Science Progress Issues

10-06-08 | Where’s the Biomed Bailout?

By Rick Weiss
Congress last week passed a continuing resolution that will keep the National Institutes of Health budget flat-out flat for the fifth year running. The policy is flat-out wrong, as Americans who have diseases that five or ten years from now should be curable are going to have to wait a lot longer.

09-30-08 | The End of Impairment?

By Mark Meier
Drugs that improve attention or prevent fatigue raise ethical questions in many workplace settings. But what about hospitals, where med students can supply themselves with the pills that let them work harder?

09-29-08 | Start Me Up

By Rick Weiss
The face of stem cell research is changing as research moves towards the clinic and commercialization, and as patients demand access to experimental treatments.

09-19-08 | Advocates of the Gold Standard

By Tristan Fowler
In the past year, stem cell research has taken great strides forward. Advocates and researchers alike are pushing for the federal government to expand its support.

08-29-08 | Better Patents Through Crowdsourcing

By Nancy Scola
Want to clean up the patent mess? Start by admitting government can’t know everything. Then put the public on the task.

08-07-08 | It’s the Money, Stupid

By Beryl Lieff Benderly
It isn’t a scientist shortage or a poor public education system. It’s the lack of decent-paying, tenured job opportunities for young graduate and postgraduate research scientists.

08-06-08 | A New Mission for American Science

By Chris Mooney
While everybody is talking about energy these days, they’re not necessarily talking about the scientific opportunity so much as the business one. The moment is right for researchers to take up—with a sense of unshaking mission and purpose—the grand cause of a generation.

06-25-08 | From the Lab to the Market

By Ed Paisley and Jennifer Nelson
Five factors influence biotechnology transfer—university policies, economic development agencies, venture capitalists, strategic partners, and financial markets. Understanding each of them is crucial to building regional centers of innovation.

10-07-08 | Predicting the Unpredictable

By Jeremy Jacquot
Climate modelers work with the data they have and play a role in understanding the complexities of the Earth’s environments. But to adapt to future climate changes, we have to invest in their predictive tools.

10-02-08 | Out of the Park

By Tom Kenworthy
A U.S. district court reminds the Park Service that the agency ignored its own scientific assessment of snowmobiling’s threats to wildlife, air quality, and natural quiet in Yellowstone National Park.

10-02-08 | Earth Raises Its Beach Umbrella

By Jeremy Jacquot
Some scientists are suggesting that marine algae are responding to manmade temperature increases by generating dimethylsulfide, a gas that forms reflective clouds. The cycle is important to understand, but a geoengineering solution that exploits it will not solve our problems.

09-16-08 | Overfishing, Climate Change, and the Rise of Slime

By Jeremy Jacquot
We risk losing what makes the world’s oceans a valuable natural resource: their rich biodiversity. It’s time to get the concept on the cultural radar.

10-07-08 | A Year of Science Progress

By Jonathan D. Moreno
Just over a year ago, we launched Science Progress. Our goal was to provide a forum for progressive science policy, a venue in which those concerned about the future of the country could assess the current state of science in America.

10-01-08 | All the President’s Scientists

By Chris Mooney
For eight years running, the National Academy of Sciences has offered public advice on scientific appointments for the next administration and seen its advice largely ignored. This year, the tone is different, and it’s time to pay attention.

09-24-08 | Cultural Collisions

By Chris Mooney
When the public hasn’t been monitoring developments in science, people can fall back on Hollywood images of big strange projects that go badly awry. If scientists monitored public perceptions, they could engage before misinformation spreads.

09-22-08 | Kicking the Doorstop on Open Access

By Rick Weiss
Since April, researchers publishing work done with NIH support must submit manuscripts for access in a free database. The experiment is working, but large journal publishers aren’t satisfied with the results.

09-04-08 | Teach the Controversy

By Jonathan D. Moreno
Crippling our nation’s future economic competitiveness and military preparedness by crimping scientific learning and denigrating authoritative science puts our nation at risk.

08-15-08 | Minding Mental Minefields

By Rick Weiss
A new report from the National Research Council argues that the military should harness the power of neuroscience to amplify the cognitive prowess of U.S. personnel and make foreign soldiers, um, less smarter.

08-12-08 | More Than Meets the Eyes

By Jerome Franck, Ph.D.
Bugs pack an amazing set of capabilities into a very small package. Understanding and mimicking those abilities can allow researchers to shrink the size of autonomous robots to proportions like those of household pests.

06-11-08 | The “What if?” of Dual-Use Research Awareness

By Michael Stebbins, Ph.D.
A clear set of policy guidelines for reporting biosecurity concerns in research labs is clearly in order. Here are some suggestions.