The Conversation

How do I know if I might have coronavirus? 5 questions answered

Written by Catharine Paules, Associate Professor of Medicine, Infectious Diseases, Pennsylvania State University

Students line up to sanitize their hands to avoid the contact of coronavirus in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Jan. 28, 2020.AP Photo/Heng Sinith

Editor’s note: The new coronavirus, 2019 n-CoV, continues to spread in China, and cases are being diagnosed in many other countries, including the U.S. In some of those countries, including Germany and...

Modern tomatoes are very different from their wild ancestors – and we found missing links in their evolution

Written by Hamid Razifard, Postdoctoral Researcher in Biology, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Tomatoes' ancestors looked very different. Foxys Forest Manufacture/Shutterstock

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

The Big Idea: The tomato’s path from wild plant to household staple is much more complex than researchers have long thought. For many years, scientists believed that humans domesticated the tomato in...

Union gunboats didn't just attack rebel military sites – they went after civilian property, too

Written by Robert Gudmestad, Professor and Chair of History Department, Colorado State University

The USS Cairo pulls up to the banks of the Mississippi River in 1862.U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command

During the American Civil War, huge metal monsters roamed the Mississippi River. Called ironclads, these boats were about 50 yards long, carried 75 tons of armor on their hulls and decks, sported up to 13 guns, and had crews numbering up to...

4 myths the Trump team promoted about Andrew Johnson

Written by Paul Harvey, Professor of American History, University of Colorado Colorado Springs

The U.S. House of Representatives brought 11 articles of impeachment against Andrew Johnson.Photo by The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images

The claims: Andrew Johnson then, like Donald Trump now, was unjustly impeached by a group of radicals in the House of Representatives.

Fortunately – so the claim continues – enough honest...

Preventing genocide in Myanmar: Court order tries to protect Rohingya Muslims where politics has failed

Written by Hurst Hannum, Professor of International Law, Tufts University

The Myanmar military's years-long campaign against the Rohingya Muslims left hundreds of villages a smoldering pile of debris. Warpait village, Rakhine State, Oct.14, 2016.Ye Aung Thu/AFP via Getty Images)

Myanmar has been ordered by the International Court of Justice to take “provisional measures” to protect the Rohingya, an ethnic...

Brain organoids help neuroscientists understand brain development, but aren't perfect matches for real brains

Written by Madeline Andrews, Postdoctoral Scholar of Regeneration Medicine, University of California, San Francisco

Just a few millimeters across, organoids are clumps of cells that resemble the brain. Madeline Andrews, Arnold Kriegstein's lab, UCSF, CC BY-ND

What was going on with our brain organoids?

As neuroscientists, we use these three-dimensional clusters of cells grown in petri dishes to learn more about how the human brain works. Researchers culture...

I track murder cases that use the 'gay panic defense,' a controversial practice banned in 9 states

Written by W. Carsten Andresen, Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice, St. Edward's University

The ABA has called for states to curtail 'gay panic' and 'trans panic' defenses.icedmocha/Shutterstock.com

On January 21, New Jersey became the ninth state in the nation to ban the gay panic defense, a strategy that the governor said is “rooted in homophobia.” W. Carsten Andresen, a criminal justice scholar, has been building a database...

Britain is about to leave the EU – what's next?

Written by Luke Reader, Teaching Fellow, History Department, Case Western Reserve University

As the U.K. leaves the European Union, what awaits Prime Minister Boris Johnson?Isabel Infantes/AFP via Getty Images

Britain will shortly leave the European Union. So that’s it. Brexit is over, right?

Wrong. To channel former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill – as every leading Brexit supporter seems to want to do – “Th...

Islamophobia in the US did not start with Trump, but his tweets perpetuate a long history of equating Muslims with terrorism

Written by Evelyn Alsultany, Associate Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity, University of Southern California – Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

A protest against Islamophobia in TImes Square in March 2019. Dev Chatterjee/Shutterstock.com

President Donald Trump retweeted a doctored image of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wearing a hijab and Senator Chuck Schumer wearing a turban on Jan. 13. In the fake photo, both were seen standing in front of an Iranian flag with a caption saying: “The...

The meme endorsement you might have missed – and why it matters for 2020

Written by Heather Woods, Assistant Professor of Rhetoric and Technology, Kansas State University

Memes played a role in 2016 – and they're set to play an even bigger one in 2020.Bernie Sanders Dank Meme Stash

On Jan. 19, the New York Times editorial board made history when it endorsed two candidates, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, for president, concluding, “May the best woman win.”

This came on the heels on another key...