Seasteading: Libertarians dream of creating self-ruling floating cities. But can the many obstacles, not least the engineering ones, be overcome?
As universities move from being national institutions to international ones, they shift from managing national reputations to seeking international identities. Reputation management may not be at the forefront of many academics’ minds, but when professors go abroad and meet colleagues who have no idea what kind of institution they come from, their interest may pick…
Imagine being able to use electricity to power your car – even if it’s not an electric vehicle. Researchers at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have for the first time demonstrated a method for converting carbon dioxide into liquid fuel isobutanol using electricity. Today, electrical energy generated by various methods…
As the world’s population looks set to grow to nearly 9 billion by 2040 from 7 billion now, and the number of middle-class consumers increases by 3 billion over the next 20 years, the demand for resources will rise exponentially. Even by 2030, the world will need at least 50 percent more food, 45 percent…
Researchers at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (CoECRS) reported in the journal Nature Climate Change encouraging new findings that some fish may be less vulnerable to high CO2 and an acidifying ocean than previously feared. “Human activity is expected to increase the acidity of the world’s oceans by 0.3 to 0.4…
The man behind the popular 2008 documentary Food, Inc. is out with a new project aimed at getting the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to label genetically engineered or modified (GE or GMO) food products. Filmmaker Robert Kenner’s “Labels Matter” piece is part of his FixFood project, a social media platform to empower Americans…
Kay Steiger and Scott Zeger talk about ways college professors could make introductory science classes less off-putting and encourage more people to major in STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). Matthew Yglesias suggests we take a deeper step back and ask whether STEM faculties actually want more people to major in their fields. Author…