Conventional wisdom deems smaller classes superior. John Boyer a professor at Virginia Tech and a self-described “Podunk instructor,” calls that “poppycock.” He’s exploring how technology can help engage students in face-to-face courses that enroll from 600 to nearly 3,000 students. It’s a timely project that may suggest tips for others. In a recent survey of…
The Obama administration announced a broad plan to foster development of the nation’s “bioeconomy,” including the use of renewable resources and biological manufacturing methods. The National Bioeconomy Blueprint, as the plan is called, discusses a variety of measures and strategies to spur research and development of medical treatments, crops, biofuels and biological manufacturing processes that…
Generating wind energy is more than twice as cheap as solar photovoltaic energy production, a study of alternative energy in six developing countries has found. The findings, published in Nature Climate Change, could help inform global debates on financing initiatives aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries. The authors note that differentiating technologies…
Big science is in competition for government funds, not only with manned space flight, and with various programs of real science, but also with many other things that we need government to do. We had better not try to defend science by attacking spending on these other needs. We would lose, and would deserve to…
When thinking about the economic recession, women exhibit less interest in alpha males in favor of guys who call themselves “natural followers,” a new study suggests. The results are surprising because they fly in the face of what evolutionary psychologists expect from women’s mate choices. According to evolutionary theory, women will seek men who provide…
When fishermen returned to the deep reefs of the Gulf of Mexico weeks after BP’s gushing oil well was capped, they started catching grouper and red snapper with large open sores and strange black streaks, lesions they said they’d never seen and promptly blamed on the spill. Now, two years after the Deepwater Horizon rig…
The Obama administration is issuing the first-ever national standards to control air pollution from gas wells that are drilled using a method called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, but not without making concessions to the oil and gas industry. Much of the air pollution from fracked gas wells is vented when the well transitions from drilling…
In a novel study of health disparities in the United States, Stanford University School of Medicine researchers have identified 22 socioeconomic and environmental variables that together are better indicators of early death than are race or geography. The findings upend long-held beliefs that where you live and the color of your skin are the best…
Who is more likely to lie, cheat, and steal—the poor person or the rich one? Research suggests as people climb the social ladder, their compassionate feelings towards other people decline. Why would wealth and status decrease our feelings of compassion for others? After all, it seems more likely that having few resources would lead to…
Until recently, the East African country of Mozambique was better known for its long civil war, and had few energy resources compared with regional heavy-hitters like Nigeria and Angola. But in the last 10 years, companies like Exxon Mobil, the BG Group of Britain and Eni of Italy have used the latest technologies, including advances…