Science in Society - NYAS

A colorful shot taken from under a microscope.

From the New York Genome Center to the New York Stem Cell Foundation, the New York science scene has, through unique alliances and partnerships, become greater than the sum of its parts.

Published November 1, 2013

By Hallie Kapner

A New York Genome Center researcher works with a sample.

As Willa Appel, chief executive officer of the New York Structural Biology Center (NYSBC), shares the story of the city’s first major collaborative life science research center, which opened in 2002, she still marvels at the good fortune that landed the NYSBC at the abandoned South Campus of the City University of New York on Convent Avenue in Harlem. The gymnasium’s lower level, complete with an empty swimming pool sunk deep into the Manhattan schist, turned out to be an ideal site for housing the city’s most advanced nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometers—exquisitely sensitive equipment unable to tolerate the nonstop vibration of millions of New Yorkers and the subways that move them.

The NYSBC—along with dozens of universities, research institutions, nonprofit organizations, and start-ups that comprise New York’s burgeoning science sector—is a true product of the city: wildly ambitious, visionary, and undaunted by the challenges of the island E.B. White called “the greatest human concentrate on earth.”

The major players in New York’s science industry almost universally view what most residents perceive as obstacles—population density, intense competition, and premium real estate—as assets. They’ve succeeded not in spite of, but because of, the city’s singular makeup and layout. The secret behind the success of what has become one of the world’s best funded and most productive multidisciplinary science sectors is the kind of mold-breaking collaboration that is uniquely possible in a place like New York.

New York as a “Science Hub”

Speaking from the new downtown headquarters of the New York Genome Center, Bill Fair, vice president of strategic operations, recalls a time when joining the terms “New York” and “science hub” was more likely to generate questions than answers. As recently as 2002— despite having the most advanced medical infrastructure and largest healthcare workforce in the country—New York City was struggling to attract science talent and the funding dollars that often followed. At the first meeting to discuss what would become the NYSBC, Appel remembers, one participant joked that “the best recruiting tool in New York was a subway token and a bus pass. People weren’t moving here to work in science.”

The town long known as the capital of finance, media, and fashion took a turn toward technology when Mayor Bloomberg zeroed in on life sciences and entrepreneurship as ways to revitalize and diversify the post-9/11 economy. What would transpire over the following decade would vault New York into an elite position among bioscience and technology hubs, uniting the city in a way that would draw the attention of the world.

From Competition to a Competitive Edge

An employee at the New York Structural Biology Center collects data on a dual beam and scanning electron microscope.

“When we first proposed the idea of the Structural Biology Center in 1997, nobody believed this kind of collaboration could happen,” says Appel, describing the circumstances that prompted its nine founding institutions to put their competitive concerns aside and form a consortium. Structural biology—the study of the three-dimensional shape of biological macromolecules and how changes in shape can affect their function in both health and disease—was a hot field that required access to highly specialized research equipment no one institution could afford alone.

Pooling their resources, the consortium initially purchased four high- field nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometers at 800 megahertz—the most advanced instrumentation in the field—housing them at the renovated NYSBC facility and alternating access much like a time- share. On opening day, the NYSBC was the most advanced facility of its kind in the country, and it has since added cryoelectron microscopes, synchrotron beamlines for x-ray crystallography, and high throughput protein production facilities. Today, it’s the most advanced structural biology facility in the world.

A Transformative Paradigm

A new and transformative paradigm for New York’s research institutions and universities was born.

By 2004, the city was gaining competitive ground, garnering close to $1 billion in National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding. By 2007, New York’s colleges and universities would well surpass that number, leading the nation in NIH funding.

Despite that progress, the city was still home to, what one researcher quipped, “a lot of R, but almost no D.” Pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer had a presence limited to sales in New York City, but the crucial behind-the-scenes work took place in the kind of lab space that seemed unattainable in the five boroughs. Many researchers who made breakthroughs with commercial promise had to weigh the possibility of leaving academia to bring an innovation to market. Finding a solution that would allow them to translate local research into reality would be the next crucial step in New York’s transformation.

“A Complete Cultural Shift”

A New York Stem Cell Foundation researcher at work.

Private labs were one way to, as Susan L. Solomon says, “leave the politics at the door and take the science as far as the researchers were able to go.” Solomon, who founded the New York Stem Cell Foundation (NYSCF) in 2005 and serves as CEO, saw the potential for New York—with its 50 hospitals and diverse population— to become a leader in stem cell research. “Young researchers were being counseled out of pursuing stem cell work,” she says. “The thinking was that the real work wasn’t happening here.”

With a roster of healthcare luminaries as an advisory board and $1.1 million in private seed funding, Solomon and her team opened a lab in less than four months. “There was very exciting diabetes research coming out of Harvard, but too much red tape preventing it from moving forward. We brought the work here, and built the lab faster than the researchers could collect patient samples.”

Since then, NYSCF scientists, including 45 postdocs from New York’s elite research centers, have done “high-risk, high-reward” work, turning out five top medical breakthroughs including the first personalized bone intended for transplant. The organization has also designed software to automate the labor-intensive process of generating stem cell lines, producing a degree of uniformity that is key to advancing therapeutics. “We’ve saved years of time and millions of dollars through the openness of our scientists and partners, who go so far as to share pre-publication work at our conferences,” Solomon says. “It’s a complete cultural shift. At our first meeting, most of the researchers in the room—and they were the best in their fields—had never met each other.”

Testing and Breaking Barriers of Convention

The shift Solomon noted occurs several dozen times a year at the lower Manhattan offices of the New York Academy of Sciences. Jennifer Henry, director of life sciences at the Academy, presides over a program for local scientists that tests—and often breaks—the barriers of convention. “We set out to create a more united community of scientists working in New York—to introduce them to each other before they meet at major conferences,” Henry explains.

For nearly 50 years, scientists from across the region and around the world have convened at the Academy to attend one-off conferences and recurring Discussion Group symposia. Formalized as Frontiers of Science 12 years ago, this program unites academia, industry, nonprofits, and government to discuss progress and challenges in science, medicine, and technology. The Academy hosts over 60 such events each year, each with a different focus. “Everyone is on equal footing at these events,” says Henry. “It’s a neutral environment where people who don’t typically get together can interact in a personal way. It’s also an incredible opportunity for younger scientists to network with major players.”

The Discussion Groups bring sought-after speakers and smaller gatherings of scientists together in New York throughout the year. “Networking is a major benefit, but these groups have become so much more than that,” Henry explains. “The Discussion Groups are now safe spaces where what are, essentially, competing researchers have been known to enlist the group’s feedback on their work in progress. Can you imagine?”

Inspiring New Ventures

A research image of induced pluripotent stem cell neuron precursors from the New York Stem Cell Foundation.

The success of New York’s academic collaborations continues to embolden and inspire new ventures, continually expanding the city’s science capabilities. Manhattan’s foothold in the emerging field of genomics and bioinformatics lies in SoHo at the New York Genome Center. Ten local institutions founded the facility, which operates as an independent nonprofit, to speed advances in genomics and commercialize breakthroughs. Researchers gain access to valuable wet lab space and latest generation sequencing equipment, along with technical support. Demand for the Genome Center’s services—which include full human genome sequencing, bioinformatics analysis, and data storage— has been so high that it had to establish a 3,000 square- foot temporary lab at The Rockefeller University during construction of the new headquarters.

The Genome Center’s founding institutions are reaping more than scientific benefit from their investment. It has been a powerful recruiting tool, helping attract top-level talent to the area. “You can’t get this kind of genomics experience just anywhere,” says Fair. “New York has the most diverse patient population in the world.”

Cooperation and technology are transforming the region’s hospitals, too, offering a glimpse into a future of fully connected care. The New York eHealth Collaborative is leading the movement to make electronic health records for any patient available to any physician, anywhere in the state, instantly. Currently under development is a portal that will also allow New York’s patients to access their own records electronically.

In less than a decade, New York’s scientific community norm moved from competition to collaboration, with positive results on the bench and at the bedside. Asked to describe the interactions of the Genome Center founders, Fair laughs. “Every Board meeting is like a 14-way pingpong match.”

A Contagious Collaboration

Two of the city’s premier science museums, the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and New York Hall of Science collectively host more than a million pairs of exploring young hands each year, drawing school groups and families with programs that are now, more importantly than ever, helping turn curiosity into careers. AMNH’s much-lauded science-enrichment initiative, the Urban Advantage Network, started in New York middle schools and is now serving as a model for schools across the country to partner with local science institutions.

Taking in the many vibrant organizations comprising New York’s current science scene, it’s clear that what began as an experiment among an elite group of New York’s research institutions has spawned a contagious collaboration that has touched every sector of the city, changing it for the better. This drive toward togetherness has inspired members of the scientific community to see the limitless possibilities for invention in this extraordinary city.

Today, the subway token has been replaced by the Metrocard, and much like the transit system that runs beneath them, New York’s science players are more connected than ever. As Appel says, in a sentiment that also characterizes New York itself, “in science, you can’t sit still for half a second.”

Also read: The Story of a 25-Year Collaboration

About the Author

Hallie Kapner is a freelance writer in New York City.

From Survival to Joy: The Science of Fear

A foggy and eerie scene inside a forest in the fall.

Is it weird that feeling afraid is so fun we have a holiday for it? Besides aiding in survival, the experience of fear can actually be enjoyable.

Published October 25, 2013

By Diana Friedman

Image courtesy of andras_csontos via stock.adobe.com.

Happy Halloween! It’s the time of year we revel in the revolting and fete our fright. Fear is one of the oldest responses life has evolved to its environment. It’s so ancient that it’s common to just about all forms of life, explains author Jeff Wise in this podcast.

Is it weird that feeling afraid is so fun we have a holiday for it, or voluntarily watch horror movies, for that matter? Besides aiding in survival, the experience of fear can actually be enjoyable.

The Psychology Today blog considers the addictive potential of adrenaline-inducing extreme sports such as BASE jumping. In the article, Emory University neuroscientist Dr. Michael Davis discusses the potentially pleasurable biochemistry of our bodies’ reaction to fear. “If something scares us, the body immediately releases endorphins, dopamine and norepinephrine. Endorphins mitigate pain. Dopamine and norepinephrine are performance enhancers…The greater the release of these chemicals, the greater the addiction-like symptoms.”

A Fear-Induced Chemical Cocktail

Developmental psychologist Nathalia Gjersoe, in this Guardian article, adds, “One reason adults like being scared so much could be the heady cocktail of a heightened sense of physical awareness with the reassuring knowledge that there is no real threat. In a real emergency [endorphins and dopamine] cushion the immediate blow of potential injury but, when no damage occurs, they simply contribute to the overall sense of excitement.”

The important catch is: things have to turn out OK! To enjoy your fear-induced chemical cocktail, you have to really believe in, or have alredy achieved, a happy ending. You know it’s just a movie. You’re climbing off the landing pad after your bungee cord remained intact, or—due to experience or optimism—you always knew it would be fine. In more technical terms, your interactions with fearful stimuli have occurred within a protective frame.

Differentiating Fact from Fiction

Professors Joel B. Cohen and Eduardo B. Andrade explain, “For positive affect to result, one must adopt a frame of mind adequate to convince the person that real danger/threat is not actually present.” This de-fanged, fun fear can happen in three different ways: “the confidence frame (i.e., one feels the danger but is confident about his/her skills to deal with it), the safety zone frame (i.e., one places himself/herself sufficiently away from immediate/likely danger), and the detachment frame (i.e., one observes the danger but does not interact with it).”

Young children have less experience than adults on which to base formulations of confidence, safety, or detachment. Kids are more sensitive to and have a harder time rationalizing fear. But, intriguingly, “children, like adults, quite enjoy a good scare,” notes Gjersoe. She goes on to describe an experiment:

“Paul Bloom, at Yale University, played four- and five-year-olds videos of other children watching happy, boring or scary movies and then asked them which of the movies they themselves would like to watch. Preliminary evidence suggests that, on the whole, children want to watch the happy movie but the scary movie comes a close second, a long way ahead of the boring movie. Like adults, kids would rather be scared than bored.”

So, ghoul it up for your Halloween parties and forge on ahead into the haunted houses. Try to get your friends with an especially good “Boo!” They should thank you for it.

Also read: The Art of Sci-Fi: 80 Years of Movie Posters

The Irreparable Impact of the Shutdown on Science

A night shot of the U.S. Capital Building in Washington D.C.

The shutdown has had serious repercussions for scientists who play an important role as public servants. What happens even when these shutdowns are short-lived?

Published October 17, 2013

By Diana Friedman

Image courtesy of Worawat via stock.adobe.com.

Yay, the government’s back on! In the meantime, scientists from a broad spectrum of subject areas have had to endure severe setbacks.

Dr. Francis Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health, summed up many frustrations in this New York Times article:

“How many potential future Nobel Prize winners are struggling to find research support today, or have been sent home on furlough? How many of them are wondering whether they should do something else-or move to another country? It is a bitter irony for the future of our nation’s health that N.I.H. is being hamstrung this way, just when the science is moving forward at an unprecedented pace.”

While some brave (and anonymous) biology post docs continued their work in DC despite furloughs, threats to animal and cell lines have put many biology experiments in jeopardy. This NPR article brings into sad relief the immense wasted costs of losing even a single transgenic lab animal.

Maryn McKenna has been doing an excellent (and terrifying, as always) job covering the shutdown’s impact on the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention.

“Here’s what we’re responding to right now: An outbreak of Legionella in a residential facility in Alabama. An outbreak of tuberculosis in another state. An investigation of a fatal case of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever on an American Indian Reservation in Arizona where we’ve been working for two years to control that disease. A serious healthcare-associated infection outbreak in Baltimore,” says Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in this interview.

Scientists as Public Servants

“A cluster of infants who have been dying, or getting severely ill, in another part of the country. A cluster of meningitis in a university in the northeast that is going to require a very complicated response. An outbreak of hepatitis B in healthcare…For every day that goes by, there’s a less intensive investigation, less effective prevention of situations like this. If I had to use one phrase to describe what’s happening: This is a self-inflicted wound,” Dr. Frieden continued.

This Popular Mechanics article describes the setbacks to NASA research. On a lighter note, #ThingsNASAMightTweet saw space science enthusiasts picking up the communication slack on Twitter.

With the government now back online, the losses and catching up strategies are now being assessed. Common worries across scientific fields are the gaps in data that will likely result from the time off and uncertainty regarding future funding.

Andrew A. Rosenberg, Director of the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, summarizes nicely,

“Scientists aren’t members of just another interest group-they’re public servants in whom the country has invested considerable time and resources. When policy makers sideline science, they’re also sidelining our safety, health and ability to understand the world around us. Looking at the results of the shutdown, they should realize that this is an experiment not worth repeating.”

Also read: For the Public Good: Policy and Science

How to Avoid the Pitfalls of Peer Review

A recent “sting operation” highlights important questions about the peer review system and how to publish, disseminate, and debate scientific findings.

Published October 03, 2013

By Diana Friedman

Science writer John Bohannon recently went undercover…for science! As Ocorrafoo Cobange, a made-up biologist at the also fictitious Wassee Institute of Medicine in Asmara, Bohannon wrote a terrible paper about the anti-cancer virtues of a molecule he claimed to have extracted from lichen.

“Any reviewer with more than a high-school knowledge of chemistry and the ability to understand a basic data plot should have spotted the paper’s short-comings immediately. Its experiments are so hopelessly flawed that the results are meaningless,” explains Bohannon in this Science article. Slightly differing versions of the “bait” paper were sent to 304 open access (OA) journals. Just over half, 157, accepted the paper, pointing out some serious flaws in the peer review system.

Balancing Quality, Economics, and Ethics

Balancing quality control with economics—and ethics—isn’t straightforward, nor is this a problem uniquely related to OA journals. In this Guardian article, Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study Fellow Curt Rice argues that the practice of charging author fees is at the root of the issue.

“This is a model that invites corruption. Set up a journal, accept some articles, charge a high fee, and publish the article on your website. This corruption is fed, of course, by the fact that researchers feel incredible pressure to publish more and more. It’s also fed by a system that uses quantity as a proxy for quality. But it is a mistake to equate open access and author payment. There are traditional journals that require some payment, too, especially in connection with high typesetting costs,” he says.

For different perspectives on this issue, subscription-based Nature covers the economics of OA publications and the debate about how to improve peer review. OA arXiv founder Paul Ginsparg considers potential improvements to the peer review system here.

In a blog post on physicsfocus.com, “Are flaws in peer review someone else’s problem?” nanoscientist Philip Moriarty invokes the genius of Douglas Adams to call attention to a related kink in the self-correcting mechanisms of scientific research: What happens when something gets through the process that turns out to have been wrong?

The idea is that it will be caught and rectified by subsequent experiments that yield different results, but there are some “buts.” Moriarty, via his colleague Mathias Brust, informally estimates that about 80% of scientists find potential flaws in papers that don’t immediately affect their work an insufficient reason to engage in disputes (the “Someone Else’s Problem” invisibility field, see above Douglas Adams link).

A Culture of Hoped-to-be-Reciprocated Politeness

Another 10% eschew “unfriendliness” between scientists. “After all, you never know who referees your next paper.” Such reluctance to rock the proverbial boat could leave the next researcher referring to shaky (or worse) preceding work, which may become canonical simply because it was published in a prestigious journal and never challenged due to an entrenched culture of hoped-to-be-reciprocated politeness.

Furthermore, it can be logistically onerous and disincentivizing to replicate an experiment with which you take issue. Neuropsychology professor Dorothy Bishop illustrates, “The expectation is that anyone who has doubts, such as me, should be responsible for checking the veracity of the findings…Indeed, I could try to get a research grant to do a further study. However…it might take a year or so to do, and would distract me from my other research. Given that I have reservations about the likelihood of a positive result [and, by extension, being able to publish], this is not an attractive option.”

One fairly recent alternative is post-publication peer review—basically, non-anonymously discussing (or criticizing) a published paper on a blog. It’s a controversial venue for debate, partly because it’s so counter to the norm of deferring to journals as the medium and safeguard of scientific record. It also rubs some people the wrong way. If someone has to go through a burdensome process to publish the fruits of his or her labor, why should someone else be able to publish criticism immediately and with no vetting or regulation?

Honest Debate vs. Malicious Vitriol

But Dr. Bishop asserts that online forums allow “for new research to be rapidly discussed and debated in a way that would be quite impossible via traditional journal publishing.” This can serve to more efficiently catch and cull errors. “In addition,” Bishop adds, “it brings the debate to the attention of a much wider readership.”

There’s a fine line on the internet, however, between debate and vitriol (to be clear, Dr. Bishop wasn’t engaged in the latter), and crossing it can also undermine good science, as well as science education. A recent study found that a rude tone in online comments responding to an article adversely affects how readers feel about the scientific content of the article, even when the readers are familiar with the subject and when the science is sound. This issue recently inspired Popular Science to do away with its comments section. Explaining the decision, PopSci online content director Suzanne LaBarre writes,

“If you carry out those results to their logical end—commenters shape public opinion; public opinion shapes public policy; public policy shapes how and whether and what research gets funded–you start to see why we feel compelled to hit the “off” switch. A politically motivated, decades-long war on expertise has eroded the popular consensus on a wide variety of scientifically validated topics…The cynical work of undermining bedrock scientific doctrine is now being done beneath our own stories, within a website devoted to championing science.”

Awareness is the First Step

Presumably, post-publication peer review would maintain a professional tone. But might seeing scientists questioning each other’s conclusions, even politely, also undermine public trust in science? It’s important to teach the process of science (as opposed to just facts). Marie-Claire Shanahan, Research Chair in Science Education and Public Engagement at the University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, writes,

“The effects of ‘right answer’ science teaching [are] clear in the way students responded to disagreements among researchers…They wanted to know what the truth really was, and they became suspicious of the various scientists [with conflicting conclusions] for not knowing how to study the issue properly or for going in with biased preconceptions…Students need much more exposure to real inconclusive and controversial science.”

There isn’t one clear solution that addresses all of these issues, but increasing awareness is an important step. Encouraging replication studies (also see this article by Ed Yong) and reconsidering the “publish or perish” culture of academia are also important.

The subjects of quality control, questionable publication patterns, and science’s ability to be self-correcting overall are discussed in this podcast, featuring excerpted coverage of our event, Envy: The Cutthroat Side of Science.

Also read: How Can Scientists Better Engage the Public?

A Theologist’s Perspective on Science and Ethics

Christiana Peppard, PhD, assistant professor of theology, science, and ethics at Fordham University, discusses the relation between science and ethics.

Published September 05, 2013

By Christiana Peppard, PhD

Image courtesy of bittedankeschön via stock.adobe.com.

According to a study performed by Yale law professor Dan Kahan et al, just thinking about politics messes with one’s ability to be objective, even when it comes to something as seemingly apolitical as numeracy. Participants were asked to analyze two identical fake data sets, which they were told represented results from two studies. The subject of one was ideologically neutral (effectiveness of skin creams) and the other was more charged (concerned with gun control laws). People who performed the analysis of the neutral data correctly were more likely to err when it came to the more culturally controversial data set.

In a nearly diametric study, UC Santa Barbara psychology professors Jim Blascovich and Christine Ma-Kellams find, “Thinking about science leads individuals to endorse more stringent moral norms and exhibit more morally normative behavior.” The authors contend this may be due to “a lay image or notion of ‘science’ that is associated with concepts of rationality, impartiality, fairness, technological progress, and ultimately, the idea that we are to use these rational tools for the mutual benefit of all people in society.”

Science and Ethics: Profoundly Related

This “might seem encouraging, particularly to fans of science. But one possible cost of assigning moral weight to science is the degree to which it distorts the way we respond to research conclusions,” points out psychology professor Dr. Piercarlo Valdesolo in this Scientific American piece. “When faced with a finding that contradicts a cherished belief (e.g. a new study suggesting that humans have, or have not, contributed to global warming), we are more likely to question the integrity of the practitioner. If science is fundamentally moral, then how could it have arrived at such an offensive conclusion? Blame the messenger.”

Another paper, regarding the ethics of data stewardship and sharing, further points out that the results and processes of science (in this case, data collection, use, and dissemination) have important social implications.

The juxtaposition of these conclusions powerfully illustrates the idea that science and ethics are profoundly related—in ways that warrant consideration by scientists and non-scientists alike.

The Ethical Intersection of Science and the Humanities

Regarding the ethical intersection of science and the humanities, ethicist and biologist Dr. Christiana Peppard says, “Pitting the humanities against science is a missed educational opportunity. There’s not a binary between total relativism on one hand and scientific realism and objectivity on the other hand.”

For science deniers, the issue of uncertainty in science is a real problem, which is why they make way too much of the concept: “If science is fallible, then all sources of authority are equally valid.” But, of course, uncertainty isn’t a problem. More information may be needed. Maybe our experiment was inappropriate. Maybe we need better methodology or equipment. But this doesn’t mean the process isn’t sound. On the other hand, for people who tend to be more triumphalistic, there tends to be a more totalizing approach, a sense of, “Hey we know so much and we have all this data! Now we can do anything!”

Having all this information is totally great and worthy of celebration, but it’s not a stopping point. Data isn’t actually useful without a framework for interpretation, and these interpretive frameworks warrant at least as much critical consideration as the data and methods of data collection. It’s really imperative in many areas of life now to be able to evaluate data and claims about what it means. Humanities critical thinking skills help to parse out what’s reasonable conjecture and what’s a stretch.”

Also read: The Ethics and Morality of Modern Biotechnology and National Security, Neuroscience and Bioethics

A Scientist’s Perspective on Ethics and Morality

A walking path forks into two different directions.

What can science tell us about ethics? Piercarlo Valdesolo, PhD, Director of the Moral Emotions and Trust Lab at Claremont McKenna College, scientifically investigates our moral decision-making processes.

Published September 12, 2013

By Diana Friedman

Image courtesy of Kaspars Grinvalds via stock.adobe.com.

Scientists must often consider the importance of ethical and interpretive frameworks for thinking about data and the results and cultural contexts of scientific inquiry. Dr. Piercarlo Valdesolo, Director of the Moral Emotions and Trust Lab at Claremont McKenna College, studies the relation from the other direction. He asks what science can tell us about people’s moral decision-making processes.

“There are all these emotional states—compassion, awe, jealousy—that philosophers and scholars of religion have been interested in for a long time and have speculated about when it comes to moral judgments. I’m trying to look at these states and their effects on moral decisions more empirically in the lab,” explains Dr. Valdesolo.

In this Q&A, Dr. Valdesolo discusses the value and challenges of investigating morality through a scientific lens.

Why use science to ask these questions?

I think the value of looking at these questions through a scientific lens is to provide philosophers and people whose job it is to think about ethics with more fodder for philosophizing. Though, I don’t see it as my role to do that part. I agree with people who are wary of scientists who make normative claims. There’s value in what we’re doing because it can inform the perspectives of people who are in that business.

What are the challenges?

There are negative feelings that need to be evoked in the lab in order to study, say, aggression. The biggest challenge is to try to create these phenomena as they would exist in the real world, but to do so in a way that still respects participants.

Could understanding patterns or emotional influences over moral choices have a dark side? Could people be manipulated more effectively, for example?

That’s the case with so much of social psychology. If you’re someone who studies persuasion or attitude change, that information can be used for good or bad. You could try to get people to change their attitudes about charity in a positive way. Conversely, the information could be used by marketers to try to get you to buy a product that might not be good for your health, for example. The application of the knowledge of psychological principles can go either way, good or bad, and that’s true across all social science findings, I think.

What do you think is the value of studying moral psychology?

What I try to emphasize in my classes, when I teach social psychology, is that the point of trying to get at the processes by which people make these decisions is to gain a third party perspective on your own choices. It helps you to try to remove yourself from a given situation, to really understand—in as objective a way as you can—why you’re doing what you’re doing. Are your behaviors and decisions getting you towards your goals, whatever those goals may be? I think that’s the real value of learning about social psychology.

For more on this topic, including some of the methodologies by which Dr. Valdesolo studies moral decisions, check out the complete interview in the podcast, The Science of Moral Decisions.

Also read: The Ethics and Morality of Modern Biotechnology

How Can Scientists Better Engage the Public?

The debate over whether scientisim is a problem points out an opportunity to engage people in science in more constructive ways.

Published August 29, 2013

By Diana Friedman

Image courtesy of kubko via stock.adobe.com.

There’s been a lot written lately debating scientism. There are various definitions of this concept but, basically, some fear that “Science” is appropriating questions that are supposed to be under the purview of “The Humanities,” while others contend that science is the only reasonable way to determine human values. While debate is a great way to vet and hone ideas, this particular one might be more constructively framed. There probably are individual exceptions to this, but I don’t think there’s really a conflict between scientists and humanists (I like to think you can be both). A more useful question is how can non-scientists better understand science and scientific perspectives, and how can scientists better engage the public.

“We both believe in the attainability of truth and progress, and we agree that science is our most powerful means of understanding and improving our world. By all means engage with science,’ says science writer John Horgan in this Scientific American blog. “But engage with it critically, because science…needs tough, informed criticism.” Science andthe humanities offer valuable frameworks for such critical thinking, and both perspectives are important.

The scientific method can be employed in the consideration of any type of question as a powerful tool for evidence-based decision-making, but it should be kept in mind that scientists are human. Denying the value of science doesn’t get anyone anywhere. Neither is it constructive for scientists to deny our own fallibility or involvement in cultural contexts.

Increasing Public Engagement and Trust in Science

There are a lot of ways to make mistakes. If an experiment turns out a false result, the best way to catch and correct it is to have more people paying attention, thinking critically, and employing the scientific method in replication studies and new experiments. Fostering these skills and an appreciation for experimentation and the challenges involved in non-scientists as well as scientists is vital for increased public engagement as well as trust in science. In this Boundary Vision blog, Marie-Claire Shanahan writes,

In this podcast, biology professor and author Dr. Stuart Firestein makes a similar point:

“How do you engage more people in the scientific project in a way they can engage in it? It begins with education and the way we teach science. We teach facts instead of teaching questions. Now we present it as a huge encyclopedic collection of facts that nobody could ever hope to master. You have to give people a taste for questions and have them understand that science is about puzzles and questions and a kind of uncertainty that’s very appealing the way that a sporting event should be…We’re all scientists in a way. We’re all out in the world trying to figure things out. We make predictions and we test them…I think being a scientist is being a human being.”

Also read: The Culture Crosser: The Sciences and Humanities

Beautiful Proof? Scientific Images, Art, and Evidence

Scientific images occupy an interesting place at the intersection of art and science. Can artistic principles be used to more effectively communicate science to the public?

Published August 19, 2013

By Maryam Zaringhalam, Ivan Oransky, and Nina Samuel

“After a certain high level of technical skill is achieved, science and art tend to coalesce in esthetics, plasticity, and form. The greatest scientists are always artists as well.” -Einstein

Scientific images are often beautiful as well as informative. Is science artistic? Are images evidence? Experts weigh in from scientific and artistic perspectives. For more on the intersection between art and science, check out this podcast.

Maryam Zaringhalam is a genetics and molecular biology PhD candidate at Rockefeller University and the author of the blog ArtLab.

I think scientists and artists have similar ways of thinking about the world. Science is based on observation and questions, and a lot of art is as well. Some of the most interesting questions come from artists. I happen to use a pipette instead of a paintbrush, but it’s all about trying to understand.

There’s a lot of emphasis in science on the image. The way I was taught to read scientific papers is figure by figure. Seeing is believing, at the end of the day. The power of images is that it’s right in front of you. Art is this really universal means of concept delivery. An image can act as a catalyst to create awareness around an issue or an area of research, and now you can send images out into the world immediately and reach huge numbers of people. It’s an amazing tool for science communication. It would be lovely if more scientists began to communicate their work to the public through images.

One of the Biggest Challenges of Teaching Science

People think of science as way up in an ivory tower because some of the concepts we deal with can seem really abstract, but you can show an image and all of a sudden it becomes more real. One of the biggest challenges of teaching science is that it’s hard to convince people that it’s more than what you learn in the classroom, where ideas can seem boring or intangible. The images can be so inspiring. You can see something and realize, “Wow! This is inside me—or all around me, or way, way off in the distant universe. It’s real and means something!” And sometimes, it’s crazy beautiful.

It’s also really interesting to think about the ethics of scientific images. A huge issue is knowing how to balance what you can manipulate. It’s so easy to edit images, and sometimes you might want to tweak something to make it clearer or more compelling. But it’s so important to make sure you’re not crossing any lines into falsification.

Ivan Oransky, MD, is the vice president and global editorial director of MedPage Today, a clinical assistant professor of medicine at the New York University School of Medicine, and co-founder and writer for the blog Retraction Watch.

Image manipulation is one of the most common reasons for retraction that we see on Retraction Watch. Sometimes, duplicated images are just unintentional or sloppy. When we see investigations uncovering images in papers from unrelated experiments that just happen to prove the main points of a paper, however, it’s hard to imagine the authors having done that for any reason other than making their results look better than they are. Fortunately for science—and unfortunately for fraudsters—the same tools that allow image manipulation allow its detection.

Nina Samuel, PhD, is a historian of science and art. She is the curator of the exhibits The Islands of Benoît Mandelbrot: Fractals, Chaos, and the Materiality of Thinking and My Brain Is in My Inkstand: Drawing as Thinking and Process, opening in November at the Cranbrook Art Museum in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.

There is a famous quote of British mathematician G.H. Hardy who stated in his essay, A Mathematician’s Apology, “Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics.” I dare to argue that most scientists have experienced a similar feeling—that a “beautiful” (or an especially simple and at the same time aesthetically compelling) theorem or equation seems to be more likely to be true (or to embody a “higher truth”) than an overly complicated or, for example, asymmetric or “ugly” one.

The aesthetic feeling that guides these choices or the design of scientific theories is no different from the aesthetic feeling that artists use to compose their works. This doesn’t mean that the result—an artwork or a scientific theory—should be confused or understood as the same. But I would not say that the feeling of beauty itself does differ in scientific or non-scientific contexts.

The Methods of Art and Science

I would say that images can make scientific ideas or theories emerge. Art and science are not the same, but the methods of art and science come very close in the moment of creation. One could maybe ask: How could science have emerged without image making at all? The observation of nature can be understood as one of the most important foundations of science. The attempt to depict, to describe, to record, to classify and to understand the observed through the production of pictorial representations is one of the most elementary operations of science.

For example, the analysis of shapes and forms, the classification of morphologies, is the most important method of sciences like biology or anatomy. Representations make it possible that things in nature can migrate to conceptual realms, that they can be written about, that they can be pointed at, and, most importantly, that they can start to exist as “scientific things.” And this doesn’t stop at the visible world surrounding us. Making the invisible visible is another basic operation in science (think for example of the micro- and the telescope, or of x-rays).

Producing evidence is one of the basic features of images in general. This becomes clear if one considers the etymology of the Latin term evidentia, which can be translated as “obviousness/vividness,” or the quality of being manifest. Based on that root, what becomes “evident” in the first place is that which comes before the eyes—what we see. The term “eye witnessing” is very telling in this sense. Also, for example, think of the history of photography. Photographs have been used as legal evidence since their invention.

A Complex Relationship

However, the relation between evidence and a proof in science is more complex. Often scientists that I met told me that the “feeling of evidence” was triggered through an image, but that the proof itself had to be done in an analytic way or based on equations. This is especially true for mathematics, where images are mostly not regarded as proofs, but they can surely lead to a proof.

With the digital revolution, the question of the image—in science but also in society—has become more urgent than ever. Our world is not only full of images, but also our decisions are based on them, e.g. whom we should admire, how we should behave, what we should desire to possess, and even whom we should start a war with—all these things are based on images used as evidences and strategies to make us believe. This is obviously dangerous if images are not understood in the right way, that is, as representations of reality and never as the reality itself.

The main challenge, I would say, isn’t the fact that we can use Photoshop or other digital tools to manipulate images (the history of the ‘manipulation’ of images is as long as the history of images themselves), but it is their overpowering presence everywhere, and their free migration and floatation. It is the fact that they can easily become economic or political weapons. Images can get out of control. Therefore, what we need today is an education that helps us to never lose the distance in front of the images. This distance will make us understand that the representation and the represented are never the same. We need an education of the eye that fosters critical thinking.

Also read: The Art and Science of Human Facial Perception

A New Pitch to the Science of Music

A colorful graphic depicting sound waves.

Though it has been more than seven decades in the making, researchers were finally able to “catch the viscous pitch, the unicorn of the scientific world, in the act of dropping.”

Published July 19, 2013

By Diana Friedman

Image courtesy of sanee via stock.adobe.com.

Last Thursday, something happened that has never happened before. After almost 70 thwarted years, a simple drip proved that basic scientific curiosity can still yield novel delights, as well as the viscosity of pitch. And, the moment was observed!

Pitch, made from wood, coal, or petroleum, is a viscoelastic polymer. Though apparently solid at room temperature—so much so that it can shatter—it’s actually flowing. Very, very slowly. Viscosity describes a fluid’s resistance to flow and is determined by the interactions of particles within a system. In liquids, viscosity usually decreases as temperature rises (so the liquid flows more quickly) because the speed of the constituent molecules increases, cutting down the amount of contact between molecules and resultant friction. In gases, this is reversed. At higher temperatures, gas molecules collide more frequently. For a more thorough explanation of the physics involved, click here. Superfluids, which have zero viscosity, seem to defy gravity.

A Catalyst for Curiosity

Pitch is well at the other end of the spectrum, with a viscosity 230 billion times that of water. If you heat it, put it into a funnel, and let it cool, it will drip at a rate of about once a decade. This very experiment was set up at the University of Queensland in 1927 and at Trinity College Dublin in 1944. Since then, nobody had managed to observe a single drop.

A Radiolab podcast with Professor John Mainstone, long-time custodian of the Queensland experiment, details the tragicomic series of missed drip sightings. At last, on July 18, 2013, scientists at Trinity College—and anyone felicitously watching the webcam at the right moment—participated in a human first and watched the pitch drop!

It’s not every day one gets to do something that’s never happened before. “It summed up why I like being a scientist,” says Trinity College School of Physics Professor Shane Bergin. “It acts as a catalyst for curiosity, and that’s, for me, what the driving force of science is.”

The Queensland pitch is looking ripe for the dripping as well. Test your luck catching the drop fall live here. “You, yourself,” writes Megan Garber for The Atlantic, “can do what nobody had done before: catch the viscous pitch, the unicorn of the scientific world, in the act of dropping.”

Also read: The Biological Foundations of Music

A Region on the Verge of Discovery

Three men have a conversation in a science research lab.

The NY tri-state area pulses with scientific progress and energy, changing the world far beyond its borders.

Published June 1, 2013

By Steven Barboza

The nursery rhyme about London Bridge falling down gives a fair assessment of the fate of bridges. Patch them up with wood and clay, and the wood and clay will wash away. Iron and steel would fare better, but eventually these bridges will bend and bow. But what about plastic?

Structural plastic—the stuff of recycled milk cartons, detergent bottles, and car bumpers—is actually a bridge-builder’s dream. It can be molded into T-beams then bolted into I-beams that are eight times stronger than steel at one-eighth the density. It can be drilled, screwed, sawed, pinned, and even sprayed with a fire-retardant coating.

Theoretically, a plastic George Washington Bridge is possible. “There’s no technical limit to how big a beam we can make out of plastic. All you need is bigger beams to make bigger bridges,” says Tom Nosker, professor of materials science and engineering, who developed structural plastic at Rutgers University’s Advanced Polymer Center in NJ.

A bridge made of recycled plastic lumber is built in Scotland.

The Material Advantages of Plastic

The engineering lesson is elementary. Even sturdy wooden or cement and steel bridges erode given enough time, traffic, and exposure to wind and weather. Plastic beams will not buckle; they’re impervious to rot; and they’re eco-friendly, providing a novel use for mountains of discarded milk containers.

But there’s a broader lesson here: the entire New York tri-state region is a kind of science and technology Grand Central, where researchers bustle to push back the boundaries of possibility. Structural plastic is only one of the region’s thousands of innovations bound to affect our lives in extraordinary ways in the not-so-distant future.

An incredible array of area research universities are bristling with a spirit of invention that extends New York’s science ecosystem into a much larger footprint—creating an entire region of unparalleled scientific excitement.

A New Frontier in Manufacturing

Connecticut is brewing a latter-day industrial revolution of its own, as it paves the way for digital manufacturing. The University of Connecticut (UConn) has built a sort of factory of the future—one of the most advanced additive manufacturing centers in the nation. Additive manufacturing is a breakthrough method of making things—from flight-proven rocket engines to individually tailored hearing aids. Instead of using lathes, drills, molding machines, and stamping presses, it uses software and digital 3D printers that build items layer by layer. There’s no waste, molds, or assembly of intricate parts

The new Pratt & Whitney Additive Manufacturing Innovation Center, a partnership of UConn and Pratt & Whitney, is the Northeast’s first such facility to work with metals. Techniques developed here might one day empower small and medium-sized firms and entrepreneurs to launch novel, incredibly complex products quickly, profitably, and more flexibly than ever, with minimal manual labor.

A 3D printer in UConn’s Pratt & Whitney Additive Manufacturing Innovation Center.

Imagine a new generation of intricate, lightweight, and durable custom products—printed in cost-efficient home factories.

At UConn’s center, which houses 3D manufacturing equipment and rapid prototyping technologies, two high-powered electron beam melting machines and lasers repeatedly melt layer upon layer of powdered material, such as titanium, into a single solid piece. The items are built to the exact specifications dictated by a 3D computer assisted design (CAD) model. Engineers are using the center to develop advanced fabrication techniques for production parts in aerospace, biomedical science, and other industries.

“The new center will allow us to push into new frontiers of manufacturing and materials science while training a new generation of engineers in some of the world’s most sophisticated manufacturing technology,” says UConn President Susan Herbst.

Bringing Cybernetics to Life

Scientists at Princeton University are also using 3D printing tools, not to crank out jet engines, but to print a fully functional organ—a bionic ear so sensitive it can tune into frequencies far beyond the limits of human hearing.

The bionic ear is a bold mixture of electronics and tissue. Researchers, led by Michael McAlpine, an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, used an ordinary 3D printer purchased off the Internet to combine a matrix of hydrogel and bovine cells with silver nanoparticles. Using CAD software, the printer deposits layer upon layer of gel, silver, and cells, building the ear out of an array of thin slices. The nanoparticles form a working antenna, while the cells multiply and mature into cartilage.

The finished product is soft and squishy and looks remarkably like the real thing, except there’s a coil antenna in the center. Two wires wind around its electrical “cochlea,” where sound is sensed. The wires can be connected to electrodes.

The ear is a step toward a device that someday could be used to restore a person’s hearing, or improve it by connecting electrical signals to a human’s nerve endings, as is customary with cochlear implants. But additional research and testing is being done. “The design and implementation of bionic organs and devices that enhance human capabilities, known as cybernetics, has been an area of increasing scientific interest,” the researchers wrote in an article. “This field has the potential to generate customized replacement parts for the human body, or even create organs containing capabilities beyond what human biology ordinarily provides.”

Revolutionizing Computing Architecture

As Princeton scientists chart a new course in the brave new world of cybernetics, Yale University scientists are inventing a new cyber age. Three Yale physicists are laying the foundation for the warp-speed computers of the future—machines that will harness the power of atoms and molecules to store, process, and transfer colossal amounts of data at almost unimaginable speeds, and do it in spaces so miniscule they cannot be seen by the naked eye.

Two applied physics professors—Robert Schoelkopf and Michel Devoret—are building a quantum computer, one “artificial atom” at a time. The scientists are putting “microwave quantum optics” on a chip by squeezing microwave photons, or tiny packets of light energy, into ultra small cavities on a chip. They’re also squeezing in electrical circuit elements, which act as artificial atoms that can be used as quantum bits, units that process and store quantum information.

These small “atoms” interact with the packets of light energy from the microwaves at extremely high speeds. The small cavity acts as a quantum bus of sorts, transmitting quantum information to and from the atoms. The result: a radical new architecture that may usher in the end of computing as we know it. Scientists hope to one day use this approach to create a huge integrated circuit of quantum bits, resulting in a quantum computer.

Old Fuel, New Production Method

Lehigh University researchers are looking to forge a new path in fuel production—creating a solution to the world’s unsustainable levels of energy consumption. They’re turning to the simple but powerful process most kids learn about in grade school, photosynthesis, to harness sunlight and synthesize liquid fuel from dissolved carbon dioxide.

While the process is new and extremely efficient, the fuel has been around for decades: it’s methanol, which is a safe fuel that burns cleaner than gas and can reduce hydrocarbon emissions by as much as 80%. In fact, methanol actually consumes CO2.

Bryan Berger, assistant professor, chemical engineering; Steven McIntosh, associate professor, chemical engineering; and graduate student / research assistant Zhou Yang collaborate in the lab. Photo by Christa Neu/Lehigh University Communications + Public Affairs

Methanol is mainly produced using natural gas or coal. Nobody knew it was possible to photosynthesize it into existence—until now. In the 1990s, methanol was marketed as an alternative fuel for vehicles. It was never fully adopted because there was no economic incentive for continuing methanol production as petroleum fuel prices fell in the ‘90s.

Why turn to methanol again? Because it has a higher-octane level than gasoline, there are no technical hurdles for vehicle design and fuel distribution, and a methanol-based fuel economy would dramatically reduce energy dependence on dwindling fossil fuel sources.

Converting Sunlight into Methanol

By using a cross-disciplinary effort in catalysis, materials chemistry, and cellular engineering, Lehigh scientists have found a way to directly convert sunlight into methanol, bypassing the need to grow and process a plant.

The team replaced slow, natural photosynthesis with rapid, efficient, and selective artificial photosynthesis, using semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) as photocatalysts. QDs are nanocrystals that once promised to revolutionize display technologies, solar power, and biological imaging. A key barrier has been price; they cost up to $10,000 per gram, thus their use has been limited to special applications.

The Lehigh team discovered a novel way to produce QDs: by using an engineered bacterial strain to initiate and control their growth—essentially a batch fermentation process. “We are thus able to achieve a cost of less than $38 per gram for quantum dots,” says Bryan Berger, professor of chemical engineering and co-principal investigator.

The Lehigh team has projected production costs for their methanol to be 65% cheaper than current costs for producing biodiesel fuel. If they can develop a production method that can be scaled-up and is commercially feasible, photocatalytic methanol production could have a significant long-term impact on society and the economy.

“A low-cost, green fuel produced in large quantities from carbon dioxide, sunlight, and water could potentially meet our transportation needs. It would reduce oil imports without depleting our natural resources,” says Berger.

New Diagnostic Tools Target Tumors

The University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) technically sits outside the New York tri-state area and yet its extraordinary commitment to R&D (as exemplified by an annual budget of more than $800 million) and a legacy of discovery traced to Benjamin Franklin, the Founding Father with a knack for creating something out of nothing, makes it an important contributor to the region’s science ecosystem.

While UPenn created the first general-purpose electronic computer in the early 1940s, a 27-ton, 680-square-foot model that calculated ballistic trajectories during World War II, current UPenn scientists are leading explorers in the world of the infinitesimal. By developing nanotechnology as an effective diagnostic tool, researchers are hoping to revolutionize the prevention and treatment of disease.

While magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can produce topographical maps of tissue, scan clarity isn’t always sufficient for diagnosis. To mitigate patients’ health risks and to improve imaging, UPenn researchers are coating an iron-based contrast agent so it interacts with the acidic microenvironments of tumors, making tumors stand out clearly from healthy tissue. The approach is both safer and less costly than other methods.

The coating of glycol chitosan—a sugar-based polymer that reacts to acids—allows nanoparticles to remain neutral when near healthy tissue but to become ionized in low pH. In the vicinity of acidic tumors, a change in charge causes the nanoparticles to be attracted to and retained by the tumors.

Delivering Drugs to Tumor Sites

“Having a tool like ours would allow clinicians to better differentiate the benign and malignant tumors, especially since there has been shown to be a correlation between malignancy and pH,” says Andrew Tsourkas, associate professor of bioengineering. The coated nanoparticles are not limited to imaging, he added. “They can also be used to deliver drugs to tumor sites.”

Developing Infection-Resistant Medical Implants Scientists at Stevens Institute of Technology are developing next generation, bacteria-resistant biomaterials that could become an implant staple for millions of patients. And as the population ages, the market for orthopedic implants will experience exponential growth; by 2017, the global market will reach $46 billion. But 1% of hip implants, 4% of knee implants, and 15% of implants associated with orthopedic trauma fail—due to infection.

“Usually the only way to resolve a biomaterials-associated infection is to remove the device, treat the infected tissue, and later implant a second device,” says Matthew Libera, professor of materials science at Stevens. “Not only does this bring really significant cost to the healthcare system; it forces the patient to undergo a lengthy and challenging surgical and rehabilitation process. We would like to eliminate that risk.”

Stevens faculty from numerous disciplines, including materials science, chemical biology, and biomedical engineering, developed technology that actually repels bacteria and promotes the growth of healthy bone cells on uncemented implants. The surface of the implants is treated with hydrogel because most bacteria, particularly the staphylococci common to implant infection, do not adhere to most hydrogels. As a result, patients won’t have to take antibiotics orally; the medicine will go to work at the surface of the implant.

A Local Home for the World’s Biosamples

Many of the biospecimens used in research projects across the region, and around the world, are provided by Rutgers University, a national leader in genetics. RUCDR Infinite Biologics, founded in 1998 as the Rutgers University Cell and DNA Repository, is the world’s largest university-based biorepository. It provides DNA, RNA, and cell lines with clinical data to research laboratories worldwide, which use them to study a host of diseases and disorders.

RUCDR contains more than 12 million biosamples, logs 100 million database entries per year, operates one of the nation’s largest stem cell programs, and facilitates a slew of research initiatives.

“This sort of advanced-technology, automated facility was sorely needed on the national level, and we anticipate a continual increase in use by Rutgers faculty,” says RUCDR CEO Jay A. Tischfield, director of the Human Genetics Institute of New Jersey and professor of genetics.

Last year, the repository received a $10 million grant from the National Institute on Alcohol and Alcoholism Abuse to provide DNA extraction, basic genetic testing, and repository services for more than 46,000 saliva samples for a national research effort to determine the genetic and environmental factors leading to alcoholism. Formerly, large-scale studies on the causes of alcoholism used sociological, behavioral, and limited biological data.

Members of the Rutgers RUCDR Infinite Biologics group maintain biosamples.

Robust Epidemiological and Biological Information

“For the first time, researchers will have robust epidemiological and biological information from large numbers of individuals so that they may correlate genetics to alcohol abuse behavior,” Tischfield says. “The results are used to formulate national policy and improve healthcare services.”

In 2013, RUCDR received $44.5 million from the Cooperative Agreement award from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), which will allow RUCDR to support the NIMH Center for Collaborative Genomics Research on Mental Disorders by collecting, processing, and analyzing blood and tissue samples from NIMH-funded scientists nationwide.

“With the new funding, RUCDR Infinite Biologics will implement new meta-analytic approaches for combined analysis of clinical and genetic data in the NIMH Human Genetics Initiative,” says Tischfield.

Transforming Lives through Research

Research projects such as those detailed above represent just a fraction of the novel endeavors under way in labs across the tri-state region—probing mysteries that puzzle us, creating technologies that amaze us, and making discoveries that alter how we live and think. And in the process, Tri-State scientists are bringing robust new revenue streams to the local economy—creating both short- and long-term benefits.

While we may never see a plastic twin of the George Washington Bridge, plastic bridges are on the horizon, literally. Rutgers has partnered with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to build plastic lumber bridges that can tolerate punishing loads: 70-ton tanks and 120-ton locomotives.

Chances are, structural plastic has already touched your life. If you’ve ever traveled by train, you have probably glided along rails held in place by plastic railroad ties. With 212,000 miles of track in the U.S., ties are big business; 20 million are replaced each year for maintenance, and composite ties are rapidly gaining notice for their corrosion-resistance.

Leave it to scientists in the tri-state region to come up with an ingenious idea for what to do with the world’s rubbish: create everlasting building blocks.

Also read: Two New York Startup Companies Envision a Waste-Free Future

About the Author

Steven Barboza is a writer in New Jersey.

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