#MIT

A new study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has ignited debate over the cognitive impact of AI writing tools like ChatGPT, revealing that their use significantly reduces brain activity and leads to less creative, more “soulless” work. The findings, published in June 2025, raise questions over the future role of artificial intelligence in education, as policymakers and educators across the world—including in Thailand—navigate the integration of new technologies in the classroom.

In an event reverberating across the scientific community, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has publicly rescinded its institutional support for a recent artificial intelligence (AI) research paper. The move, reported by Retraction Watch, raises fundamental questions about the future of AI-authored academic articles and the ethical challenges facing research institutions worldwide.

The decision by MIT, a global powerhouse in science and technology innovation, has significant implications for the credibility and accountability of scientific literature. AI-generated content, increasingly prevalent in both drafting and data analysis duties, is under the microscope for issues relating to originality, transparency, and academic integrity. For Thai academic institutions, researchers, and the broader public, this case exemplifies the urgent need to establish clear policies and ethical guardrails as the adoption of AI tools accelerates throughout the research landscape.

In a move that has reverberated throughout the global academic community, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has formally withdrawn its support for a widely circulated research paper on artificial intelligence (AI) authored by a former PhD student in its economics program. The paper, titled “Artificial Intelligence, Scientific Discovery, and Product Innovation,” was first posted to the preprint server arXiv in November 2024 and quickly garnered high-profile attention for purportedly showing how AI can significantly boost scientific discovery and product innovation. However, following a confidential review, MIT has announced it has “no confidence in the provenance, reliability or validity of the data and [has] no confidence in the veracity of the research contained in the paper,” marking a rare and public reversal from one of the world’s top research universities (source).

MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research is accelerating our understanding of the human brain and using that knowledge to drive innovations that improve lives worldwide. According to a recent feature published on the MIT News site, the McGovern Institute has become a beacon for cutting-edge neuroscience, uniting top researchers in pursuit of answers to questions that affect not only scientific communities, but also real-world health and education challenges facing societies, including those in Thailand. The Institute’s latest projects point to new pathways for treating psychiatric disorders, transforming special education, and empowering community health systems—developments highly relevant for policymakers, clinicians, and educators across Southeast Asia.

A groundbreaking study from MIT is shaking up decades of neuroscience wisdom, revealing the brain’s “object recognition” pathway may also play a significant role in understanding spatial information—an insight that could revolutionize our approach to learning, artificial intelligence, and brain health around the world, including here in Thailand.

For years, scientists have believed the ventral visual stream, a key pathway in the human brain, is dedicated to recognizing objects—like a Starbucks cup on a Bangkok Skytrain or a rambutan vendor at the Chatuchak Market. This idea shaped not just neuroscience textbooks, but also inspired computer vision systems now used in everything from smartphones to smart cars. Yet, new research led by MIT graduate student Yudi Xie suggests the story is far more nuanced. Their findings, presented at the prestigious International Conference on Learning Representations, show that when deep learning models are trained not only to identify objects, but also to understand spatial features like location, rotation, and size, these models mirror neural activity in the ventral stream just as accurately as traditional object recognition models. In other words, the ventral stream might be wired for much more than recognizing faces or products—it could be a multifaceted toolkit for seeing and interacting with the world.

Recent research led by MIT and Harvard Medical School has uncovered the intriguing role that the immune molecule interleukin-17 (IL-17) plays in shaping social behavior and anxiety by acting directly on specific brain regions. This groundbreaking study reveals that IL-17 serves dual functions: enhancing sociability by reducing neuron excitability in the brain’s cortex and triggering anxiety by increasing excitability in the amygdala. These findings suggest IL-17 acts like a neuromodulator, drawing a fascinating link between immune system activity and behavioral outcomes, with potential implications for the treatment of conditions like autism and depression (Neuroscience News).