT Biology Department, MIT Chemistry Department, MIT Mathematics Department, MIT Physics Department, Center for Theoretical Physics, McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Picower Institute for Learning and Memory and MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center be merged into this article or section. ... It has been suggested that MIT Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department, MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, MIT Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems and Research Laboratory of Electronics at MIT be merged into this article or section. ... It has been suggested that MIT Design Advisor, MIT at Lawrence and West Philadelphia Landscape Project be merged into this article or section. ... The MIT Sloan School of Management is one of the five schools of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. It is one of the worlds leading business schools, conducting research and teaching in finance, entrepreneurship, marketing, strategic management, economics, organizational behavior, operations management, supply chain... It has been suggested that MIT Economics Department be merged into this article or section. ... Founded in 1970, the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, or HST, is one of the oldest and largest biomedical engineering and physician-scientist training programs in the United States and the longest-standing functional collaboration between Harvard and MIT. [[ |frame|HST]] HSTs unique interdisciplinary educational program...

MIT is governed by a 78-member board of trustees known as the MIT Corporation^[48] which approve the budget, degrees, and faculty appointments as well as electing the President.^[49] MIT's endowment and other financial assets are managed through a subsidiary MIT Investment Management Company (MITIMCo).^[50] The chair of each of MIT's 32 academic departments reports to the dean of that department's school, who in turn reports to the Provost under the President. However, faculty committees assert substantial control over many areas of MIT's curriculum, research, student life, and administrative affairs.^[51] It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Board of directors. ... A financial endowment is a transfer of money or property donated to an institution, with the stipulation that it be invested, and the principal remain intact. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

MIT students refer to both their majors and classes using numbers alone. Majors are numbered in the approximate order of when the department was founded; for example, Civil and Environmental Engineering is Course I, while Nuclear Science & Engineering is Course XXII.^[52] Students majoring in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, the most popular department, collectively identify themselves as "Course VI." MIT students use a combination of the department's course number and the number assigned to the class number to identify their subjects; the course which many American universities would designate as "Physics 101" is, at MIT, simply "8.01."^[53]

Campus

MIT's 168 acre (0.7 km²) Cambridge campus spans approximately a mile of the Charles River front. The campus is divided roughly in half by Massachusetts Avenue, with most dormitories and student life facilities to the west and most academic buildings to the east. The bridge closest to MIT is the Harvard Bridge, which is marked off in the fanciful unit – the Smoot. The Kendall MBTA Red Line station is located on the far northeastern edge of the campus in Kendall Square. The Cambridge neighborhoods surrounding MIT are a mixture of high tech companies occupying both modern office and rehabilitated industrial buildings as well as socio-economically diverse residential neighborhoods. The Charles River from the Boston side, facing Cambridge and the main campus of Harvard University. ... Massachusetts Avenue is the name shared by several prominent streets in the United States, located in Boston, Massachusetts; Washington, D.C.; and Lawrence, Kansas. ... The Harvard Bridge (also known locally as the MIT bridge or the Mass Ave bridge) is the longest bridge over the Charles River. ... The Harvard Bridge, looking towards Boston The smoot is a nonstandard unit of length created as part of an MIT fraternity prank. ... Kendall/MIT Station, Fall 2004 Kendall/MIT Station is located in Kendall Square at the intersection of Broadway and Main Street, in Cambridge. ... Red Line train of #1 Red Line stock crossing the Charles River on the Longfellow Bridge, towards Boston View of Boston from the Red Line The Red Line is a rapid transit line operated by the MBTA running roughly north-south through Boston, Massachusetts into neighboring communities. ... Kendall Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge, Massachusetts, located at the intersection of Main Street, Broadway, Wadsworth Street, and Third Street (known as Kendall Square). It may also refer to the broad business district that is west of Portland Street, east of Charles River, north of MIT and south of...

   

Northward view of MIT's campus along the Charles River. Undergraduate dormitories MacGregor House, Burton-Connor House, Baker House, and McCormick Hall, as well as graduate dormitory Ashdown House, can be seen to the west of the Harvard Bridge and Massachusetts Avenue. The Maclaurin buildings and Killian Court can be seen at the center of the image. The Green Building, Walker Memorial, Media Lab, and high-rise offices and laboratories in Kendall Square can be seen to the east.

MIT buildings all have a number (or a number and a letter) designation and most have a name as well.^[54] Typically, academic and office buildings are referred to only by number while residence halls are referred to by name. The organization of building numbers roughly corresponds to the order in which the buildings were built and their location relative (north, west, and east) to the original, center cluster of Maclaurin buildings. Many are connected above ground as well as through an extensive network of underground tunnels, providing protection from the Cambridge weather. MIT also owns commercial real estate and research facilities throughout Cambridge and the greater Boston area. MIT's on-campus nuclear reactor is the second largest university-based nuclear reactor in the United States. The high visibility of the reactor's containment building in a densely populated area has caused some controversy,^[55] but MIT maintains that it is well-secured.^[56] Other notable campus facilities include a pressurized wind tunnel, a towing tank for testing ship and ocean structure designs, and a low-emission cogeneration plant that serves most of the campus electricity and heating requirements. MIT's campus-wide wireless network was completed in the fall of 2005 and consists of nearly 3,000 access points covering 9.4 million square feet of campus.^[57] Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 133 pixel Image in higher resolution (2475 × 412 pixel, file size: 1. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 133 pixel Image in higher resolution (2475 × 412 pixel, file size: 1. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... The Charles River from the Boston side, facing Cambridge and the main campus of Harvard University. ... The Harvard Bridge (also known locally as the MIT bridge or the Mass Ave bridge) is the longest bridge over the Charles River. ... Massachusetts Avenue is the name shared by several prominent streets in the United States, located in Boston, Massachusetts; Washington, D.C.; and Lawrence, Kansas. ... Kendall Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge, Massachusetts, located at the intersection of Main Street, Broadway, Wadsworth Street, and Third Street (known as Kendall Square). It may also refer to the broad business district that is west of Portland Street, east of Charles River, north of MIT and south of... The MIT Nuclear Research Reactor (MITR) is currently on the MITR-II design. ... Core of a small nuclear reactor used for research. ... NASA wind tunnel with the model of a plane A wind tunnel is a research tool developed to assist with studying the effects of air moving over or around solid objects. ... A ship model basin may be defined as one of two separate yet related entities, namely: a physical basin or tank used to carry out hydrodynamic tests with ship models, for the purpose of designing a new (full sized) ship, or refining the design of a ship to improve the... Cogeneration (also combined heat and power, CHP) is the use of a heat engine or a power station to simultaneously generate both electricity and useful heat. ...

Architecture

Main article: Architecture of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Stata Center houses CSAIL, LIDS, and the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy

Frieze on Building 2 dedicated to Newton

As MIT's school of architecture was the first in the United States,^[58] it has a history of commissioning progressive, if stylistically inconsistent, buildings.^[59] The first buildings constructed on the Cambridge campus, completed in 1916, are known officially as the Maclaurin buildings after Institute president Richard Maclaurin who oversaw their construction. Designed by William Welles Bosworth, these imposing buildings were built of concrete, a first for a non-industrial — much less university — building in the U.S.^[60] The utopian City Beautiful movement greatly influenced Bosworth's design which features the Pantheon-esque Great Dome, housing the Barker Engineering Library, which overlooks Killian Court, where annual Commencement exercises are held. The friezes of the limestone-clad buildings around Killian Court are engraved with the names of important scientists and philosophers. The imposing Building 7 atrium along Massachusetts Avenue is regarded as the entrance to the Infinite Corridor and the rest of the campus. Building 7 (77 Massachusetts Ave. ... A photograph of MITs Stata Center. ... A photograph of MITs Stata Center. ... MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, or CSAIL, is an interdisciplinary research laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, formed on July 1, 2003 by the merger of MIT Laboratory for Computer Science and MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. ... This article is about waste matter. ... Newton Tower at MIT Photograph taken by Jackson Frakes. ... Newton Tower at MIT Photograph taken by Jackson Frakes. ... Sir Isaac Newton FRS (4 January 1643 – 31 March 1727) [ OS: 25 December 1642 – 20 March 1727][1] was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, and alchemist. ... Richard Cockburn Maclaurin (1870 - 1920), was a U.S. educator and physicist. ... Please wikify (format) this article or section as suggested in the Guide to layout and the Manual of Style. ... The City Beautiful movement was a Progressive reform movement in North American architecture and urban planning that flourished in the 1890s and 1900s with the intent of using beautification and monumental grandeur in cities to counteract the perceived moral decay of poverty-stricken urban environments. ... Facade of the Pantheon The Pantheon (Latin Pantheon[1], from Greek Πάνθεον Pantheon, meaning Temple of all the gods) is a building in Rome which was originally built as a temple to the seven deities of the seven planets in the state religion of Ancient Rome. ... Massachusetts Avenue is the name shared by several prominent streets in the United States, located in Boston, Massachusetts; Washington, D.C.; and Lawrence, Kansas. ... The Infinite Corridor is the hallway, 251 meters (825 feet) long, that runs through the main building of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ...

Alvar Aalto's Baker House (1947), Eero Saarinen's Chapel and Auditorium (1955), and I.M. Pei's Green, Dreyfus, Landau, and Weisner buildings represent high forms of post-war modern architecture. More recent buildings like Frank Gehry's Stata Center (2004), Steven Holl's Simmons Hall (2002), and Charles Correa's Building 46 (2005) are distinctive amongst the Boston area's staid architecture^[61] and serve as examples of contemporary campus "starchitecture."^[59] These buildings have not always been popularly accepted; the Princeton Review includes MIT in a list of twenty schools whose campuses are "tiny, unsightly, or both." ^[62] “Aalto” redirects here. ... Saarinens Gateway Arch frames The Old Courthouse, which sits at the heart of the city of Saint Louis, near the rivers edge. ... Ieoh Ming Pei (貝聿銘 pinyin Bèi Yùmíng) is a Chinese American architect born in Suzhou, China on April 26, 1917. ... Modern architecture, not to be confused with contemporary architecture, is a term given to a number of building styles with similar characteristics, primarily the simplification of form and the elimination of ornament. ... Frank Owen Gehry (born Ephraim Owen Goldberg, February 28, 1929) is a Pritzker Prize winning architect based in Los Angeles, California. ... Stata Center Building 32 at Night View from a window The Ray and Maria Stata Center is a 430,000-ft² (40,000 m²) academic complex designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Frank Gehry for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ... Steven Holls design for Simmons Hall of MIT won the Harleston Parker Medal in 2004. ... Simmons Hall. ... Charles Correa (born in Hyderabad, India on September 1, 1930) is an Indian architect, planner, activist, theoretician and a fundamental figure in the world-wide panorama of contemporary architecture. ...

Academics

Student demographics

MIT enrolls more graduate students (approximately 6,000 in total) than undergraduates (approximately 4,000). In 2006, women constituted 44 percent of all undergraduates and 30 percent of graduate students. The same year, MIT students represented all 50 states, the District of Columbia, three U.S. Territories, and 113 foreign countries. Languages Predominantly American English Religions Protestantism (chiefly Baptist and Methodist); Roman Catholicism; Islam Related ethnic groups Sub-Saharan Africans and other African groups, some with Native American groups. ... An Asian American is generally defined as a person of Asian ancestry and American citizenship,[2][3][4] although may also be extended to include non-citizen resident Asians as well. ... Hispanics in the United States, or Hispanic Americans, are American citizens or residents of Hispanic ethnicity who identify themselves as having Hispanic Cultural heritage. ... This article is about the people indigenous to the United States. ... International students are students, usually in early adulthood, who study in foreign schools. ... ... An incorporated territory of the United States is a specific area under the jurisdiction of the United States, over which the United States Congress has determined that the United States Constitution is to be applied to the territorys local government and inhabitants in its entirety (e. ...

The admissions rate for freshmen in 2007 was 11.9% with over 69% of admitted freshmen choosing to enroll. Although graduate admissions are less centralized, they are similarly selective: 19.7% of 16,153 applications were admitted with 61.2% of admitted candidates enrolling.^[66]

Undergraduate tuition is $33,400 and graduate tuition is $33,600 per year although 64% of undergraduates receive need-based financial aid and 87% of graduate students are supported by MIT fellowships, research assistantships, or teaching assistantships.^[67][68]

Classes

The Infinite Corridor is the primary passageway through campus.

MIT has an extensive core curriculum required of all undergraduates called the General Institute Requirements (GIRs). The science requirement, generally completed during freshman year as prerequisites for classes in science and engineering majors, comprises two semesters of physics classes covering Classical Mechanics and E&M, two semesters of math covering single variable calculus and multivariable calculus, one semester of chemistry, and one semester of biology. Undergraduates are required to take a laboratory class in their major, eight Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (HASS) classes (at least three in a concentration and another four unrelated subjects), and non-varsity athletes must also take four physical education classes. In May 2006, a faculty task force recommended that the current GIR system be simplified with changes to the science, HASS, and Institute Lab requirements.^[69] Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 600 pixel Image in higher resolution (1024 × 768 pixel, file size: 281 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) The Infinite Corridor (http://www. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 600 pixel Image in higher resolution (1024 × 768 pixel, file size: 281 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) The Infinite Corridor (http://www. ... The Infinite Corridor is the hallway, 251 meters (825 feet) long, that runs through the main building of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ... Classical mechanics (also called Newtonian mechanics) is used for describing the motion of macroscopic objects, from projectiles to parts of machinery, as well as astronomical objects, such as spacecraft, planets, stars, and galaxies. ... Electromagnetism is the physics of the electromagnetic field: a field, encompassing all of space, composed of the electric field and the magnetic field. ... Calculus (from Latin, pebble or little stone) is a branch of mathematics that includes the study of limits, derivatives, integrals, and infinite series, and constitutes a major part of modern university education. ... Multivariable calculus is the extension of calculus in one variable to calculus in several variables: the functions which are differentiated and integrated involve several variables rather than one variable. ... The humanities are those academic disciplines which study the human condition using methods that are largely analytic, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural and social sciences. ... The Arts is a broad subdivision of culture, comprised of many expressive disciplines. ... The social sciences are a group of academic disciplines that study human aspects of the world. ... Physical education (PE) is the interdisciplinary study of all area of science relating to the transmission of physical knowledge and skills to an individual or a group, the application of these skills, and their results. ...

Although the difficulty of MIT coursework has been characterized as "drinking from a fire hose,"^[70] the failure rate and freshmen retention rate at MIT are similar to other large research universities.^[71] Some of the pressure for first-year undergraduates is lessened by the existence of the "pass/no-record" grading system. In the first (fall) term, freshmen transcripts only report if a class was passed while no external record exists if a class was not passed. In the second (spring) term, passing grades (ABC) appear on the transcript while non-passing grades are again rendered "no-record."

Most classes rely upon a combination of faculty led lectures, graduate student led recitations, weekly problem sets (p-sets), and tests to teach material, though alternative curricula exist, e.g. Experimental Study Group, Concourse, and Terrascope.^[72][73] Over time, students compile "bibles," collections of problem set and examination questions and answers used as references for later students. In 1970, the then-Dean of Institute Relations, Benson R. Snyder, published The Hidden Curriculum, arguing that unwritten regulations, like the implicit curricula of the bibles, are often counterproductive; they fool professors into believing that their teaching is effective and students into believing they have learned the material. The Experimental Study Group (ESG) is a learning community at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ... The Hidden Curriculum (1973 edition) The Hidden Curriculum (1970) is a book by Benson R. Snyder, the then-Dean of Institute Relations at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ...

Collaborations

An example of cooperation, "The Coop" is the official bookstore of Harvard and MIT^[74]

Building 7 (also 77 Massachusetts Avenue) is regarded as the entrance to campus.

MIT historically pioneered research collaborations between industry and government.^[75][76] Fruitful collaborations with industrialists like Alfred P. Sloan and Thomas Alva Edison led President Compton to establish an Office of Corporate Relations and an Industrial Liaison Program in the 1930s and 1940s that now allows over 600 companies to license research and consult with MIT faculty and researchers.^[77] As several MIT leaders served as Presidential scientific advisers since 1940,^[78] MIT established a Washington Office in 1991 to continue to lobby for research funding and national science policy.^[79] Harvard MIT Co-op Logo Image Copyright © 1990 by the Harvard-MIT Co-op. ... Harvard MIT Co-op Logo Image Copyright © 1990 by the Harvard-MIT Co-op. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 399 × 599 pixel Image in higher resolution (599 × 900 pixel, file size: 850 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) from: [1] by: Paul Moody File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 399 × 599 pixel Image in higher resolution (599 × 900 pixel, file size: 850 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) from: [1] by: Paul Moody File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this... Cover of Time Magazine (December 27, 1926) Alfred Pritchard Sloan, Jr. ... Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847 - October 18, 1931) was an inventor and businessman who developed many important devices. ... Technology transfer is the process of developing practical applications for the results of scientific research. ... Vannevar Bush (March 11, 1890 – June 30, 1974) was an American engineer and science administrator, known for his political role in the development of the atomic bomb, and the idea of the memex—seen as a pioneering concept for the World Wide Web. ... James Rhyne Killian (1904-1988) was the 10th president of MIT from 1948 until 1959. ... Jerome Wiesner (Jerome Bert Wiesner) (May 30, 1915-October 21, 1994) was an educator, a science advisor to U.S. Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy, an advocate for arms control, and a critic of anti-ballistic-missile defense systems. ... // In 1951 President Harry S. Truman established the Science Advisory Committee as part of the Office of Defence Mobilization (ODM). ... This article is about the political effort. ... Science policy is usually considered the art of justifying, managing or prioritizing support of scientific research and development. ...

MIT's proximity^[80] to Harvard University has created both a quasi-friendly rivalry ("the other school up the river") as well as a substantial number of research collaborations such as the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Broad Institute, Center for Ultracold Atoms, and Harvard-MIT Data Center.^[81][82] In addition, students at the two schools can cross-register without any additional fees, for credits toward their own school's degrees. Harvard University (incorporated as The President and Fellows of Harvard College) is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA and a member of the Ivy League. ... The Charles River from the Boston side, facing Cambridge and the main campus of Harvard University. ... Founded in 1970, the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST) is one of the oldest and largest biomedical engineering and physician-scientist training programs in the United States and the longest-standing collaboration between Harvard and MIT. From the beginning, HST pioneered a new way of thinking... The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, formerly the Whitehead Institute/MIT Center for Genome Research (WICGR), is a multidisciplinary institution dedicated to fulfilling the potential of genomics for the biomedical sciences. ... The Center for Ultracold Atoms (CUA) is a collaborative research laboratory between MIT and Harvard University. ... Cross-registration in United States higher education is a system allowing students at one university, college, or faculty within a university to take individual courses for credit at another institution or faculty, typically in the same region. ...

MIT has a long-standing cross-registration program with Wellesley College as well as an undergraduate exchange program with the University of Cambridge known as the Cambridge-MIT Institute.^[83] MIT has limited cross-registration programs with Boston University, Brandeis University, Tufts University, Massachusetts College of Art, and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.^[83] For other uses, see Wellesley College (disambiguation). ... The University of Cambridge (often Cambridge University), located in Cambridge, England, is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world and has a reputation as one of the worlds most prestigious universities. ... The Cambridge-MIT Institute, or CMI, is a partnership between the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, UK, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts. ... For similarly-named academic institutions, see Boston (disambiguation). ... Usen Castle, the most recognized building on campus Brandeis University is a private university located in Waltham, Massachusetts, United States. ... Tufts University is a private research university in Medford/Somerville, Massachusetts, suburbs of Boston. ... MassArt, August 2005 Massachusetts College of Art (also known as MassArt) is a publicly funded college of visual and applied art, founded in 1873. ... The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (also known as the Museum School or SMFA) is an undergraduate and graduate college located in Boston, Massachusetts and is dedicated to the visual arts. ...

MIT maintains substantial research and faculty ties with independent research organizations in the Boston-area like the