The Conversation

Air pollution kills thousands of Americans every year – here's a low-cost strategy to reduce the toll

Written by Jason West, Professor of Environmental Sciences and Engineering, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Reducing fine particle air pollution from petrochemical complexes, like this one near the Houston Ship Channel in Texas, is a low-cost way to lower air pollution mortality.AP Photo/David J. Phillip

About 1 of every 25 deaths in the U.S. occurs prematurely because of exposure to air pollution. Dirty air kills roughly 110,000 Americans yearly, which...

Why do people believe con artists?

Written by Barry M. Mitnick, Professor of Business Administration and of Public and International Affairs, University of Pittsburgh

Would you buy medicine from this man?Carol M. Highsmith/Wikimedia Commons

What is real can seem pretty arbitrary. It’s easy to be fooled by misinformation disguised as news and deepfake videos showing people doing things they never did or said. Inaccurate information – even deliberately wrong information – doesn’t just come...

They're all fabulous and wonderful! How to figure out what's real in an inflated letter of recommendation

Written by Stephen J Ceci, Professor of Human Development, Cornell University

What do you do when every letter says the job candidate is fabulous?Shutterstock/Victoruler

Over the decades that I’ve worked in universities, I’ve watched academic letters of reference become increasingly inflated. And letter inflation goes beyond the academy; friends who hire in business say they, too, have witnessed reference letter...

Nondisclosure and secrecy laws protect Bloomberg – not the women who sued him

Written by Elizabeth C. Tippett, Associate Professor, School of Law, University of Oregon

Billionaire Mike Bloomberg and Sen. Elizabeth Warren had a heated exchange. AP Photo/John Locher

Billionaire and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg received a lot of flak at the Feb. 19 Democratic debate for his refusal to release employees who sued his company from nondisclosure agreements.

He admitted to having a “few...

Execution for a Facebook post? Why blasphemy is a capital offense in some Muslim countries

Written by Ahmet T. Kuru, Professor of Political Science, San Diego State University

Pakistani Islamists march to protest the Supreme Court lenient treatment of Asia Bibi, a Christian Pakistani woman accused of blasphemy, in Karachi, Feb. 1, 2019.ASIF HASSAN/AFP via Getty Images

Junaid Hafeez, a university lecturer in Pakistan, had been imprisoned for six years when he was sentenced to death in December 2019. The charge: blasphemy,...

Deep learning AI discovers surprising new antibiotics

Written by Sriram Chandrasekaran, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering, University of Michigan

A colored electron microscope image of MRSA.NIH - NIAID/flickr, CC BY

Imagine you’re a fossil hunter. You spend months in the heat of Arizona digging up bones only to find that what you’ve uncovered is from a previously discovered dinosaur.

That’s how the search for antibiotics has panned out recently. The relatively few...

Coronavirus: We need to start preparing for the next viral outbreak now

Written by David E. Bloom, Professor of Economics and Demography, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

Residents of Hong Kong wear masks as they make their commutes. AP Photo/Kin Cheung

The coronavirus outbreak is officially a crisis – let’s not waste it.

Undeniably, the international community is taking the matter very seriously, as it should given that the death total from the COVID-19 epidemic already well surpasses that from SARS in...

Congress fixes – just a bit – the unpopular, 'unfair' rule that stopped injured service members from suing for damages

Written by Robert M. Ackerman, Professor of Law, Wayne State University

Some U.S. service members may now collect damages for medical malpractice.Shutterstock/Christopher Lyzcen

Members of the military who have long been barred by law from collecting damages from the federal government for injuries off the battlefield will finally be able to do so after Congress stepped in to amend the law.

The legislation represents...

Is your city making you fat? How urban planning can address the obesity epidemic

Written by John Rennie Short, Professor, School of Public Policy, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

The Ohio City Farm in Cleveland provides low-cost land, shared facilities and technical assistance to support entrepreneurial farmers.Horticulture Group/Flickr, CC BY

New disease outbreaks, like the novel coronavirus that recently emerged in China’s Hubei province, generate headlines and attention. Meanwhile, however, Americans face a slower...

Can you get rid of your student loans by filing for bankruptcy?

Written by Brent Evans, Assistant Professor of Public Policy & Higher Education, Vanderbilt University

Borrowers looking to eliminate student loan debt through bankruptcy have to clear a series of high hurdles.zimmytws/Getty Images

Paying back student loans is not an easy thing to do. One out of every 5 borrowers with outstanding student loan debt has fallen behind their payments.

There are several ways borrowers can get help to deal with their debt...