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Petroleum-based adhesives are everywhere: bonding the wood and drywall in a construction project, holding together the joints of furniture, and even sticking labels to otherwise recyclable containers. 

“The labels on a container are held up with petroleum-based glue. And because of that, even though you’re putting the container in the recycle bin, it will not get recycled,” says Patty Ferreira, MBA ’97, CEO and cofounder of Silvis Materials, which is combating this problem with its fully biodegradable cellulose adhesives. 

When Ferreira began thinking about bio-based adhesives, in 2014, she started by modifying cellulose’s existing role as a stabilizer in adhesive emulsions and replicating the known adhesive properties of more expensive nanocellulose. Today, the formula can make adhesives from virtually every type of plant cellulose, and the MIT Startup Exchange (STEX) is helping Silvis work with packaging and construction companies to test the results.

She expects the adhesive to cut production emissions by up to 80% and use half the energy of fossil-based glues.

Read more at www.technologyreview.com/alumni-profiles.

As a first-generation student from a small town, Gohar Khan ’21 had to navigate the college admissions process largely on his own. He founded his YouTube channel, Gohar’s Guide, to make things easier for other young people.

Today, more than 10 million people follow Khan on social media for college application advice, study tips, and life hacks. He is also the CEO and cofounder of Next Admit, a consulting business that provides help with college essays, applications, and test preparation. “I’m on a mission to help students worldwide succeed inside and outside of school,” he says.

Born in Pakistan, Khan moved to the United States when he was six months old and grew up in Connecticut, attending a public high school that rarely sent students to top colleges. “That, coupled with the fact that my parents hadn’t gone through the process themselves, made [applying to colleges] a little bit difficult,” he says. “I wanted to demystify the admissions process for a lot of people in the position I was once in.”

Read more at www.technologyreview.com/alumni-profiles.

Even as a teenager, Laurie Stach ’06 says, she had a “crazy ambition to take on the world and solve problems.” At MIT, she realized she wasn’t the only one.

“Adults always see these youth who are good at math and science and say, ‘You’re going to do great things—someday,’” says Stach. “Meanwhile, traditional education isn’t preparing them.”

That’s why in 2012 Stach founded LaunchX, a for-profit entrepreneurship program that helps high school students build practical skills through an intensive summer program in which they start real companies. Stach says that students form teams, identify a problem, and build an actual product or service that they then take to market—often generating preorders or even revenue before the four-week program ends.

Raised in Texas and the Carolinas, Stach majored in mechanical engineering at MIT and earned her MBA from Harvard Business School in 2011. She ran her first summer program on MIT’s campus with 30 students in 2013 and says “it kind of snowballed.” LaunchX now serves about 500 students per year across both in-person and online programs.

Read more at www.technologyreview.com/alumni-profiles.

For Rupert Young ’95, SM ’95, his career in data science and cybersecurity began when his grandfather gifted him thousands of stamps: He built intricate databases to catalogue them, displaying the “precise eye” for detail and nuance that his MIT application essay said would make him a good engineer.

Young is now chief product officer of ­MaxMind, whose work with IP-address location data and fraud prevention has made it a go-to resource. Streaming companies, security vendors, merchants, and ad-network providers use its signature tool, GeoIP, to determine how and where users are accessing services. This information makes it possible to ensure retail sites are using the correct currency, flag suspicious bank logins, and more.

Young’s passion for engineering was shaped by internships, and he has paid it forward by volunteering at his children’s California high school and trying to keep up with what “the next generation of engineers are tinkering with.” The next generation of product innovation at MaxMind excites him too.

“Working with my team to try to find patterns in data and solve challenging problems—to me, there’s no greater joy,” he says.

Read more at www.technologyreview.com/alumni-profiles.

When Don Yansen ’63 arrived at the MIT AgeLab for a study on technology in care­giving for older adults, he didn’t plan to launch another company. But when he heard participants talk about how hard modern devices can be to use, he decided to develop an alternative.

Yansen, a serial entrepreneur who retired to care for his wife, earned an MIT degree in electrical engineering and a master’s in physics from Northeastern. “What I took from MIT was a good education and the feeling I could solve difficult problems,” he says.

One such problem: Many older adults “can’t even use a modern cell phone,” he says, “and very few people can use something like an Apple Watch.” So Kiwi Health, which he founded in October 2024, sells a wristband controlled primarily by voice. Wearers can set reminders, make calls, send texts, and share health data, all without navigating screens. AI helps interpret these commands, accounting for the way voices may change with age. The device also measures health metrics and automatically alerts caregivers to falls. 

Yansen’s hope, he says, is that it can “help seniors live the best life that they can.”

Read more at www.technologyreview.com/alumni-profiles.