Perspectives on Cannabis Reform Shape its Maturation

Perspectives on Cannabis Reform Shape its Maturation

A skim through American media outlets might catch ones attention to the very contentious issue over marijuana and scientific research. Particularly interesting is the kaleidoscopic vantage points forwarded from scientists, policy analysts, and media anchors. Each perspective obscures certain aspects of marijuana while simultaneously distinguishing others that has consequences for how we understand marijuana reform. It is crucial to be aware and reflexive of these repercussions as we move towards marijuana reform.

Words Matter…So, Let’s Talk About Vaginas

I want to talk about how people talk about vaginas… Or, more specifically, how people have been talking about four particular vaginas over the course of the past month or so. For those of you who know me, or are familiar with my research, this will not be a surprise; after all, I write about technological advances in gynecology, so when the news broke in April that a research team at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center's Institute for Regenerative Medicine had successfully implanted four vaginas grown in their lab from patients’ own cells, you can bet that I took notice.

Antarctica: beyond predictive value

The primary public concern regarding ice sheet retreat is sea level rise. Predictions of sea level rise would be incredibly useful to communities on the coast so that they can accommodate flooding and higher storm surges without catastrophic loss of life and property.  On May 12, 2014, scientists reaffirmed that ice loss can be expected from a particularly vulnerable region of West Antarctica, the Amundsen Sea sector.  The timescale of the loss of the entirety of these ice streams was predicted to be 200 to 1100 years.  This range does not allow us to offer very precise predictions, for the total sea level rise over this interval amounts to 1.2 m.  But this is only a small portion of the global ice volume.  The entire West Antarctic Ice Sheet is sensitive to climate change.  Now we're talking about 4.6 m of sea level rise.  

Is Autistic the New Normal?

What makes someone autistic?  What should we do about/with/for autistic people?  Can we, should we, get rid of autism?  How do autistic people feel about themselves and about society’s view of them?  What would it be like to be autistic?  If I’m not autistic, then what am I?  Am I normal?  Why does autism exist at all? 

Moore's [Profit] Law

Topological insulators are a fascinating new class of materials that feature an insulating bulk, but metallic surfaces. This means that, although it is the same material through and through (not necessarily a multi-layered heterostructure), electrons cannot travel through the interior of the material, but can easily zoom around at the material’s surfaces. Previously, physicists have only uncovered materials that are purely insulating, semiconducting, or conducting. The discovery of a class of materials that features both insulating and metallic behavior in a single system rocked the condensed matter physics community (the folks who study electrons on periodic crystal lattices), and publications with the words “topological insulator” have increased in number almost exponentially since the early 2000s, when they first started gaining attention.