The Conversation

Fight for federal right to education takes a new turn

Written by Derek W. Black, Professor of Law, University of South Carolina

The nation's founders saw education as key to self-rule.Joseph Sohm/www.shutterstock.com

A new fight to secure a federal constitutional right to education is spreading across the country. This fight has been a long time coming and is now suddenly at full steam.

In 1973, plaintiffs in San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez argued that...

I used facial recognition technology on birds

Written by Lewis Barnett, Associate Professor of Computer Science, University of Richmond

Do you know this downy woodpecker?Lewis Barnett, CC BY-SA

As a birder, I had heard that if you paid careful attention to the head feathers on the downy woodpeckers that visited your bird feeders, you could begin to recognize individual birds. This intrigued me. I even went so far as to try sketching birds at my own feeders and had found this to be...

Hunting for rare isotopes: The mysterious radioactive atomic nuclei that will be in tomorrow's technology

Written by Artemis Spyrou, Associate Professor of Nuclear Physics, Michigan State University

Researchers have identified 3,000 radioactive isotopes – and predict 4,000 more are out there.GiroScience/Shutterstock.com

When you hear the term “radioactive” you likely think “bad news,” maybe along the lines of fallout from an atomic bomb.

But radioactive materials are actually used in a wide range of beneficial...

3 ways Facebook and other social media companies could clean up their acts – if they wanted to

Written by Anthony M. Nadler, Associate Professor of Media and Communication Studies, Ursinus College

Under fire, but not without options.AP Photo/Francois Mori

Facebook is in crisis mode, but the company can take major steps to fix itself – and the global community it says it wants to promote. Facebook founder, CEO and majority shareholder Mark Zuckerberg need not wait for governments to impose regulations. If he and other industry leaders...

Could a recession be just around the corner?

Written by Amitrajeet A. Batabyal, Arthur J. Gosnell Professor of Economics, Rochester Institute of Technology

The U.S. economy is growing at the fastest pace in five years, American companies are earning record profits and unemployment is at the lowest level in almost half a century.

So why are Wall Street and some economists suddenly worried about a recession?

Financial markets in particular have been signaling that trouble is brewing. The Standard &...

Zika y embarazo: análisis de sangre prenatal podría predecir malformaciones fetales

Written by Suan-Sin Foo, Postdoctoral scholar, University of Southern California

Madres y familiares sosteniendo en brazos a bebés que nacieron con microcefalia, uno de los muchos problemas médicos graves causados por el síndrome congénito por el virus del Zika.AP Photo/Felipe Dana

El brote repentino y descontrolado del virus del Zika en 2016 aterrorizó a las mujeres embarazadas, especialmente...

Syria may be using chemical weapons against its citizens again – here's how international law has changed to help countries intervene

Written by Michael Scharf, Dean and Director of the Frederick K. Cox International Law Center, Joseph C. Hostetler - Baker Hostetler Professor of Law, Case Western Reserve University

New reports have emerged from the Syrian civil war that banned chemical weapons are being used in Aleppo, a city on the edge of the last remaining rebel stronghold, Idlib province.

Since 2011, the war has been the deadliest conflict on the planet. Among the Assad regime’s most disturbing actions has been the repeated use of chemical weapons...

Why a 14th-century mystic appeals to today's 'spiritual but not religious' Americans

Written by Joel Harrington, Centennial Professor of History, Vanderbilt University

A sculpture of Meister Eckhart in Germany.Lothar Spurzem , CC BY-SA

The percentage of Americans who do not identify with any religious tradition continues to rise annually. Not all of them, however, are atheists or agnostics. Many of these people believe in a higher power, if not organized religion, and their numbers too are steadily increasing.

The...

We've been studying a glacier in Peru for 14 years – and it may reach the point of no return in the next 30

Written by Mathias Vuille, Professor of Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, University at Albany, State University of New York

The Quelccaya Glacier in Peru, which has major social and economic value, is disappearing along with other tropical glaciers. Edubucher, CC BY-NC-SA

High mountain environments in South America, which in many locations encompass peaks that reach 21,000 feet (6,500 meters) or more in altitude, are home to some of the most spectacular glaciers on our...

From pledges to action: Cities need to show their climate progress with hard data

Written by Conor K Gately, Postdoctoral Associate, Boston University

Port of Long Beach, California.USCBP/Charles Csavossy/Wikimedia

As world leaders negotiate rules for cutting greenhouse gas emissions at the COP24 meeting in Poland, U.S. cities have a vested interest in the outcome. About 85 percent of Americans live in cities, and urban areas produce some 80 percent of our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions....