Category: Features

  • Working Towards Gender Equity in Academic Science Requires Addressing Systemic Barriers

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    Would you continue pursuing scientific curiosity if you had to constantly fight for your place at the bench? What if it were highly likely that your work would be overlooked, minimized, or even written out of history? For many women in science, this is a lived reality. Despite persistent barriers to training, recognition, and career…

  • From Barre to Bench: When Art and Science Converge

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    I have spent more of my life in a ballet studio than in a traditional classroom, let alone a laboratory. From a young age, I dreamed of a career as a ballet dancer, and ballet consumed my day-to-day life. I was homeschooled to accommodate my training schedule and moved away from home at sixteen to…

  • Celebrating the Fourth Anniversary of Five Trailblazing Women Scientists at The Rockefeller University

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    In 2020, Women in Science at Rockefeller (WISeR) and the Women & Science Initiative commissioned a portrait by Brenda Zlamany titled “Five Trailblazing Women Scientists at The Rockefeller University.” This portrait, the University’s first depicting women scientists, was installed in the lounge of the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Hall in 2022. Behind the scenes, a group…

  • You Can’t Have Science Without Migration: The Rise of Anti-Immigrant Sentiment is Hurting the Scientific Community

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    Migration is woven into the fabric of the scientific community. Many scientists move across regions or continents to pursue opportunities for training, education, and collaboration. These journeys affect both an individual’s life and the trajectory of scientific innovation, fostering diversity of thought and new discoveries. However, as anti-immigrant sentiment increases in the United States and…

  • Platforms, Podcasts, and Politics

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    As someone who grew up chronically online, I never would have guessed that dance videos and SpongeBob memes could be used as tools for teaching science. Yet here we are. Scientists and medical professionals are breaking down complex concepts through TikToks, tweets, and podcasts. Social media has made science approachable and accessible to individuals far…

  • PIT in a Pit: A Guide to Rockefeller’s Most Interactive Resource Center

    PIT in a Pit: A Guide to Rockefeller’s Most Interactive Resource Center

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    Deep in the bowels of The Rockefeller University, through a maze of underground hallways and fickle elevators, is a set of unremarkable brown double doors. A doorbell on the wall glows with a tempting light, beckoning you to press it. Doing so summons a mysterious underground creature known as an “engineer,” a term usually whispered…

  • From Patronage to Policy

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    Scientific research is and always has been deeply entangled with politics, culture, and the broader currents of society. Like most human endeavors, doing science requires materials and manpower, both of which come with a price tag. Thus, funding becomes one of the most direct and potent forces influencing not just what kind of science gets…

  • Bridges Across Worlds: International Voices at the Tri-I

    Bridges Across Worlds: International Voices at the Tri-I

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    New York City has long been a beacon for those seeking education, opportunities, and new horizons. As artist Benny Cruz poetically declares, “New York is the end of your past and place of rebirth,” a sentiment that resonates deeply with the countless newcomers who arrive in this city seeking not merely an address change but…

  • The Myth of Apolitical Science

    The Myth of Apolitical Science

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    The Rockefeller University has a singular mission: to “do good science.” This statement, given by President Richard Lifton at an annual meeting with the Student Representatives Committee (SRC) on May 8, 2024, seems, at first glance, to be an innocuous paraphrase of the Rockefeller University mission statement. If you parse it further, however, it reveals…

  • Trying to Survive as a Scientist Under Shifting Presidential Administrations

    Trying to Survive as a Scientist Under Shifting Presidential Administrations

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    The contentious 2024 U.S. presidential election has had a resounding impact on the social state of the U.S. and broader communities. In a country that seems to be more divided every day, fueled by rhetoric from both sides of the aisle, it is difficult not to question what effect the political environment will have on…

  • Introducing the multitalented Jazz Weisman

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    Jazz Weisman’s desk is in the far-right corner of Gaby Maimon’s lab at Rockefeller University, located on the third floor of Flexner Hall. You can recognize his desk based on the myriad of seemingly unrelated items on display: a series of intricate circuit boards and half-assembled custom electronics, a 3D-printed iPhone charging station, a cheat…

  • Interview with Hsuan-An Chen

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    Hsuan-an (Sean) Chen is a joint postdoctoral researcher at Rockefeller University and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. He is currently working in the Charles M. Rice Lab, a lab focusing on virology and infectious disease, at Rockefeller University. He provides an expert cancer biology perspective on the pathology caused by the chronic Hepatitis C Virus…