SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY
DARPA’s new $30 million project in “engineering biology” seeks to use synbio to revolutionize American manufacturing and exemplifies how defense research can be leveraged for broader economic benefits.
SCIENCE DIPLOMACY
While bombs fall on Libya, science diplomacy remains an under-recognized opportunity to engage peacefully in the Middle East and North Africa.
TECHNOLOGY AND NATIONAL SECURITY
Rapid technological change is producing gaps in the treaties that ban biological and chemical weapons, giving rise to the need for new measures to address these developments.
Bioethics
Arthur Caplan reviews Worst Case Bioethics, and advances the case for a national philosophy of medicine for bioethics.
From 1992 until 2001, a special group of scientists collaborated with the U.S. intelligence community to use reconnaissance satellite imagery to study environmental change around the planet. Known as Medea, Measurements of Earth Data for Environmental Analysis, the project came [...]
FINANCING SCIENCE
As the new Obama administration develops its innovation, economic development, and workforce policies, it should look to build and sustain regional and networked efforts, rather than only crafting broad national policies.
NEUROSCIENCE
Traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder are major clinical challenges for doctors treating soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Although very different in nature, the symptoms of the two conditions overlap, making diagnosis and treatment difficult.
NATIONAL SECURITY
A large set of questions for 21st century neural and behavioral science has come into focus, and they will play a significant role in both national intelligence operations and in relations within a globalized scientific community.
The servers are obviously having a tough time handling the traffic load (I’ve gotten a few errors throughout the day), but President-elect Obama’s transition project has already hit the ground running with a box of web 2.0 tools to organize the next administration at change.gov.
INTERNET
The next transition team must make the most of modern information and communications technology to shape, coordinate, and run the process of moving the next president into office. Here are some suggestions on how that can work.
Early this morning, the new Minneapolis bridge on interstate 35W opened. What you can’t see in this CNN video is the network of electronic sensors that will monitor the bridge, allowing engineers to forestall major damage from future wear and prevent catastrophes like the bridge’s collpase that killed 13 people and injured 145 last August.
The recent federal investigation of Dr. Bruce Ivins, the Army bioterrorism researcher suspected of facilitating the 2001 anthrax attacks, is drawing media attention to dual-use research and could provide an opportune moment for biotech researchers to take another look at the rules that govern work with deadly pathogens.
What can fiddler crabs and peacocks teach us about defeating Al Qaeda? Plenty, argues Raphael Sagarin, associate director for Ocean and Coastal Policy at the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University, and editor of the new book, Natural Security: A Darwinian Approach to a Dangerous World.
A quick look at some of the policy-related stories making the rounds on the science and technology blogs.
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
National security and public safety require a coherent national strategy for investing in a range of telecommunications technologies.
Science Progress and American Progress's Doing What Works project teamed up to produce a set of policy proposals that the Obama administration and Congress can adopt to reinvest in the building blocks of American science, innovation, and economic competitiveness. Read the overview of the five reports.
Science Progress proceeds from the propositions that scientific inquiry is among the finest expressions of human excellence, that it is a crucial source of human flourishing, a critical engine of economic growth, and must be dedicated to the common good. Scientific inquiry entails global responsibilities. It should lead to a more equitable, safer, and healthier future for all of humankind.