Pint-sized car engine

Well I just finished my group's discussion section, so I am really feeling emissions data and ways to increase the efficiency of an internal combustion engine. And then, all of a sudden, as I am just going along mindin my own business...an article about what some MIT geniuses are doing currently. No...It couldn’t be, I mean what? A pint-sized engine....nawwww. YESSSSSS! So it turns out that for several years "MIT researchers have been developing a half-sized gasoline engine that performs like its full-sized cousin but offers fuel efficiency approaching that of today's hybrid engine system--at a far lower cost. The key? Carefully controlled injection of ethanol, an increasingly common biofuel, directly into the engine's cylinders when there's a hill to be climbed or a car to be passed."
I mean if that doesn’t sound interesting then maybe some of the stats will blow your mind. Like that this new engine will go 30% farther on a gallon of fuel than a typical gas engine. And, if all cars had this engine today, we would be using 30 billion gallons of gasoline..yea GASOLINE, NOT OIL. Also, the emissions would be much cleaner due to the ethanol supplementation. That’s huge!

Read up on this at the following website: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2006/engine.html

Cheers!
-Alex Dru