On Friday evening, March 24, the winner of the 2023 Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize (MCHAP) was announced in Chicago. The venue was Crown Hall itself, a steel and glass masterwork by Mies van der Rohe on the campus he designed for the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). Jury chair Sandra Barclay presented the award to the studio of Mexican architect Mauricio Rocha for its expansion of the Anahuacalli Museum in Mexico City.
GPT-4 took all sections of the July 2022 bar exam and earned a score so high that it approaches the 90th percentile of test-takers, according to researchers Daniel Martin Katz, a professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology’s Chicago-Kent College of Law, and Michael James Bommarito, a professor at the Michigan State University College of Law. “Our analysis highlights that GPT-4 has indeed passed the bar and has done so by a significant margin,” they wrote in a paper.
Adjunct Professor Christopher Garcia writes in an article that Seattle recently became the first U.S. city to add “caste” to its list of categories protected from discrimination.
Carol Ross Barney recently won the highest award given by the American Institute of Architects. She calls it a shining light for Chicago and for women in the field. CBS2 caught up with Barney to talk about her work and her vision.
“I heard so many people say, ‘Well, it might get the multiple choice but it will never get the essays,’” Chicago-Kent College of Law Katz said of his efforts giving GPT the bar exam. GPT-4 passed the Uniform Bar Exam, including the essay and performance test.
Fear of running out of power out of range of a recharging station is a major impediment to the widespread adoption of electric cars, but scientists in Illinois are changing that. Mohammad Asadi, an assistant professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology, last month co-published a paper in the journal Science with Larry A. Curtiss and other Illinois colleagues about their work on a novel lithium-air battery that has a solid electrolyte made with a mix of polymer and ceramic. By combining those two materials, the paper argued, the product could leverage both “ceramic’s high ionic conductivity and the high stability and high interfacial connection of the polymer.” The resulting battery, the paper claimed, has the potential for “reaching ultra-high power densities far beyond current lithium-ion technology.”
“I firmly believe that adults need room and time and space to play,” said Carly Kocurek, professor in the game design and experiential media program at Illinois Tech. The tile toward immersive experiences is “a growing trend in our media and entertainment landscape,” said Kocurek, citing the growth of escape rooms and themed restaurants as evidence of the societal hunger for escapist play.
“Being a civil engineer means you get to improve society,” said Mae Whiteside Williams, the CEO and owner of CKL Engineers and a graduate of Illinois Tech. “And I was always one of those kids who wanted to find a way to improve society. What better way than to be a civil engineer?"
A new federal law has earmarked $39 billion for semiconductor manufacturers, and Illinois Institute of Technology wants Chicago to be centerstage for the next generation of such vital technology. “By establishing this center on our campus in Bronzeville, the hope is to catalyze both workforce development of local workforce and regional workforce,” Illinois Tech Provost Ken Christensen says.
David Williams, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering led a research team that has for the first time successfully demonstrated the use of active flow control in an aircraft with no tail. Active flow control (AFC) allows an aircraft to be as smooth and sleek as possible, making it safer for the military to fly in dangerous areas where radar scans the sky for sharp edges. It could also be used to make commercial airplanes more fuel-efficient by removing existing steering parts that create drag. Partners on the project include researchers from the US Air Force Academy, the Office of Naval Research and UAV developer Astrium.
