Hear the biggest stories from the world of science | 23 October 2026...
A new course in the Department of Electrical Science and Engineering (EECS) is not focused on machine learning or microprocessors, on cryptography or quantum computing. Instead, 6.C31 (Hack Yourself) draws student interest with an intriguing pitch: that by using computing tools to implement a personal toolkit of more than 60 positive habits, students can substantially improve their college experiences. A joint venture with the Experimental Study Group (ESG), developed by EECS Senior Lecturer Ana Bell, ESG Visiting Instructor Carter Jernigan, and ESG Senior Lecturer Paola Rebusco, Hack Yourself offers students the opportunity to upgrade their lives. 'We wanted to build an MIT course that exposes students, in a structured way, to what we actually know about learning and thriving,' explain the course's instructors. 'That said, MIT students are skeptical unless they can see evidence. They want data. They want methods. So we built the class around research-backed ideas that students can explore themselves, and that's where computational thinking comes in. The course treats well-being and learning almost like systems problems: How do you gather meaningful data, break a big question into manageable parts, test an intervention, and evaluate whether it worked''...
The report, released last month by the American Association for Cancer Research1 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, finds that 71% of people with cancer in the United States will live for at least five years after diagnosis, up from 49% in the late 1970s (see 'Uneven progress'). Among the success stories, gains in lung cancer survival rates are particularly striking, says Rebecca Siegel, a cancer epidemiologist at the American Cancer Society in Atlanta, Georgia. Lung cancer is one of the world's biggest causes of death, and on average, only 13% of people diagnosed with lung cancer between 1975 and 1979 lived for another five years. Between 2016 and 2022, that number reached 29%. 'It's still really low, but it's such an improvement,' says Siegel. That jump in survival rates comes from improvements in surgical techniques and radiation treatments, as well as new medicines that either unleash the immune system against tumours or target cancer cells bearing specific mutations. 'It's very heartwarming,' says Michel Coleman, an epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Coleman says global statistics broadly exhibit this same trend towards greater survival....
The most successful early-career researchers often rely on a network of mentors who each have different roles ' from advising on research and grants to making professional introductions and providing emotional support, finds a study of nearly 900 scientists just starting out1. The findings are consistent with what mentorship scholars and practitioners have long argued: no single mentor can meet all of a trainee's scientific, professional and psychosocial needs, says Keivan Stassun, an astrophysicist at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. 'It is encouraging to see these patterns emerge so clearly in a large data set of successful early-career investigators,' says Stassun, who has won awards for his mentorship. For the study, which was posted on the bioRxiv preprint server and hasn't been peer-reviewed, researchers analysed responses from recipients of K awards, issued by the US National Institutes of Health for career development. These prestigious grants support early-career researchers in strengthening their research skills and provide time for training activities that prepare them to become independent investigators....
