The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the United States, has been mentioned in many works of cinema, television, music, and the written word. MIT's widespread overall reputation has greater influence on its role in popular culture than does any particular aspect of its history or its student lifestyle. Because MIT is well known as a seedbed for technology and technologists, the makers of modern media are able to use it to effectively establish character, in a way that mainstream and international audiences can immediately understand. A smaller number of creative works use MIT directly as their scene of action.
The use of "MIT as metaphor" is relatively widespread, so much so that in popular culture, "the MIT of" is an idiom for "top science and engineering university", or "elite technical institution", like "Cadillac of" for "most luxurious", or "an Einstein" for "intelligent person". Similarly, any regionally prominent science or engineering school is likely to be called "the MIT of" that region. For example, the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Texas at Dallas have also been popularly and historically referred to as "the MIT of the South".[1][2][3] Additionally, US Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama) touted the University of Alabama in Huntsville as a possible "MIT of the South".[4] Other examples,[5] make "X is the MIT of Y" an example of a snowclone (a family of formulaic clichés).
Frequently, when a character in Hollywood cinema is required to have a science or engineering background, or in general possess an extremely high level of intelligence, the film establishes that he or she is an MIT graduate or associate. (MIT can also be a comparative or a metaphor for intellect in general: "Would they think of that at MIT?"). Numerous films and television series resort to this technique, including:
The Time Tunnel (television show) episode 28, "The Hitchiker", a computer on a planet in the solar system of the star Canopus in the year 8433 AD, while compiling all the data of the history of Earth, reveals that Tony Newman received his PhD from MIT in 1954) (Dr. Newman is played by James Darren) (first broadcast on March 24, 1967)[7]
Peacemaker (2022) Season 1, Episode 1 contains the following exchange. Jamil: "Why do you think I'm mopping floors, bro? I went to MIT. I don't want the responsibility." Peacemaker: "You went to MIT?" Jamil: "Oh, yeah."
Space Force (2022) Dr. Adrian Mallory, after a prank: "That's how it was done at MIT in the '70s."
Home Economics (2022) Season 2, Episode 15. Marshall: "...back when I was at MIT, my frat brothers and I got to wondering which of us is the best genetic specimen." After following Marshall's advice, Jimmy says, "Kinda makes you doubt MIT."
Mr. Mayor (2022) Season 2, Episode 1. Mikaela Shaw, evaluating innovation consultants: "Ah, this guy is wearing an MIT sweatshirt with the arms cut off and he's pulling it off."
Duncanville (2022), Season 3, Episode 8. Neighbor child Bradley needs a babysitter because his "regular sitter is doing her dissertation at MIT."
James Burke's nonfiction television series The Day the Universe Changed (1985) explicitly employed the snowclone metaphor for a more academic purpose. In the episode "Point of View", which describes the discovery of perspective geometry and its ramifications, Burke spent some time in the Italian city of Padua. This city, which hosted the second-oldest Italian university after Bologna, boasted a large concentration of intellectuals. In Burke's phrase, Padua was "the MIT of the fifteenth century". An episode of his later series Connections 2 (1994) uses a similar shorthand to characterize the seventeenth-century Royal Society.
Films set at MIT are less common than those that use the MIT name as metaphor. Nevertheless, MIT has been part of movie settings, in such films as the action thriller Blown Away (1994), the drama Good Will Hunting (1997), the biographical drama A Beautiful Mind (2001), the heist drama 21 (2008),[18][19] and the science fiction thriller Knowing (2008, also featuring exteriors of the Haystack Observatory). Most of the scenes for these movies, especially indoor scenes, are in fact filmed elsewhere due to MIT's reluctance to give permission to film on campus. Although portions of Blown Away were shot on the MIT campus,[20] the film still makes several geographical errors about MIT and Boston in general.[21] An incidental scene in neo-noirThe Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973) was shot on location outside of MIT Baker House. A scene in the drama A Small Circle of Friends (1980) was shot in Walker Memorial, an MIT cafeteria and gymnasium; ironically the movie setting portrays Harvard University, but Harvard declined to allow the filming on their own campus.
The television series Numbers (2005–2010) has several different connections to MIT locales and people. The pilot episode was shot in Boston. Co-creator and Executive Producer Cheryl Heuton explained, "We originally tried to choose MIT for the show. We originally set the show in Boston, and Charlie [Eppes, one of the main characters,] was going to be a professor at MIT. We contacted MIT, and their answer was they're not in the film and TV business..."[22] Multiple episodes of the show mention that Charlie studied at MIT. Dylan Bruno, the actor who plays Colby Granger, has earned a bachelor's degree in environmental engineering from MIT.
Some cinematic references to MIT betray a mild anti-intellectualism, or at least a lack of respect for "book learning". For example, the adventure drama Space Cowboys (2000) features the seasoned hero (Clint Eastwood) trying to explain a piece of antiquated spacecraft technology to a whippersnapper novice. When the young astronaut fails to comprehend Eastwood's explanation, he brags that "I have two master's degrees from MIT", to which Eastwood replies, "Maybe you should get your money back". Similarly, Gus Van Sant's introduction to the published Good Will Hunting screenplay suggests that the lead character's animosity towards official MIT academia reflects a class struggle with ethnic undertones, in particular Will Hunting's Irish background versus the "English aristocracy" of the MIT faculty. Help! (1965), The Beatles' second film, ties MIT to the mad scientiststereotype when Professor Foot (Victor Spinetti) declares, "MIT was after me, you know. Wanted me to rule the world for them!"
"Inside" MIT references also appear in film and television without attribution. In the comedy Stir Crazy (1980), the opening close-up shot of Grossberger, played by Erland Van Lidth De Jeude (MIT Class of 1976, SB in Computer Science and Engineering), clearly reveals his actual "Brass Rat" class ring. In superhero filmIron Man (2008), several close-ups of Terrence Howard clearly show his character ("Jim Rhodes") to be wearing a Brass Rat; Robert Downey, Jr.'s character ("Tony Stark") appears to wear one as well in the movie.
In The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle (2000), a background image of "Whassamatta U." is recognizable as the centerpiece Great Dome of the main MIT building complex. A story arc from the original 1960s television series Rocky and Bullwinkle, "Goof Gas Attack", starts with a psychoactive gas attack that induces stupidity at the "Double Dome Institute of Advanced Thinking". The MIT campus is noted for its two prominent neoclassical domes.
MIT is referenced in some Japanese anime: the sci-fi series Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995) mentions MIT as the location of one of the replica MAGI supercomputers; and the comedy series Pani Poni Dash! (2001–2011) revolves around an 11-year-old student who graduated from MIT and travels to Japan to become a high school teacher. The CIA character "Ed Hoffman" in the action thriller Body of Lies (2008) can be seen wearing an MIT shirt in multiple shots.[23]
Individual characters in single episodes of television series are often described as MIT graduates. For example, in the 1992 episode "The Corporate Veil" of the crime-solving television series Law & Order, both mother and son protagonists are said to be electrical engineering graduates of MIT.[24] MIT was also mentioned in the year 2000 pilot episode of the comedy-drama television series Gilmore Girls.
In the comedy drama television series Las Vegas (2003), Mike Cannon (played by James Lesure), one of the main characters, is a highly intelligent, and technically very gifted MIT graduate engineer. The character Eli Wallace in the science fiction television series SGU Stargate Universe (2009–2011) is a genius MIT dropout.[25]
Two lead characters in the science fiction crime-solving television series Fringe (2008–2013) have MIT backgrounds: Walter Bishop earned a PhD at MIT, and his son Peter Bishop has falsified an MIT degree.[25]
The action comedy movie Keeping Up with the Joneses (2016) depicts its protagonist, Jeff Gaffney (Zach Galifianakis), pretending to be a scientist named Dr. Rascal Flatts, about whom his wife says, "He's very smart. MIT."[27]
An episode of the fantasy television series The Magicians (2016) introduces a character named Kira (Yaani King Mondschein),[28] who says, "I went to MIT, but I didn't study a lick of magic in school".[29]
In the science fiction time-travel television series Timeless (2016), a protagonist named Rufus Carlin (Malcolm Barrett) often mentions on the show that he is an alumnus of MIT. In one episode, Carlin time travels to 1893 and meets real-life MIT alumna Sophia Hayden (MIT Class of 1890), who assumes that Carlin must be Robert Robinson Taylor (MIT Class of 1892), the first African-American student at MIT.[30]
In the comedy animatic series, Tenacious D in Post-Apocalypto (2018), the protagonists meet a group of scientists who say, "Where are we from? MIT, where else? We are the top uttermost scientists in all of the world, surviving."[31]
The title character of the action-comedy movie sequel Shaft (2019) is a cybersecurity expert with a degree from MIT.[13]
In a 2019 episode of the science fiction television series Lost in Space, principal character Judy Robinson's biological father, Grant Kelly, is described as having had "a scholarship to MIT when he was 17 and graduated top of his class".[32]
Radio, spoken word, and podcasts
Tom Magliozzi and his younger brother Ray were "Click and Clack, The Tappet Brothers", the hosts of National Public Radio's comedy car advice show Car Talk. Both were MIT alumni — Tom earned a degree in chemical engineering (1958), and Ray earned a degree in humanities and general science (1972) — and they regularly used that fact in their humorously self-deprecating attempts to establish their credibility on technical matters. After campaigning on-air for years, they were finally invited to speak at MIT's 1999 commencement exercise.[33] Although their radio show had stopped new programming in 2012, and Tom died in 2014, archived episodes continue to be aired nationally as The Best of Car Talk.
The comedian James Mattern, in his comedy album No Segues (2019), tells this story: "When they invented emojis years ago in Cupertino, California, who had the gall to go to Steve Jobs like, 'Steve, I've got a great idea — how about drips of water?' 'Eureka, Merv, way to use your MIT degree.'" [34]
Nonfiction works have examined MIT, its history, and its various subcultures. In addition to books like Nightwork, which recount the Institute's hacking tradition, Benson Snyder's The Hidden Curriculum (1970) describes the state of MIT student and faculty psychology in the late 1960s. Noted physicist and raconteur Richard Feynman built up a collection of anecdotes about his MIT undergraduate years, several of which are retold in his loose memoir Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! Some of this material was incorporated into Matthew Broderick's film Infinity (1996), in addition to Feynman stories from Far Rockaway, Princeton University, and Los Alamos, New Mexico.
In fiction, the novel Now, Voyager (1941, by Olive Higgins Prouty) features a key character, Jeremiah Duvaux Durrance, who studied architecture at MIT.[35] The novel The Gadget Maker (1955, by Maxwell Griffith) traces the life of aeronautical engineer Stanley Brack, who performs his undergraduate studies at MIT. Ben Bova's novel The Weathermakers (1966) about scientists developing methods to prevent hurricanes from reaching land, is also set in part at MIT. Patricia Vasquez visits (or comes from) MIT in Greg Bear's Eon (1985). Neal Stephenson hints at MIT in Quicksilver (2004), and other books of The Baroque Cycle, by having Daniel Waterhouse found the "Massachusetts Bay Colony Institute of the Technologickal Arts" in the 18th century.
Ayn Rand's 1943 novel The Fountainhead begins with architecture student Howard Roark being expelled from the fictional "Stanton Institute of Technology". As that institute is depicted as being located in a seashore suburb of Boston, it seems that MIT – specifically, its School of Architecture – was alluded to.
Jhumpa Lahiri's 2003 debut novel The Namesake features a character, Ashoke, who received his PhD in Fiber Optics from MIT.
When the novel The Magicians by Lev Grossman was first published in 2009, the principal review of the book in The New York Times described the story's academic location, Brakebills College, as "kind of like the M.I.T. [sic] for magic".[37]
The 2012 historical fiction novel The Technologists, by Matthew Pearl, is set in the MIT of 1868, during its first decade of existence. The protagonists are some of the first students to enroll in the fledgling college, and include both fictional composite characters and real-life historical figures, such as Ellen Swallow Richards and Daniel Chester French. In response to a high-tech terrorist attack on the City of Boston, the students form a secret research laboratory to discover the perpetrator and to forestall further attacks. They interact closely with prominent historical figures, such as William Barton Rogers (the founder of MIT), Harvard professor Louis Agassiz (pioneer of modern geology and paleontology), and Charles William Eliot (then an MIT professor, and soon to become the longest-serving president of Harvard University). The author spent many hours doing background research in the MIT Archives while writing the novel, and weaves many historical details into his narrative of mystery and adventure.[38][39][40][41][42]
In Thornton Wilder's play "Our Town" (1938), the stage manager mentions the gravestone of Joe Crowell, whom he describes as "awful bright – graduated from high school here, head of his class. So he got a scholarship to Massachusetts Tech. Graduated head of his class there, too. It was all wrote up in the Boston paper at the time. Goin’ to be a great engineer, Joe was. But the war broke out and he died in France. – All that education for nothing."
In the 2008 historical novel People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks, Dr. Hanna Heath's research is funded by "an MIT math genius who'd invented an algorithm that led to some kind of toggle switch that was used in every silicon chip. Or something like that."[45]
Kurt Vonnegut
MIT is a recurring motif in the works of Kurt Vonnegut, much like the planet Tralfamadore or the Vietnam War. In part, this recurrence may stem from Vonnegut family history: both his grandfather Bernard and his father Kurt, Sr. studied at MIT and received bachelor's degrees in architecture. His older brother, another Bernard, earned a bachelor's and a PhD in chemistry, also at MIT. Since so many of Vonnegut's stories are ambivalent or outright pessimistic with regard to technology's impact on humankind, it is hardly surprising that his references to the Institute express a mixed attitude.
In Hocus Pocus (1990), the Vietnam-veteran narrator Eugene Debs Hartke applies for graduate study in MIT's physics program, but his plans go awry when he tangles with a hippie at a Harvard Square Chinese restaurant. Hartke observes that men in uniform had become a ridiculous sight around colleges, even though both Harvard and MIT obtained much of their income from weapons research and development. ("I would have been dead if it weren't for that great gift to civilization from the Chemistry Department of Harvard, which was napalm, or sticky jellied gasoline.") Jailbird notes drily that MIT's eighth president was one of the three-man committee who upheld the Sacco and Vanzetti ruling, condemning the two men to death. As reported in The Tech, June 7, 1927:[46]
President Samuel W. Stratton has recently been appointed a member of a committee that will advise Governor Alvan T. Fuller in his course of action in the Sacco-Vanzetti case, it was announced a few days ago by the metropolitan press. The President is one of a committee of three appointed, the others being President A. Lawrence Lowell of Harvard and Judge Robert Grant. It was stated at Dr. Stratton's office that this appointment was very reluctantly accepted, for not only has the President not had experience with criminal law procedure, but he has not been following the case at all in the newspapers. It is thought by some that this very fact may result in an entirely unbiased review of the case, which might not be possible had he followed the case closely.[46]
We no longer believe that God causes earthquakes and crop failures and plagues when He gets mad at us. We no longer imagine that He can be cooled off by sacrifices and festivals and gifts. I am so glad we don't have to think up presents for Him anymore. What's the perfect gift for someone who has everything?
The perfect gift for somebody who has everything, of course, is nothing. Any gifts we have should be given to creatures right on the surface of the planet, it seems to me. If God gets angry about that, we can call in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. There's a very good chance they can calm Him down.
Isaac Asimov
Kurt Vonnegut was friends with fellow humanist and writer Isaac Asimov, who resided for many years in Newton, Massachusetts. During much of this time, Asimov chose the date for the MIT Science Fiction Society's annual picnic, citing a superstition that he always picked a day with good weather. In his copious autobiographical writings, Asimov reveals a mild predilection for the institute's architecture, and an awareness of its aesthetic possibilities. For example, In Joy Still Felt (1980) describes a 1957 meeting with Catherine de Camp, who was checking out colleges for her teenage son. Asimov recalls:
I hadn't seen her for five years and she was forty-nine now, and I felt I would be distressed at seeing her beauty fade.
How wrong I was! I saw her coming down the long corridor at MIT and she looked almost as though it were still 1941, when I had first met her.
Asimov's work, too, trades on MIT's reputation for narrative effect, even touching upon an anti-academic theme. In the short story "The Dead Past" (1956), the scientist-hero Foster must overcome the attitudes his Institute physics training has entrenched in his mind, before he can make his critical breakthrough. Several jokes in Isaac Asimov's Treasury of Humor and its sequel Asimov Laughs Again hinge upon MIT, its reputation for scientific prowess, and the technocentric focus of its students. In a similar vein, the satirical newspaper The Onion published an article entitled "Corpse-Reanimation Technology Still 10 Years Off, Say MIT Mad Scientists", among many others in the same general tradition.[47]
Joe Haldeman
From 1983–2014, science fiction writer Joe Haldeman has been an adjunct professor teaching writing at MIT,[48][49] and has known the Institute well. This is very evident in The Accidental Time Machine (2007) where MIT at various past and future times in its history plays a central role. The institution is described with considerable affection and much "insider" knowledge of the hidden corners in the MIT campus (as well as conspicuous parts of its geography such as the Green Building and the Infinite Corridor), of the relations between students and lecturers, and of various wild and rather illicit student practices.
The book begins with MIT student Matt Fuller accidentally discovering a phenomenon, and using it to create the time machine of the title. He jumps a decade forward to find that his professor has taken credit for his discovery and gotten a Nobel Prize for it; jumps centuries ahead and finds a theocracy where MIT is the Massachusetts Institute of Theology; and after more adventures winds up in the past, in the late 19th century when MIT was still in its original location on Boylston Street. In all time periods visited, under vastly differing circumstances, the protagonist becomes an MIT full professor.
Comic strips
Several comic strips make use of MIT. In Doonesbury, Kim Rosenthal almost earned her PhD in computer science, but dropping out because it was "too easy". In the fall of 2006, Kim and Mike Doonesbury's daughter Alex entered MIT as a freshman. (The 3 October 2006 Doonesbury strip satirizes the "MIT of" snowclone; Zipper Harris declares the fictional Walden College to be "the MIT of southern Connecticut".)
Dilbert, the title character in the comic strip about engineers and corporate management, received a degree from MIT Course VI-1.
Bill Amend's FoxTrot has also made MIT allusions, in keeping with the strip's genial satire of nerd subcultures. On Christmas Day 2005, the comic strip Baby Blues featured a character reading the instruction manual accompanying a gadget that he has given to his child as a Christmas present. The first volume of instructions begins, "Assembly Instructions—Step 1: Obtain a master's degree in mechanical engineering from M.I.T. Step 2: ..."
Some genres of computer and video games have characterization requirements like those of movies. For example, a game involving a team of commandos might require a member who can break into computers, crack security systems, or work with explosives. This character's background would typically have to be established very quickly and efficiently, perhaps within one screen of introductory text. Stating that a commando or top-secret operative "graduated from MIT" is one way to accomplish this.
In the case of the Half-Life series, the main protagonist, Gordon Freeman, is an MIT graduate and has a PhD in Theoretical Physics.
The Infocom game The Lurking Horror (1987), written by MIT alumnus and interactive fiction pioneer Dave Lebling, is set on the campus of the George Underwood Edwards Institute of Technology, which strongly resembles MIT. Its fictional culture also parodies the MIT culture. For instance, G.U.E. Tech's class ring is known as the "brass hyrax", parodying MIT's Brass Rat.
In the Fallout games, MIT is known as the "Commonwealth Institute of Technology". As nuclear war began, researchers from the university hid below the main building and continued with their research without making contact with other survivors. Eventually after many years, they took on the title of simply "The Institute", and became well known as a shady organization with extraordinary technology and the ability to create androids. The institute is featured as a major faction in the 2015 title, Fallout 4. In Fallout: New Vegas, one of the main characters in the story is Edwin Robert House, also called Mr. House, is a graduate of the institute, as stated in his obituary.
In 2012, MIT students released "MIT Gangnam Style", a light-hearted parody of the K-pop viral hit video, "Gangnam Style". Within a week, the parody video reached 4 million views on YouTube, and it also won approval from Psy, the featured performer in the original music video.
The 2001 song "Etoh" by the Australian electronic music group The Avalanches describes MIT as "the home of complicated computers, which speak a mechanical language all their own". This lyric can be taken literally, or it can be read metaphorically as a description of MIT student life and culture.[citation needed]
"Nerdcore" rap artist MC Hawking's song "All My Shootin's Be Drive-bys" (1997) takes tropes associated with gangsta rap and plays them out in a more academic setting. He speaks of taking revenge for the death of a friend, part of his Cambridge, UK crew:
When the narrator learns the identity of Pookie's killers, he decides to "give a Newtonian demonstration, of a bullet its mass and its acceleration", leaving six MIT students dead in the street.[52]
In the Broadway musical Rent (1996–2008), a major character, Tom Collins, is expelled from teaching at MIT, "for [his] theory of actual reality".
Rhythm and blues group Tony! Toni! Toné! mentions MIT in the song "Born Not to Know" from their 1988 debut album Who? In the song, a pretentious individual rattles off a long list of his impressive academic credentials—culminating with a "PhD from MIT"—only to then ask, "so, can I get a job?" Tony! Toni! Toné! responds with a resounding "No!"
The mathematician and satirist Tom Lehrer taught for a time in MIT's political science department in the 1960s, lecturing on quantitative methods and statistics. This experience led him to write a song called "Sociology", played to the tune of Irving Berlin's "Choreography". The lyrics conclude,
MIT students have also written many of their own songs during their stays at the Institute. This tradition, which goes back at least to The Doormat Singers[55] of the 1960s, continues with several present-day vocal groups, such as The Logarhythms and The Chorallaries.
Tony Stark, Marvel Cinematic Universe – At the age of 15 Tony entered the undergraduate electrical engineering program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and graduated with two master's degrees by age 19. Stark has a "Brass Rat" ring which can be seen during a dinner scene in the movie.[58]
Tony Newman, PhD one of two lead characters in The Time Tunnel (television show) is revealed to have earned a degree from MIT in episode 28, 'The Hitchiker'. Dr. Tony Newman is played by James Darren) (first broadcast on March 24, 1967)[7]
Barney Stinson, How I Met Your Mother – May be an MIT alumnus as revealed in Season 7, Episode 16. Turns out it stood for Magicians Institute of Teaneck as told by him in Season 9, episode 15.
Molly Griggs, Stuart Campbell, Winslow Schott, Gabriel Duncan, Alistair Kreig are among many villains from Smallville who graduated from MIT
Dabney Donovan, in Superman & Lois, is described by Lois Lane as having dual PhDs in genetics and molecular neurochemistry, and she says that he "left a tenure-track position at MIT to work for Edge". In Season 1 Episode 12, an aerial view of MIT's campus is shown, followed by a close-up of a sign saying "Metropolis Institute of Technology".
Argenthina Woolridge, in iCarly, describes herself as a "Harvard and MIT graduate".
Reagan Ridley, in Inside Job, described as having graduated MIT at the age of 13[62]
Tony Stark, Marvel Comics' Iron Man – enrolled in MIT's undergraduate program and easily graduated with double honors majors in electrical engineering and physics at the age of 17.
Djinn Makhmud, Virgil Ayres, and Anne Saint James met at MIT and teamed up as the engineers in the novel New Jersey's Famous Turnpike Witch by Brad Abruzzi. Makhmud received "wholly unsolicited admission to [MIT's] class of 2012", Ayres was Makhmud's classmate, and Saint James was a "townie [who had permission] to haunt with impunity the student-only computer clusters at MIT".[65]
Alex Altschuler, in Mind's Eye by Douglas E. Richards "finished his doctorate at MIT in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in only four years".[66]
In the novel Split Second by Douglas E. Richards, the character Edgar Knight says, "Long story short, the head of Black Ops R&D got wind of my abilities and plucked me right up after I graduated MIT".[67]
Elena Janev (also known as Sally Bins née Sally Petracova), in the novel 3:34 a.m by Nick Pirog, "was awarded a full-ride scholarship to MIT where she studied chemistry with a minor in psychology. She graduated in 1970." [68]
Anna Thurman in the novel First Shift - Legacy by Hugh Howey. "Her research at MIT had been in wireless harmonics; remote charging technology; the ability to assume control of electronics via radio".[69]
The novel MindWar by Douglas E. Richards includes the character Lucas, who "had just graduated from MIT with a PhD in physics and robotics, the youngest PhD the school had minted in over a decade".[70]
In the novels Extinction Code and Extinction Countdown by James D. Prescott, Rajesh Viswanathan "help[ed] to pioneer [an android powered by artificial intelligence]'s creation, a move that has made him one of MIT's rising stars."[71]
Related Research Articles
The California Institute of Technology (Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California. The university is known for its strength in science and engineering, and is among a small group of institutes of technology in the United States which is primarily devoted to the instruction of pure and applied sciences. Caltech is ranked among the best academic institutions in the world and is among the most selective in the U.S.
Dean Lawrence Kamen is an American engineer, inventor, and businessman. He is known for his invention of the Segway and iBOT, as well as founding the non-profit organization FIRST with Woodie Flowers. Kamen holds over 1,000 patents.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has since played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, ranking it among the top academic institutions in the world.
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is the result of a merger of the Carnegie Institute of Technology and the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research. The predecessor was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools, and it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1912 and began granting four-year degrees. In 1967, the Carnegie Institute of Technology merged with the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research, founded in 1913 by Andrew Mellon and Richard B. Mellon and formerly a part of the University of Pittsburgh. Carnegie Mellon has operated as a single institution since the merger.
The Technion – Israel Institute of Technology is a public research university located in Haifa, Israel. Established in 1912 under the dominion of the Ottoman Empire, the Technion is the oldest university in the country. The Technion is ranked as the top university in both Israel and the Middle East, and in the top 100 universities in the world in the Academic Ranking of World Universities of 2019.
Madras Institute of Technology (MIT) is an engineering institute located in Chromepet, Chennai, India. It is one of the four autonomous constituent colleges of Anna University. It was established in 1949 by Chinnaswami Rajam as the first self-financing engineering institute in the country and later merged with Anna University. The institute gave India new areas of specialization such as aeronautical engineering, automobile engineering, electronics engineering and instrumentation technology. MIT was the first self-financing institute opened in India.
The New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology is a public university in Socorro, New Mexico. It offers over 30 bachelor of science degrees in technology, the sciences, engineering, management, and technical communication, as well as graduate degrees at the masters and doctoral levels.
Michael James Massimino is an American professor of mechanical engineering at Columbia University and a former NASA astronaut. He is the senior advisor of space programs at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum.
Bialystok University of Technology is the largest technical university in northeast Poland.
Peter Frederick Weller is an American film and stage actor, television director, and art historian.
Tomsk State University of Control Systems and Radioelectronics is a public university in Tomsk, Russia.
The College of Computing is one of the six academic units at the Georgia Institute of Technology. It is divided into four schools: the School of Computer Science, the School of Interactive Computing, the School of Computational Science & Engineering, and the School of Cybersecurity and Privacy. The College of Computing's programs are consistently ranked among the top 10 computing programs in the nation. In 2022, U.S. News & World Report ranked the Computer Science graduate program #6 in the U.S. In 2016, Times Higher Education and the Wall Street Journal ranked the College #5 in the world.
Prototype This! is an American television with the stated goal to "look into the viability of gadgets and technology seen in science-fiction movies". The series premiered on October 15, 2008, on The Discovery Channel. It was filmed on Treasure Island in Building 180 and occasionally at Standard Metal Products in San Francisco.
The Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) is the engineering school within Harvard University's Faculty of Arts and Sciences, offering degrees in engineering and applied sciences to graduate students admitted directly to SEAS, and to undergraduates admitted first to Harvard College. Previously the Lawrence Scientific School and then the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences, the Paulson School assumed its current structure in 2007. Francis J. Doyle III has been its dean since 2015.
Yale University, one of the oldest universities in the United States, has been the subject of numerous aspects of popular culture.
ShanghaiTech University is a public research university in Shanghai, China. The university is founded by contracts between the Shanghai Municipal People's Government and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Emily Dawn Calandrelli is an American science communicator, former MIT engineer, and the host and an executive producer of Xploration Outer Space and Emily's Wonder Lab.
The Information Technology University (ITU) is a public university in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan. Founded in 2012, the university was founded and headed by Umar Saif and is modeled after the MIT.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
