MIT News

Keeping our distance from each other for an extended period of time is the most effective way to reduce COVID-19’s spread. But the prospect of prolonged social isolation is uncharted territory for many of us. To get some insight on how we might navigate this period of social separation, MIT News checked in with MIT alumna and former astronaut Cady Coleman, who perhaps had the ultimate isolation experience.

Cady spent months at a time on the International Space Station (ISS). While orbiting some 250 miles above Earth, Cady with other astronauts lived and worked in quarters that are about the size of a six-bedroom house, with only occasional opportunities to step outside on spacewalks to repair or maintain the station. Despite being physically isolated from the rest of the world for months at a time, the astronauts found ways to bridge the distance with family and friends by talking on the phone, or through video chats. But just as importantly, they also made sure to find time for themselves, and embrace their isolation. Cady Coleman flew on the space shuttle twice and served a long-duration mission for six months aboard the Space Station as a NASA astronaut. Here, Cady shares with us some of the lessons she learned from living in space, and how we can all commit to a mission to live, at least for now, at a distance.

CADY COLEMAN: I think what makes everything work is the mission. As an astronaut, I was on the forward edge of exploration, representing the many people who make the ISS mission and experiments happen. Right now our mission is to keep each other safe here on Earth. I think keeping that mission in mind makes it easier to wash your hands that one more time when you really don’t feel like it, and to tell friends who are more casual about social distancing, things like, “No, I really don’t think it’s safe to do that together for now." NARRATOR: The challenging times of isolation in space is something only a select few may experience during their lifetime, but feelings of isolation can be felt here on Earth right now. Currently, people across the globe are facing the challenge of forced isolation that, with the overall anxiety surrounding this novel virus have many finding it harder to cope than anticipated. Colman remembers the more challenging moments she had to work through during their time on ISS, and share some advice on how to get through and even embrace this social-distancing period.

CADY COLEMAN: We had one crew member whose mom passed away fairly unexpectedly while we were in space. We established we’d have our own memorial service at the same time as the funeral back home. And I looked at the world map and realized we were going to be passing over his hometown at the time of the funeral. So the six of us were there in the cupola together, and we had a few moments of silence, and I really felt we were together with all the family on the ground. There are a lot of things we can’t control now. What are the things we can? We can control the things we learn. And I’m thinking I may take some Skype lessons for playing the flute, and learning Chinese has always been on my list, as well as practicing my Russian. There are projects I have on my list, from finishing my website to cleaning out my attic, and right now it feels like I may, in a joyful and not so joyful way, get them all done.

CADY COLEMAN: I think about the things I wish I did when I was up on the space station. One is get enough sleep. Probably my whole life I’ve never gotten enough sleep, especially at MIT, right? So taking care of yourself is a really good thing — prioritize that. And also, some kind of journaling or recording: Jot a few notes, capture this time for yourself, whether you plan to share it with anyone or not. Take pictures that help people realize what it was like for you. Because your experiences may be valuable to others in the future. When the mission you've chosen forces you to be isolated, you find a way to be the best you can.

Frontline health workers represent the lifeblood of many health care systems in low- and middle-income countries around the world. These workers operate outside hospital settings to meet the community's poorest people where they live and work, ensuring health care initiatives impact the families that need them most. CommCare, a product developed by the MIT spinout, Dimagi, allows frontline health workers to build useful tools that can be accessed even offline by cell phones of all types.

*Edited to reflect Dimagi’s response to COVID-19.

Read the article: http://news.mit.edu/2020/dimagi-commcare-health-0309

MIT researchers report that more than half of all air-quality-related early deaths in the United States are a result of emissions originating outside of the state in which those deaths occur.

Read the article: http://news.mit.edu/2020/half-us-deaths-air-pollution-out-state-0212

A new study estimates that improving the rates of handwashing by travelers passing through just 10 of the world’s leading airports could significantly reduce the spread of many infectious diseases. The findings, which deal with infectious diseases in general including the flu, were published in late December, just before the recent coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, China, but the study’s authors say that its results would apply to any such disease and are relevant to the current outbreak.

Read the article: http://news.mit.edu/2020/slow-epidemic-airport-handwashing-0206

The areas of Indonesia where Dutch colonial rulers built a huge sugar-producing industry in the 1800s remain more economically productive today than other parts of the country, according to a study co-authored by an MIT economist.

Read the article: http://news.mit.edu/2020/sugar-factories-colonial-indonesia-olken-dell-0206

We've asked graduate student Rachel Smith to explain what bioprinting is, and what biohybrid materials are, and give us some idea of where these fields of study are going.

3D printing is everywhere. From bike parts, to fashion, to novelty key chains, to tools and light fixtures. We often see it employed to accelerate production processes and prototyping but what about the biological potential of printing?

Audio Explainer transcript: http://news.mit.edu/2020/audio-explainer-bioprinting-biohybrid-materials-0123

While the process by which volcanic islands from is similar from chain to chain, the time that any island spends above sea level can very widely, from a few million years in the case of the Galapagos to over 20 million for the Canary Islands. And yet the mechanisms that set an island's lifespan are largely unknown.

Read the article: http://news.mit.edu/2019/how-long-will-volcanic-island-live-0101

Throughout most of 2016, a significant percentage of the American public believed the winner of the November 2016 election would be a woman. Strikingly, a new study from cognitive scientists and linguists at MIT and elsewhere shows that despite that belief people rarely used the pronoun "she" when referring to the next U.S. president before the election.

Read the article: http://news.mit.edu/2020/she-missing-presidential-language-0108

At the undergraduate level at MIT there is a course within the linguistics program creating a lot of buzz: 24.917 Constructed Languages. Taught by Professor Norvin Richards, this course aims to get students interested in linguistics by having them create their own languages from scratch.

Audio transcript: https://shass.mit.edu/news/news-2019-transcript-audio-feature-build-your-own-language-24917

Written, produced and performed by: Melanie Gonick/MIT News

Co-producer: Christine Daniloff/MIT

Featured (in order of appearance): Alyssa Wells-Lewis, Shiloh Curtis, Joseph Noszek, Norvin Richards and Lulu Russell.

Once upon a time — from the 1600s through the 1800s — Japan had a spy corps so famous we know their name today: the ninjas, intelligence agents serving the ruling Tokugawa family. Over the last 75 years, however, as international spying and espionage has proliferated, Japan has mostly been on the sidelines of this global game. Defeat in World War II, and demilitarization afterward, meant that Japanese intelligence services were virtually nonexistent for decades.

A new book, by MIT political scientist Richard Samuels, examines the past and future of Japanese intelligence services in a rapidly shifting world.

Read the story: http://news.mit.edu/2019/special-duty-japan-intelligence-1008