The Conversation

Global herd immunity remains out of reach because of inequitable vaccine distribution – 99% of people in poor countries are unvaccinated

Written by Maria De Jesus, Associate Professor and Research Fellow at the Center on Health, Risk, and Society, American University School of International Service

A COVID-19 field hospital in Santo Andre, Brazil. The pandemic has killed over 503,000 people in Brazil; just 11% of the population is fully vaccinated. Mario Tama/Getty Images

In the race between infection and injection, injection has lost.

Public health experts estimate that approximately 70% of the world’s 7.9 billion people must be fully...

'Upcycling' promises to turn food waste into your next meal

Written by Rodney Holcomb, Professor of Agricultural Economics, Oklahoma State University

New processed food products might contain what would otherwise be waste from other foods.GCShutter/E+ via Getty Images

How would you like to dig into a “recycled” snack? Or take a swig of juice with “reprocessed” ingredients made from other food byproducts? Without the right marketing, these don’t sound like the most...

Explorer Robert Ballard's memoir finds shipwrecks and strange life forms in the ocean's darkest reaches

Written by Suzanne OConnell, Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Wesleyan University

Tube worms, anemones and mussels clustered near a hydrothermal vent on the Galapagos Rift.NOAA Okeanos Explorer Program, Galapagos Rift Expedition 2011/Flickr, CC BY

Who doesn’t love a good story, especially one about amazing discoveries in Earth’s farthest reaches? Oceanographer, Navy veteran and explorer Robert D. Ballard has written...

White Gen X and millennial evangelicals are losing faith in the conservative culture wars

Written by Terry Shoemaker, Lecturer, School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies, Arizona State University

Younger evangelicals are openly questioning the religious and political traditions of their parents and grandparents.Julie Bennett/AP

Since the 1970s, white American evangelicals – a large subsection of Protestants who hold to a literal reading of the Bible – have often managed to get specific privileges through their political...

The gas tax's tortured history shows how hard it is to fund new infrastructure

Written by Theodore J. Kury, Director of Energy Studies, University of Florida

Gas taxes have long been used to pay for roads and bridges.AP Photo/Seth Perlman

As the Biden administration and Republicans negotiate a possible infrastructure spending package, how to pay for it has been a key sticking point.

President Joe Biden and Democrats in Congress want to raise taxes on the rich, while some Republicans have been pushing...

US third parties can rein in the extremism of the two-party system

Written by Bernard Tamas, Associate Professor of Political Science, Valdosta State University

An editorial cartoon from 1900 shows the Populist Party swallowing the Democratic Party.J.S. Pughe/Buyenlarge/Getty Images

When the Republican Party ousted Liz Cheney from a leadership position, it exposed a major ideological divide within the current GOP. That caused some people, including prominent Republicans, to suggest there might be a third...

Critical race theory sparks activism in students

Written by Jerusha Osberg Conner, Professor of Education, Villanova University

Youth organizers tend to outperform their peers in school. Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Critical race theory – an academic framework that holds that racism is embedded in society – has become the subject of an intense debate about how issues of race should or shouldn’t be taught in schools.

Largely missing in the debate is evidence of...

The surface of Venus is cracked and moves like ice floating on the ocean – likely due to tectonic activity

Written by Paul K. Byrne, Associate Professor of Planetary Science, North Carolina State University

New research suggests that Venus' crust is broken into large blocks – the dark reddish–purple areas – that are surrounded by belts of tectonic structures shown in lighter yellow–red. Paul K. Byrne/NASA/USGS, CC BY-ND

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

The big idea

Much of the brittle, upper...

What's behind the rising profile of transgender kids? 3 essential reads

Written by Nick Lehr, Arts + Culture Editor

As more trans teens have come out, they've attracted more attention from the media and politicians.iStock via Getty Images

Why are trans youth more visible these days? Is it due to more widespread acceptance, or more media coverage? Just how many trans kids are there?

There seem to be few clear-cut answers. But after talking with a number of...

Why gain-of-function research matters

Written by David Gillum, Senior Director of Environmental Health and Safety and Chief Safety Officer, Arizona State University

In February 2021, a World Health Organization team investigating the origins of COVID-19 visited the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan, China.Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images

Due to unanswered questions into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic, both the U.S. government and scientists have called for a deeper examination into the validity...