Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology have built a flying robot that can guide people around complex urban environments or aid search-and-rescue missions, in an attempt to show that drones can perform useful tasks as well as sinister ones (+ movie). More
News: researchers at MIT Media Lab's Mediated Matter group have created a dome from silk fibres woven by a robotic arm, which was then finished by live silkworms (+ movie). Update: this interview is featured in Dezeen Book of Interviews, which is on sale now for £12. More
Milan 2013: Italian architect Carlo Ratti and his team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology installed three robotic bartenders in Milan last week (+ movie). More
An undulating canopy of cardboard tubes by American studio Cristina Parreño Architecture and students from MIT hovered over visitors at the ARCOMadrid art fair in Spain last month (+ slideshow). More
Researchers at MIT plan to 3D print a pavilion by imitating the way a silkworm builds its cocoon. More
News: flexible high-tech rental apartments with moving "robo-walls" should replace speculative developments as young people increasingly view homes as services rather than possessions, according to Kent Larson, director of the Changing Places Group at MIT Media Lab (+ movie). More
Dezeenwire: Bill Mitchell, former dean of the School of Architecture and Planning at MIT and one of the world's leading urban theorists, had died aged 65. MIT News has published an obituary.
