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• Fall 2021

  Reflections on a Tool of Observation

  Timothy Makepeace

  

  Cryogenic Test Structure, 2018, charcoal on paper, 49 x 49 inches In 2017, Washington, DC-based artist Timothy Makepeace was one of several artists selected by NASA to create artwork inspired by… Read More

• August 18, 2020

  A Patriot Act Moment for Science

  Tayyaba Jiwani

  As the world fights a historic pandemic, science has taken global center stage. Many governments made tough decisions following scientific advice, such as enforcing lockdowns and closing national borders, that ground the… Read More

• Spring 2023

  Materially Different

  In “Computers on Wheels?” (Issues, Winter 2023), Matthew Eisler makes a significant contribution in understanding the roots of the modern electric vehicle (EV) revolution. He provides many missing details of… Read More

• December 20, 2022

  Episode 23: Shirley Malcom – Where Science and Society Meet

  Shirley M. Malcom

  Shirley M. Malcom is a trailblazer in the area of broadening participation in science. Currently senior advisor and director of the SEA Change initiative at the American Association for the Advancement of… Read More

• May 16, 2023

  Episode 31: Race, Genetics, and a “Most Dangerous Myth”

  Ann Morning, Monya Baker

  The concept of distinct races came from European naturalists in the 1700s. It’s now recognized as a social construct, rather than a biological classification. Nonetheless, genetics researchers sometimes use race or ethnicity to… Read More

• Spring 2023

  How Science Gets Drawn Into Global Conspiracy Narratives 

  Marc Tuters, Tom Willaert, Trisha Meyer

  A few short years ago, mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) was the subject of fundamental research, but it is now known as the basis for COVID-19 vaccines. At the same time, the concept… Read More

• April 18, 2023

  Episode 29: To Solve the AI Problem, Rely on Policy, Not Technology

  Kate Crawford, Monya Baker

  Artificial intelligence is everywhere, growing increasingly accessible and pervasive. Conversations about AI often focus on technical accomplishments rather than societal impacts, but leading scholar Kate Crawford has long drawn attention to the… Read More

• Spring 2014

  The View from Nowhere

  Jason Lloyd

  The global positioning system (GPS) technology incorporated into the vehicles, computers, smart phones, and other devices we use every day provides a convenience that would have been almost unimaginable two decades ago.… Read More

• Fall 2022

  Imagining a Better Internet

  The future of technology is too often imagined and engineered by corporations and venture capitalists, foreclosing more radical possibilities. Today, it is Meta’s iteration of the Metaverse that dominates headlines, a riff… Read More

• Fall 2022

  A Vision for Democratizing Government Data

  Julia Lane

  During the earliest weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a desperate need for data to respond to the worst labor market crisis in almost a century. State-administered unemployment claims skyrocketed. Jobseekers,… Read More

• Spring 2022

  Unmet Desire

  Adam Seth Levine

  I vividly remember March 2020, the month the United States shut down as COVID-19 spread uncontrollably and upended daily life. At the time, I worked at Cornell University in upstate New York.… Read More

• February 21, 2023

  Episode 26: You’ve Been Misinformed About Sharks

  David Shiffman, Lisa Margonelli

  Recent conversations about scientific misinformation have concentrated on what is new: social media and algorithms that spread all kinds of information—reliable and unreliable—surprisingly fast. But misinformation has long been an issue for… Read More

• November 18, 2021

  The Ongoing Transformation

  For the Issues podcast, we talk with fascinating people to get a behind-the-scenes look at how their research and ideas are transforming our world. Listen and subscribe to The Ongoing Transformation wherever … Read More

• April 12, 2022

  Episode 12: Chasing Connections in Climate Action

  There is scientific consensus on climate change and its human cause, but how to understand and address global warming remains a divided topic in American life. Art and religion are two lenses… Read More

• Winter 2023

  What the Ukraine-Russia War Means for South Korea’s Defense R&D

  Keonyeong Jeong, Yongseok Seo, Kyungmoo Heo

  South Koreans are watching the war between Russia and Ukraine not as a far-off conflict, but as a possible model for future power struggles in East Asia—especially in the context of increasing… Read More

• Winter 2023

  The Most Complex Puzzle

  Julia Buntaine Hoel

  

  Julia Buntaine Hoel, Territory 1, 2017, digital print on aluminum, 16 x 24 inches. Created from microscopy photographs taken by the artist of rhesus macaque brain slides. Artist Julia Buntaine Hoel… Read More

• Spring 2023

  Biosafety Needs to Redefine Itself as a Science

  Antony Schwartz, Andrea Vogel, Mary Brock

  Have you heard the joke about jobs in biosafety? One professional asks another for recommendations to fill an open position. The second says sure, but she first needs recommendations to fill her… Read More

• February 14, 2022

  Episode 8: Fighting COVID with Art

  Because art is a powerful tool for connecting with communities, building stronger relationships between artists and public health programs may be a way to increase people’s confidence about vaccines. On this episode, cartoonist… Read More

• December 6, 2022

  Episode 22: Peaches, Pimentos, and Myths of Innovation

  Cynthia R. Greenlee, Lisa Margonelli

  The challenge of transforming regional economies through technological innovation is at the heart of current discussions about science and industrial policy—not to mention the CHIPs and Science Act itself. To think about what regional… Read More

• Summer 2022

  “What I’m Mostly Afraid of Is That There Will Be Two Sciences—Democratic Science and Autocratic Science.”

  Jerzy Duszynski, Molly Galvin

  Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, close to 5 million Ukrainians—including hundreds of scientists and researchers—have fled the country, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. More… Read More

• Fall 2022

  Humanizing Science and Engineering for the Twenty-First Century

  Kaye Husbands Fealing, Aubrey Deveny Incorvaia, Richard Utz

  Dr. Nettrice Gaskins is a widely recognized African American digital artist who creates works that combine images of individuals with an artificial intelligence (AI) application that synthesizes patterns. When her larger-than-life portraits… Read More

• December 7, 2021

  Episode 3: Eternal Memory of the Facebook Mind

  David Beer, Jason Lloyd

  Social media and streaming platforms such as Facebook and Spotify analyze huge quantities of data from users before feeding selections back as personal “memories.” How do the algorithms select which content to… Read More

• Spring 2021

  A Manifesto to Responsibly Extend Reality Into Virtual Realms

  Dhoya Snijders, Rinie Van Est

  We perceive physical reality with our senses: we see the blue sky, hear waves crashing on the beach, feel the wind in our hair. As technology such as augmented reality (AR) and… Read More

• Summer 2022

  Reflections on Carrie Mae Weems’s RESIST COVID | TAKE 6!

  David Fakunle, Carrie Mae Weems

  

  I often share a Zimbabwean proverb about lion hunts: “Until the lion tells its side of the story, the tale of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.” I felt the spirit… Read More

• Winter 2020

  Ownership Dilemmas in an Age of Creative Machines

  Lav R. Varshney, Deepak Somaya

  Recently, a computer-generated work of art titled “Edmond de Belamy, from La Famille de Belamy” was sold by the auction house Christie’s for $350,000 to an anonymous bidder. Purported to be the… Read More

• Fall 2022

  Arctic Ice

  Cy Keener, Justine Holzman, Ignatius Rigor, John Woods

  

  Sea Ice Daily Drawings, 2019–2022, aluminum, acrylic, paper, and ink (detail) Integrating field data, remote satellite imagery, scientific analysis, and multimedia visual representation to document Arctic ice that is disappearing due to… Read More

• Summer 2021

  COVID Artifacts

  James Gouldthorpe

  

  It’s been more than a year since the pandemic started. Now that vaccines have arrived, a measure of hope has returned. But memories of the early days of the pandemic lie close… Read More

• Winter 2022

  Complexity and Visual Systems

  Ellen K. Levy

  

  Art, in both creation and experience, is one of the most complex of human endeavors. Artist Ellen K. Levy engages the mental loop of seeing, connecting, and processing by juxtaposing imagery that… Read More

• Spring 2021

  Data for the People!

  In “The Path to Better Health: Give People Their Data” (Issues, Winter 2021), Jason Cohen makes an important contribution to the discussion of data privacy. Data privacy in the midst… Read More

• December 21, 2021

  Episode 4: Art of a COVID Year

  In the early days of the pandemic, communities began singing together over balconies, banging pans, and engaging in other forms of collective support, release, and creativity. Artists have also been creatively responding… Read More