Category: Science and Society

  • Twenty-four visits to Stockholm: a concise history of the Rockefeller Nobel Prizes. Part I: Alexis Carrel, 1912 Prize in Physiology or Medicine

    —

    by

    By Joseph Luna If there were an epicenter for a fascination with the Nobel Prize, The Rockefeller University, with 24 such awards, would be it. For its size, the university has the greatest density of Nobel prizes of any place in the world. The big-picture factors that have led to such a prestigious legacy are…

  • Leaving the Lab, but Still Thinking Science

    —

    by

    By Mayla Hsu Barbara Ehrenreich graduated from The Rockefeller University (RU), Class of 1968, but never worked as a scientist. Instead, she became a journalist, best known for Nickel and Dimed, in which she documented the hardship of life working at a series of low-wage jobs. She has written nineteen books and numerous articles, on…

  • Crickets: From Midnight Music to Midnight Snack?

    —

    by

    By Jason Rothauser “And how much is that per cricket?” I ask. I’m standing in front of the reptile cages of a local Brooklyn pet store. “Ten cents a pop.” Sounds reasonable. “I’ll take forty.” In a minute or two, the clerk has wrapped up the insects in a large plastic bag, the same way…

  • Scientists Decide: No interesting stories in Science

    —

    by

    By John Borghi On March 16, 1926, Robert H. Goddard launched the first ever liquid-fueled rocket in Auburn, Massachusetts. Though this test did little to silence the mocking editorials and harsh criticisms that had followed Goddard since his 1920 proposal that liquid-fueled rockets would eventually reach beyond Earth’s atmosphere, it was a major breakthrough in…

  • Crisis in Congress

    —

    by

    by Jason Rothauser This is what a government in crisis looks like. Last month, on October 1, the federal government entered its first shutdown since 1996, when an impasse between President Clinton and congressional Republicans led to the government’s doors being shuttered for almost two weeks. Our most recent shutdown beat that record, coming to an…

  • WISeR (Women In Science at Rockefeller): A New Initiative

    —

    by

    By Asma Hatoum, Mariko Kobayashi, and Alessia Deglincerti This summer, a small group of postdocs came together to launch a new initiative called wiser (Women In Science at Rockefeller) to begin to tackle a persistent problem: the underrepresentation of female leaders in academic and non-academic sectors of science. While women hold 60% of all bachelor’s…

  • Academic Governance: A Model

    —

    by

    by Daniel Briskin An unfortunately high proportion of our elected officials are highly opinionated, but irrational people who let their guts drive their politics; many more of them are voters. With the same concerns in mind as the architects of the Electoral College, I don’t want this type of person making decisions for me. We…

  • Fiscal Cliff: The Next Big Challenge for Science

    —

    by

    by Christina Pyrgaki A version of this article appeared on The Incubator blog on February 14, 2013. For the last 35 years, the University of Lake Superior has published a list of banished words—words in the English language that are deemed overused, misused, or useless. Topping the 2013 version1 was a term that no American…

  • Natural Selections interviews Jeanne Garbarino, Director of Science Outreach

    —

    by

    by Christina Pyrgaki I met with Jeanne Garbarino, the newly appointed Director of Science Outreach, the day after the very successful RU holiday party, in her newly renovated office on the fourth floor of Nurse’s Residence. The space radiates science, with flasks decorating the shelves of the bookcases and images of cells scattered on Jeanne’s…

  • Political Polemics

    —

    by

    by Daniel Briskin With the ultimate mandate of giving a select few the power of making decisions for the masses, politics carry an inherent nature of polarity, as differing viewpoints compete for legislative, executive, and judicial power. However, in the current era of hyper-partisan American politics, elected officials can appear more interested in denigration of…