Podcasts about NSF

Last February, Sudip Parikh, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, issued a dire warning about federal cuts to science, saying the country was on its way to losing its status as a global science leader.Nearly a year later, where does the United States stand with science funding, and what happens next? Sudip Parikh joins Host Flora Lichtman once again to discuss.Guest: Dr. Sudip Parikh is CEO and Executive Publisher of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, based in Arlington, Virginia.Transcripts for each episode are available within 1-3 days at sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Ned meets NSF's marketing manager. Near the South Pole.Register your support for NSF Live In France.....every sign up helps! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Do you find yourself constantly replaying past events—or feeling like your mind is in a state of chaos?  In this episode, I sit down with Dr. Caroline Leaf, PhD to explore why anxiety, overwhelm, and intrusive thought patterns aren't signs that something is broken—but signals of how the mind is responding to stress, experiences, and unresolved patterns. We break down what thoughts actually are, how experiences are wired into “thought networks,” and why the mind controls the brain—not the other way around. Dr. Leaf also explains how it's possible to redesign a memory—not by erasing the past, but by changing how it's wired and how it shows up in the present.Suggested Resources:Cleaning Up the Mental Mess PodcastDr. Caroline Leaf | WebsiteDr. Caroline Leaf | FacebookCaroline Leaf | TwitterDr. Caroline Leaf | InstagramDr. Caroline Leaf | YouTubeSwitch on Your BrainHelp in a HurrySend me a text!This episode is proudly sponsored by: Weddell WaterWe focus on the water we drink, but the water you shower with matters too—your skin absorbs more than you think, which is why I use the Weddell Water Duo Shower Filter, the only NSF-certified option that targets chlorine, PFAS, and hard-water buildup. It's one of the easiest healthy- This episode is proudly sponsored by: SizzlefishLet's talk about fueling your body with the best nature has to offer. If you're looking for premium, sustainable seafood delivered straight to your door, you need to check out Sizzlefish! Head to sizzlefish.com and use my code “wellnstrong” at checkout for an exclusive discount on your first order. Trust me, you're going to taste the difference with Sizzlefish!Join the WellnStrong mailing list for exclusive content here!Want more of The How To Be WellnStrong Podcast? Subscribe to the YouTube channel. Follow Jacqueline: Instagram Pinterest TikTok Youtube To access notes from the show & full transcripts, head over to WellnStrong's Podcast Page

As part of the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory First Look event in June 2025, Rubin announced that it had observed thousands of asteroids cruising about our Solar System, about 1,900 of which have been confirmed as never-before-seen. Within the flurry, a team of astronomers has discovered 19 super- and ultra-fast-rotating asteroids. One of these is the fastest-spinning asteroid larger than 500 meters (0.3 miles) ever found. In this podcast, Dr. Sarah Greenstreet discusses these fast spinning asteroids and what makes the Rubin Observatory ideal for discovering these types of objects.   Bios:  - Rob Sparks is in the Communications, Education and Engagement group at NSF's NOIRLab in Tucson, Arizona. - Sarah Greenstreet is a tenure-track assistant astronomer at the NSF National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory (NOIRLab) and an affiliate assistant professor in the University of Washington's Department of Astronomy. She is also a member of the Rubin Observatory Community Science Team and has served as the Lead for the Rubin Observatory Solar System Science Collaboration's Near-Earth Objects and Interstellar Objects Working Group for the past seven years. Prof. Greenstreet's research program broadly focuses on orbital dynamics, characterization, and impacts of small bodies across the Solar System, with a particular focus on the rarest and most unusual asteroids. To learn more about her research, please visit her website: www.sarahgreenstreet.com.   We've added a new way to donate to 365 Days of Astronomy to support editing, hosting, and production costs.  Just visit: https://www.patreon.com/365DaysOfAstronomy and donate as much as you can! Share the podcast with your friends and send the Patreon link to them too!  Every bit helps! Thank you! ------------------------------------ Do go visit http://www.redbubble.com/people/CosmoQuestX/shop for cool Astronomy Cast and CosmoQuest t-shirts, coffee mugs and other awesomeness! http://cosmoquest.org/Donate This show is made possible through your donations.  Thank you! (Haven't donated? It's not too late! Just click!) ------------------------------------ The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by the Planetary Science Institute. http://www.psi.edu Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at info@365DaysOfAstronomy.org.

How do supermassive black holes actually form in the early universe? Is the Cosmological Constant not so constant after all? And what would be on the astrophysical menu at a Cosmic Brunch? To find out, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome astrophysicist Thresa Kelly, who is a second year grad student working on her PhD at the Rochester Institute of Technology. As always, though, we start off with the day's joyfully cool cosmic thing, one of the recent studies made using the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument, aka DESI, located at Kitt Peak National Observatory near Tucson, Arizona. According to the DESI team's research, there is a about a 95% chance that the dark energy levels in the universe have changed over cosmic time. This “Dynamical Dark Energy model” offers the first, tiny hint that the Cosmological Constant may not be so constant after all. Thresa, who is using DESI and other sources for her work putting together a catalog of AGNs, or active galactic nuclei – the supermassive black holes found at the center of galaxies, tells us about what DESI is trying to do and why it's so important. The end goal of Thresa's project is to estimate the black hole masses of AGNs, and she's gotten spectra data on over 2,000 objects that have been observed using DESI. Thresa can't get into the details of her catalog, which hasn't been published yet and includes about 14,000 objects, but Allen and Chuck join her in a discussion of what's going on with black hole masses, accretion discs, Eddington Luminosity, black hole growth, galactic evolution, and more. Our first audience question comes from Kathryn, who asks, “When we look through a standard telescope looking at "past" versions of planets/stars/etc., how far back in the past are we observing?” Thresa explains how we use red shift to measure how long light from a galaxy takes to reach us to help us determine how far in the past the objects are. For instance, an AGN with a red shift of 7 can reach back to the period of “Cosmic Dawn” or, as Thresa puts it, “Cosmic Brunch” taking place 12 billion years ago. Thresa talks about her experience in an REU, or “Research Experiences for Undergraduates,” funded by the NSF, which enabled her to spend time studying at the University of Hawaii and cemented her desire to go to grad school, get a PhD, and become a “real scientist.” She explains how each step of her career brought her from Kansas to where she is today. Our next audience question comes from Walter: “If a quasar's jets are aimed directly away from Earth, would we then not be able to see the supermassive black hole?” Thresa says that depends on how you define “seeing” a black hole, and that even without visible light, you can discern black holes by looking at other wavelengths like x-rays and ultraviolet rays which are generated by different component areas of the black hole like the corona, accretion disk, or the torus. Chuck notices a shelf of games behind Thresa and asks her about them. She pulls out Stardew Valley, a farming simulator she plays with her fiancé and her fellow grad students. It's not long until Chuck, Allen and Thresa are geeking out about Dungeons and Dragons. Finally, Chuck asks Thresa to speculate on a specific scientific discovery that may come out of her PhD thesis work. Her answer: figuring out how supermassive black holes actually form in the early universe. If you'd like to know more about Thresa Kelly, you can find her on LinkedIn. We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon. Credits for Images Used in this Episode: DESI - The Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument. – Credit: KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/P. Marenfeld DESI data map of celestial objects from Earth to billions of light years away.. – Credit: Claire Lamman/DESI collaboration. Montage of dwarf active galactic nuclei candidates. – Credit: DESI collaboration. Map of galaxies based on redshift data. – Credit: Creative Commons / M. Blanton and Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Quasar PKS 1127-145, a luminous source of X-rays and visible light. – Credit: NASA/CXC/A.Siemiginowska(CfA)/J.Bechtold(U.Arizona). Model of AGN. – Credit: Creative Commons.

Karl and Erum kick off 2026 by reviewing their 2025 forecasts—celebrating the wins (DeSci's rise, waste as a resource, AI-biology convergence) and acknowledging the misses (no biotech M&A boom, no quantum biology breakthrough yet). Then they unveil their boldest predictions for the year ahead: the first functional AI-composed genome entering production, a major non-sterile biomanufacturing facility breaking ground, biological arbitrage creating competitive advantages against tariffs, consumer-held health records surpassing traditional medical data in clinical significance, space-manufactured drug crystals entering human trials, definitive proof of alien life, and AI-enabled communication with whales and other animals. They also welcome Lizette Couto, who joins the podcast to provide science definitions and explanations throughout episodes going forward. From dirty biology manifestos to peptide proliferation to interspecies communication, this episode maps the frontiers where synthetic biology, AI, space technology, and consumer adoption collide. Grow Everything brings the bioeconomy to life. Hosts Karl Schmieder and Erum Azeez Khan share stories and interview the leaders and influencers changing the world by growing everything. Biology is the oldest technology. And it can be engineered. What are we growing?Learn more at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.messaginglab.com/groweverything⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Chapters:(00:00:00) - 

In today's episode, I sit down with Jon Noyes of Stand to Reason, a former atheist who once believed faith in God was intellectually unwarranted. After examining the evidence for Christianity, everything changed. Drawing from his background in the legal field, Jon shares how to engage doubt with clarity and compassion—and what it looks like to wrestle honestly with God through grief, loss, anger, and unanswered questions.Suggested Resources:Stand to Reason The Anxious GenerationBad TherapyScrolling Ourselves to DeathSend me a text!We focus on the water we drink, but the water you shower with matters too—your skin absorbs more than you think, which is why I use the Weddell Water Duo Shower Filter, the only NSF-certified option that targets chlorine, PFAS, and hard-water buildup. It's one of the easiest healthy-home swaps—use code WELLNSTRONG for 10% off! This episode is proudly sponsored by: SizzlefishLet's talk about fueling your body with the best nature has to offer. If you're looking for premium, sustainable seafood delivered straight to your door, you need to check out Sizzlefish! Head to sizzlefish.com and use my code “wellnstrong” at checkout for an exclusive discount on your first order. Trust me, you're going to taste the difference with Sizzlefish!Join the WellnStrong mailing list for exclusive content here!Want more of The How To Be WellnStrong Podcast? Subscribe to the YouTube channel. Follow Jacqueline: Instagram Pinterest TikTok Youtube To access notes from the show & full transcripts, head over to WellnStrong's Podcast Page

Listen ad-free by becoming an Insider: https://www.benbikman.comReferences:For complete show notes and references, we invite you to become an Insider subscriber. You'll enjoy real-time, livestream Metabolic Classroom access which includes live Q&A with Ben after the lecture, unlimited access to Dr. Bikman's Digital Mind, ad-free podcast episodes, show notes and references, and online, live Office Hours access with Ben. It also includes Ben's Weekly Research Review Podcast.

Space has long been considered bi-partisan domain in the US, but is it becoming more political? Our guest is Kevin Kelly. Kevin is a former Senate appropriations staffer who oversaw funding for NASA, the NSF, and 25 other agencies. Now a partner at Actum, he advises some of the most influential players in science and defense. His career has spanned everything from nuclear tech and climate systems to the tools we use to monitor near-Earth threats, and he shares his thesis on why space is becoming more political. Remember to leave us a 5-star rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Be sure to follow T-Minus on LinkedIn and Instagram. Want to hear your company in the show? You too can reach the most influential leaders and operators in the industry. Here's our media kit. Contact us at space@n2k.com to request more info. Want to join us for an interview? Please send your pitch to space-editor@n2k.com and include your name, affiliation, and topic proposal. T-Minus is a production of N2K Networks, your source for strategic workforce intelligence. © N2K Networks, Inc. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Clear water shouldn't require a chemistry degree, a mountain of tabs, or weekly emergencies. We sit down with Fred Schweer, VP of Sales at PoolRX, to unpack how a chelated mineral system—copper, silver, and zinc—eliminates algae and frees up chlorine so your pools stay cleaner with less effort and expense. If you've battled microalgae, chased phosphate numbers, or watched high CYA slow your sanitizer to a crawl, this conversation reframes your approach with simple, reliable steps.We break down what “chelated” really means and why it matters for safety, stain prevention, and long-lasting effectiveness. Fred explains how PoolRX's unique chelation keeps minerals active for up to six months, even under pH swings and heavy oxidation, and why standard copper tests won't read chelated copper accurately. With algae out of the picture, chlorine becomes more active, clarifiers and extra shocks fade from the routine, and many pros find they can maintain 0.5 to 1 ppm free chlorine while holding crystal clarity.If you want to cut costs, reduce shocks and clarifiers, and keep customers happy with clear water week after week, this is a must-listen. Subscribe for more deep dives, share this episode with a fellow pro who needs a win, and leave a quick review to tell us your biggest algae headache—we'll tackle it in a future show.• EPA-registered, NSF-certified mineral system that prevents all algae• Chelation that protects minerals, reduces staining risk, and confuses copper tests• Phosphates reframed as algae food, not a chlorine consumer• Lower chlorine targets with stable clarity and safety• Practical tips to cut tabs, shocks, and clarifiers• Sizing guidance for blue, black, red, orange, and spa units• Overdose symptoms and how to correct them• Strategy for clearing mustard and green algae pools• Managing high CYA and regional challenges• Steps for simple setup, clean filters, and six-month performanceSend us a textSupport the Pool Guy Podcast Show Sponsors! HASA https://bit.ly/HASAThe Bottom Feeder. Save $100 with Code: DVB100https://store.thebottomfeeder.com/Try Skimmer FREE for 30 days:https://getskimmer.com/poolguy Get UPA Liability Insurance $64 a month! https://forms.gle/F9YoTWNQ8WnvT4QBAPool Guy Coaching: https://bit.ly/40wFE6y

Episode Description You trust that expensive fish oil is molecularly distilled and free from mercury. You believe your magnesium is actually absorbed. You assume your creatine is pure pharmaceutical-grade powder. But can these brands prove it—or are you swallowing contaminated, oxidized, low-potency supplements that do more harm than good? Dr. Christian Gonzalez investigated the supplement industry with one critical question: can the most popular longevity supplements prove they're free from heavy metals, microplastics, and oxidation through third-party testing and Certificates of Analysis (COAs)? The shocking reality? Most can't—or won't—provide basic proof of purity. You're expected to trust your mitochondria, brain health, and long-term performance to manufacturers who refuse transparency about what's actually in the bottle. The hidden dangers lurking in "premium" supplements: • Fish oils contaminated with mercury, lead, microplastics, and oxidized rancid fats that trigger inflammation instead of reducing it • Magnesium oxide marketed as "magnesium" with 4% absorption—meaning you're literally flushing your money down the toilet • Creatine cut with heavy metals, banned substances, and fillers that negate performance benefits and contaminate your system • Vitamin D formulated in seed oils and synthetic carriers that interfere with absorption and create inflammatory byproducts • Fiber supplements loaded with inulin blends and maltodextrin that spike blood sugar and cause severe digestive distress • Zero verification of potency claims—dosages listed on labels that have no relationship to what third-party testing reveals inside • Supplements stored in conditions that degrade active ingredients months before expiration dates In this episode, Dr. Christian Gonzalez reveals: • The 5 most studied supplements for longevity, brain power, and energy—and exactly how to buy the cleanest versions • Why Omega-3 fish oils are either your greatest longevity tool or a toxic inflammatory bomb depending on purity testing • The one form of magnesium that actually works (and the three forms that are complete scams stealing your money) • How creatine monohydrate boosts ATP in your muscles AND brain—but only if it passes strict third-party certification • Why Vitamin D without K2 can calcify your arteries while you think you're "optimizing" your health • The soluble fiber that lowers all-cause mortality by 11%—and why most fiber supplements use the wrong type • Exact evidence-based doses, timing strategies, and quality markers so you never waste money on fairy dust formulas again • The certifications that actually matter: IFOS, NSF, Informed Sport, Creapure, and why "GMP certified" means nothing • How to read COAs and spot red flags in oxidation scores, heavy metal panels, and microplastic screening This episode goes beyond basic supplementation—it's about understanding that your cellular membranes, mitochondrial function, and long-term disease prevention depend on purity, not marketing. It's about demanding proof before putting daily supplements into your body, and recognizing that the supplement industry profits from your trust, not your health outcomes. The supplement industry doesn't want you asking for COAs. But your brain, heart, and longevity depend on it. My one stop shop for quality supplements: https://theswellscore.com/pages/drg Timestamps: 0:00 - Introduction 1:07 - #1: Omega-3s for Brain & Longevity  4:41 - How Much Omega-3 Do You Actually Need?  7:42 - #2: Magnesium for Energy & Nervous System  12:42 - #3: Creatine for Muscle & Brain Energy  16:07 - #4: Vitamin D3 + K2 for Immune & Bone Health  20:22 - #5: Soluble Fiber for Gut Health & Longevity

Eric welcomes Council on Foreign Relations President Mike Froman to discuss CFR's latest task force report on U.S. economic security. They explore the importance of AI, quantum computing and biotechnology as foundational technologies in today's strategic competition, the effort that China is investing in these technologies, and the market failures that have led the U.S. to underinvest in quantum and biotech. The conversation also covers supply chain vulnerabilities, human capital shortfalls in key areas of technology, and the tension in the Trump administration's effort to address China's growing technological dominance while simultaneously cutting funding for basic research at the NSF, NIH, and other institutions. U.S. Economic Security: Winning the Race for Tomorrow's Technologies: https://www.cfr.org/task-force-report/us-economic-security Mike Froman on Substack: https://mikefroman.substack.com/ Shield of the Republic is a Bulwark podcast co-sponsored by the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia.

Ed Cicale visits the 2025 MLB Winter Meetings to sit down with orthopedic surgeon Reza Jazayeri, MD and COO Grey Hunt to discuss Accelerated Recovery — a clinically designed, NSF-certified supplement and nutrition program that supports collagen synthesis, preserves muscle, and improves perioperative outcomes. The episode covers how the product is used one week before and two weeks after surgery, its application for overtrained athletes, and where listeners can learn more or order with an MLB discount.  XCELERATED RECOVERY https://xrscience.org where their mission is to redefine recovery through science-driven nutritional solutions and comprehensive programs. ​In today's ASAP Podcast, Ed Cicale discusses with orthopedic surgeon Reza Jazayeri, MD of XCELERATED RECOVERY, the benefits of his well researched pre and post surgery and how he and COO Grey Hunt are committed to bridging the gap between nutrition, recovery, and peak performance to help individuals and teams achieve their goals. Orthopedic surgeon and XR® Founder Reza Jazayeri, MD  Orthopedic Sports Medicine Specialist explains in layman's terms the benefits of the exciting new and powerful supplement. Their Chief Operations Officer Grey Hunt, reinforces the discussion and details an official MLB & PBSCCS WINTER MEETINGS~ORLANDO product discount code when ordering from the company website xrscience.org

Su chats with Dr. Steve Rathje. Dr. Rathje is an incoming Assistant Professor of Human-Computer Interaction in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. He is an NSF and AXA postdoctoral fellow at New York University. Steve's work centers on the psychology of technology. He studies how core psychological phenomena like polarization, intergroup conflict, the spread of information, and mental health interact with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and social media. Through a combination of behavioral science, computational methods, and large-scale data, his research sheds light on how our minds and our societies are being shaped in the digital age. In today's episode, we discuss his research background together with his recent review paper “The psychology of virality," in which they explore why certain content spreads rapidly online and offline, often involving a mix of emotional, social, and structural factors..Steve's paper: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2025.06.014 Steve's personal website: https://stevenrathje.com/ Su's Twitter @sudkrc & Bluesky @sudkrc.bsky.socialPodcast Twitter @StanfordPsyPodPodcast Substack https://stanfordpsypod.substack.com/Let us know what you thought of this episode, or of the podcast! :) stanfordpsychpodcast@gmail.com

Janet Walkoe & Margaret Walton, Exploring the Seeds of Algebraic Reasoning ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 8 Algebraic reasoning is defined as the ability to use symbols, variables, and mathematical operations to represent and solve problems. This type of reasoning is crucial for a range of disciplines.  In this episode, we're talking with Janet Walkoe and Margaret Walton about the seeds of algebraic reasoning found in our students' lived experiences and the ways we can draw on them to support student learning.  BIOGRAPHIES Margaret Walton joined Towson University's Department of Mathematics in 2024. She teaches mathematics methods courses to undergraduate preservice teachers and courses about teacher professional development to education graduate students. Her research interests include teacher educator learning and professional development, teacher learning and professional development, and facilitator and teacher noticing. Janet Walkoe is an associate professor in the College of Education at the University of Maryland. Janet's research interests include teacher noticing and teacher responsiveness in the mathematics classroom. She is interested in how teachers attend to and make sense of student thinking and other student resources, including but not limited to student dispositions and students' ways of communicating mathematics. RESOURCES "Seeds of Algebraic Thinking: a Knowledge in Pieces Perspective on the Development of Algebraic Thinking" "Seeds of Algebraic Thinking: Towards a Research Agenda" NOTICE Lab  "Leveraging Early Algebraic Experiences"  TRANSCRIPT Mike Wallus: Hello, Janet and Margaret, thank you so much for joining us. I'm really excited to talk with you both about the seeds of algebraic thinking. Janet Walkoe: Thanks for having us. We're excited to be here.  Margaret Walton: Yeah, thanks so much. Mike: So for listeners, without prayer knowledge, I'm wondering how you would describe the seeds of algebraic thinking. Janet: OK. For a little context, more than a decade ago, my good friend and colleague, [Mariana] Levin—she's at Western Michigan University—she and I used to talk about all of the algebraic thinking we saw our children doing when they were toddlers—this is maybe 10 or more years ago—in their play, and just watching them act in the world. And we started keeping a list of these things we saw. And it grew and grew, and finally we decided to write about this in our 2020 FLM article ["Seeds of Algebraic Thinking: Towards a Research Agenda" in For the Learning of Mathematics] that introduced the seeds of algebraic thinking idea. Since they were still toddlers, they weren't actually expressing full algebraic conceptions, but they were displaying bits of algebraic thinking that we called "seeds." And so this idea, these small conceptual resources, grows out of the knowledge and pieces perspective on learning that came out of Berkeley in the nineties, led by Andy diSessa. And generally that's the perspective that knowledge is made up of small cognitive bits rather than larger concepts. So if we're thinking of addition, rather than thinking of it as leveled, maybe at the first level there's knowing how to count and add two groups of numbers. And then maybe at another level we add two negative numbers, and then at another level we could add positives and negatives. So that might be a stage-based way of thinking about it.  And instead, if we think about this in terms of little bits of resources that students bring, the idea of combining bunches of things—the idea of like entities or nonlike entities, opposites, positives and negatives, the idea of opposites canceling—all those kinds of things and other such resources to think about addition. It's that perspective that we're going with. And it's not like we master one level and move on to the next. It's more that these pieces are here, available to us. We come to a situation with these resources and call upon them and connect them as it comes up in the context. Mike: I think that feels really intuitive, particularly for anyone who's taught young children. That really brings me back to the days when I was teaching kindergartners and first graders.  I want to ask you about something else. You all mentioned several things like this notion of "do, undo" or "closing in" or the idea of "in-betweenness" while we were preparing for this interview. And I'm wondering if you could describe what these things mean in some detail for our audience, and then maybe connect them back with this notion of the seeds of algebraic thinking. Margaret: Yeah, sure. So we would say that these are different seeds of algebraic thinking that kids might activate as they learn math and then also learn more formal algebra. So the first seed, the doing and undoing that you mentioned, is really completing some sort of action or process and then reversing it.  So an example might be when a toddler stacks blocks or cups. I have lots of nieces and nephews or friends' kids who I've seen do this often—all the time, really—when they'll maybe make towers of blocks, stack them up one by one and then sort of unstack them, right? So later this experience might apply to learning about functions, for example, as students plug in values as inputs, that's kind of the doing part, but also solve functions at certain outputs to find the input. So that's kind of one example there.  And then you also talked about closing in and in-betweenness, which might both be related to intervals. So closing in is a seed where it's sort of related to getting closer and closer to a desired value. And then in formal algebra, and maybe math leading up to formal algebra, the seed might be activated when students work with inequalities maybe, or maybe ordering fractions.  And then the last seed that you mentioned there, in-betweenness, is the idea of being between two things. For example, kids might have experiences with the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and the porridge being too hot, too cold, or just right. So that "just right" is in-between. So these seats might relate to inequalities and the idea that solutions of math problems might be a range of values and not just one. Mike: So part of what's so exciting about this conversation is that the seeds of algebraic thinking really can emerge from children's lived experience, meaning kids are coming with informal prior knowledge that we can access. And I'm wondering if you can describe some examples of children's play, or even everyday tasks, that cultivate these seeds of algebraic thinking. Janet: That's great. So when I think back to the early days when we were thinking about these ideas, one example stands out in my head. I was going to the grocery store with my daughter who was about three at the time, and she just did not like the grocery store at all. And when we were in the car, I told her, "Oh, don't worry, we're just going in for a short bit of time, just a second." And she sat in the back and said, "Oh, like the capital letter A." I remember being blown away thinking about all that came together for her to think about that image, just the relationship between time and distance, the amount of time highlighting the instantaneous nature of the time we'd actually be in the store, all kinds of things.  And I think in terms of play examples, there were so many. When she was little, she was gifted a play doctor kit. So it was a plastic kit that had a stethoscope and a blood pressure monitor, all these old-school tools. And she would play doctor with her stuffed animals. And she knew that any one of her stuffed animals could be the patient, but it probably wouldn't be a cup. So she had this idea that these could be candidates for patients, and it was this—but only certain things. We refer to this concept as "replacement," and it's this idea that you can replace whatever this blank box is with any number of things, but maybe those things are limited and maybe that idea comes into play when thinking about variables in formal algebra. Margaret: A couple of other examples just from the seeds that you asked about in the previous question. One might be if you're talking about closing in, games like when kids play things like "you're getting warmer" or "you're getting colder" when they're trying to find a hidden object or you're closing in when tuning an instrument, maybe like a guitar or a violin.  And then for in-betweeness, we talked about Goldilocks, but it could be something as simple as, "I'm sitting in between my two parents" or measuring different heights and there's someone who's very tall and someone who's very short, but then there are a bunch of people who also fall in between. So those are some other examples. Mike: You're making me wonder about some of these ideas, these concepts, these habits of mind that these seeds grow into during children's elementary learning experiences. Can we talk about that a bit? Janet: Sure. Thank you for that question.  So we think of seeds as a little more general. So rather than a particular seed growing into something or being destined for something, it's more that a seed becomes activated more in a particular context and connections with other seeds get strengthened. So for example, the idea of like or nonlike terms with the positive and negative numbers. Like or nonlike or opposites can come up in so many different contexts. And that's one seed that gets evoked when thinking potentially when thinking about addition. So rather than a seed being planted and growing into things, it's more like there are these seeds, these resources that children collect as they act on the world and experience things. And in particular contexts, certain seeds are evoked and then connected. And then in other contexts, as the context becomes more familiar, maybe they're evoked more often and connected more strongly. And then that becomes something that's connected with that context. And that's how we see children learning as they become more expert in a particular context or situation. Mike: So in some ways it feels almost more like a neural network of sorts. Like the more that these connections are activated, the stronger the connection becomes. Is that a better analogy than this notion of seeds growing? It's more so that there are connections that are made and deepened, for lack of a better way of saying it? Janet: Mm-hmm. And pruned in certain circumstances. We actually struggled a bit with the name because we thought seeds might evoke this, "Here's a seed, it's this particular seed, it grows into this particular concept." But then we really struggled with other neurons of algebraic thinking. So we tossed around some other potential ideas in it to kind of evoke that image a little better. But yes, that's exactly how I would think about it. Mike: I mean, just to digress a little bit, I think it's an interesting question for you all as you're trying to describe this relationship, because in some respects it does resemble seeds—meaning that the beginnings of this set of ideas are coming out of lived experiences that children have early in their lives. And then those things are connected and deepened—or, as you said, pruned. So it kind of has features of this notion of a seed, but it also has features of a network that is interconnected, which I suspect is probably why it's fairly hard to name that. Janet: Mm-hmm. And it does have—so if you look at, for example, the replacement seed, my daughter playing doctor with her stuffed animals, the replacement seed there. But you can imagine that that seed, it's domain agnostic, so it can come out in grammar. For instance, the ad-libs, a noun goes here, and so it can be any different noun. It's the same idea, different context. And you can see the thread among contexts, even though it's not meaning the same thing or not used in the same way necessarily. Mike: It strikes me that understanding the seeds of algebraic thinking is really a powerful tool for educators. They could, for example, use it as a lens when they're planning instruction or interpreting student reasoning. Can you talk about this, Margaret and Janet? Margaret: Yeah, sure, definitely. So we've seen that teachers who take a seeds lens can be really curious about where student ideas come from. So, for example, when a student talks about a math solution, maybe instead of judging whether the answer is right or wrong, a teacher might actually be more curious about how the student came to that idea. In some of our work, we've seen teachers who have a seeds perspective can look for pieces of a student answer that are productive instead of taking an entire answer as right or wrong. So we think that seeds can really help educators intentionally look for student assets and off of them. And for us, that's students' informal and lived experiences. Janet: And kind of going along with that, one of the things we really emphasize in our methods courses, and is emphasized in teacher education in general, is this idea of excavating for student ideas and looking at what's good about what the student says and reframing what a student says, not as a misconception, but reframing it as what's positive about this idea. And we think that having this mindset will help teachers do that. Just knowing that these are things students bring to the situation, these potentially productive resources they have. Is it productive in this case? Maybe. If it's not, what could make it more productive? So having teachers look for these kinds of things we found as helpful in classrooms. Mike: I'm going to ask a question right now that I think is perhaps a little bit challenging, but I suspect it might be what people who are listening are wondering, which is: Are there any generalizable instructional moves that might support formal or informal algebraic thinking that you'd like to see elementary teachers integrate into their classroom practice? Margaret: Yeah, I mean, I think, honestly, it's: Listen carefully to kids' ideas with an open mind. So as you listen to what kids are saying, really thinking about why they're saying what they're saying, maybe where that thinking comes from and how you can leverage it in productive ways. Mike: So I want to go back to the analogy of seeds. And I also want to think about this knowing what you said earlier about the fact that some of the analogy about seeds coming early in a child's life or emerging from their lived experiences, that's an important part of thinking about it. But there's also this notion that time and experiences allow some connections to be made and to grow or to be pruned.  What I'm thinking about is the gardener. The challenge in education is that the gardener who is working with students in the form of the teacher and they do some cultivation, they might not necessarily be able to kind of see the horizon, see where some of this is going, see what's happening. So if we have a gardener who's cultivating or drawing on some of the seeds of algebraic thinking in their early childhood students and their elementary students, what do you think the impact of trying to draw on the seeds or make those connections can be for children and students in the long run? Janet: I think [there are] a couple of important points there. And first, one is early on in a child's life. Because experiences breed seeds or because seeds come out of experiences, the more experiences children can have, the better. So for example, if you're in early grades, and you can read a book to a child, they can listen to it, but what else can they do? They could maybe play with toys and act it out. If there's an activity in the book, they could pretend or really do the activity. Maybe it's baking something or maybe it's playing a game. And I think this is advocated in literature on play and early childhood experiences, including Montessori experiences. But the more and varied experiences children can have, the more seeds they'll gain in different experiences.  And one thing a teacher can do early on and throughout is look at connections. Look at, "Oh, we did this thing here. Where might it come out here?" If a teacher can identify an important seed, for instance, they can work to strengthen it in different contexts as well. So giving children experiences and then looking for ways to strengthen key ideas through experiences. Mike: One of the challenges of hosting a podcast is that we've got about 20 to 25 minutes to discuss some really big ideas and some powerful practices. And this is one of those times where I really feel that. And I'm wondering, if we have listeners who wanted to continue learning about the ways that they can cultivate the seeds of algebraic thinking, are there particular resources or bodies of research that you would recommend? Janet: So from our particular lab we have a website, and it's notice-lab.com, and that's continuing to be built out. The project is funded by NSF [the National Science Foundation], and we're continuing to add resources. We have links to articles. We have links to ways teachers and parents can use seeds. We have links to professional development for teachers. And those will keep getting built out over time.  Margaret, do you want to talk about the article? Margaret: Sure, yeah. Janet and I actually just had an article recently come out in Mathematics Teacher: Learning and Teaching from NCTM [National Council of Teachers of Mathematics]. And it's [in] Issue 5, and it's called "Leveraging Early Algebraic Experiences." So that's definitely another place to check out.  And Janet, anything else you want to mention? Janet: I think the website has a lot of resources as well. Mike: So I've read the article and I would encourage anyone to take a look at it. We'll add a link to the article and also a link to the website in the show notes for people who are listening who want to check those things out.  I think this is probably a great place to stop. But I want to thank you both so much for joining us. Janet and Margaret, it's really been a pleasure talking with both of you. Janet: Thank you so much, Mike. It's been a pleasure.  Margaret: You too. Thanks so much for having us. Mike: This podcast is brought to you by The Math Learning Center and the Maier Math Foundation, dedicated to inspiring and enabling all individuals to discover and develop their mathematical confidence and ability. © 2025 The Math Learning Center | www.mathlearningcenter.org  

What does it take to lead a university for over two decades, and still love the work?In this special farewell episode of Start the Week with Wisdom, hosts Bridget Burns and Sarah Custer sit down with President Satish Tripathi of the University at Buffalo as he reflects on a remarkable 22-year legacy of leadership, innovation, and transformation. With retirement on the horizon, President Tripathi shares candid reflections on what's changed, what he's proudest of, and what it really takes to lead through complexity, uncertainty, and change.From moving a medical school to revitalizing a city, to pioneering national research in AI and drug discovery, Tripathi's tenure is marked by bold vision and patient execution. But beyond the milestones, he shares what shaped his leadership, from growing up in a small Indian village to navigating crises like the Great Recession and the COVID-19 pandemic. He also offers unfiltered advice for aspiring higher ed leaders, and a surprising answer about what he's looking forward to most after stepping down.Key Takeaways:Big change requires long-term vision: Transformational projects like relocating UB's medical school or launching NSF research centers took years, and a relentless commitment to mission.Naivete can be a secret weapon: Not knowing how hard something will be might just be the key to starting it at all.Legacy is defined by others: True leadership means focusing on impact, not recognition.Leadership evolves: Tripathi now leads with more listening, humility, and trust in his team than when he began.Great leadership isn't about the next job, it's about doing the current one with excellence.“If you're always thinking about the next job, you're not doing your current job well. Excellence now is what leads you forward.” – President Satish TripathiIf this conversation inspired you, share it with a colleague, subscribe for more wisdom-filled episodes, and take a moment to journal: what long-term impact are you building today?Learn more about the UIA by visiting:WebsiteLinkedInTwitterYouTubeFacebookThis week's episode is sponsored by Mainstay, a student retention and engagement tool where you can increase student and staff engagement with the only platform consistently proven to boost engagement, retention, and wellbeing. To learn more about Mainstay, click here.

The House on Monday passed a bill that would revamp how agencies purchase software, putting the legislation in the same place it was a year ago: waiting for the Senate to follow suit as the clock ticks down on the congressional calendar. The Strengthening Agency Management and Oversight of Software Assets (SAMOSA) Act would require agencies to examine their software licensing practices, with the aim of streamlining IT buying practices to avoid duplicative purchases. The bill is identical to legislation that passed the House last December but did not move forward in the Senate. The House bill, co-sponsored by Reps. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., Shontel Brown, D-Ohio, Pat Fallon, R-Texas, and April McClain Delaney, D-Md., would press agencies to better manage their software without limiting procurement options. They would be required to submit IT assessments to the Office of Management and Budget, the General Services Administration and Congress, so better oversight could be conducted. On the House floor Monday, Brown credited her three co-sponsors as well as former Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., who died of cancer in May after taking the lead on this bill in addition to his myriad other government IT efforts. Brown, ranking member of the House Oversight Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation subcommittee, said the SAMOSA Act is a “straightforward good government bill that has strong bipartisan support from members of the Oversight Committee.” A new bill from Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa., and Ted Budd, R-N.C., would establish a national network of cloud laboratories led by the National Science Foundation and supported by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, with the goal of enhancing collaboration between institutions while improving research efficiency with AI. If passed, NSF will select up to six programmable cloud laboratories from a range of applicants, including academic institutions and private-sector research groups. NIST would be tasked with setting standards and reporting to Congress about the feasibility for expansion. The bill, introduced last week, aligns with provisions laid out by the Trump administration's AI Action Plan and aims to codify existing NSF proposals, according to the sponsors. NSF earmarked $100 million for a similar AI-powered cloud network in August as it looked to expand access to emerging technologies. Researchers in the co-sponsors' home states have developed methods to ease automated discoveries, which will serve as a blueprint for the national effort. NSF will judge applicants on the level of existing data integration and automated capability infrastructure and capacity to support multi-user cloud workflows, among other criteria. In addition to bipartisan backing, the legislation garnered support from officials at Carnegie Mellon University, the Accelerate Science Now coalition and the Allegheny Conference on Community Development. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

Astronomers have observed the longest-ever gamma-ray burst — a powerful, extragalactic explosion that lasted over seven hours. Rapid follow-up observations with the U.S. Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy Camera and the International Gemini Observatory provided crucial information about the possible origin of this extraordinary event and the galaxy that hosts it.   Bios: - Rob Sparks is in the Communications, Education and Engagement group at NSF's NOIRLab in Tucson, Arizona. - Jonathan Carney is a graduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he studies time-domain astronomy with a focus on tidal disruption events. His research spans the full pipeline of transient discovery and characterization, from developing machine learning models for the forthcoming Argus Array to conducting follow-up observations with NOIRLab telescopes. https://carneyjo.github.io/   We've added a new way to donate to 365 Days of Astronomy to support editing, hosting, and production costs.  Just visit: https://www.patreon.com/365DaysOfAstronomy and donate as much as you can! Share the podcast with your friends and send the Patreon link to them too!  Every bit helps! Thank you! ------------------------------------ Do go visit http://www.redbubble.com/people/CosmoQuestX/shop for cool Astronomy Cast and CosmoQuest t-shirts, coffee mugs and other awesomeness! http://cosmoquest.org/Donate This show is made possible through your donations.  Thank you! (Haven't donated? It's not too late! Just click!) ------------------------------------ The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by the Planetary Science Institute. http://www.psi.edu Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at info@365DaysOfAstronomy.org.

Guests Dawn Wages | Loren Crary Panelist Richard Littauer Show Notes In this episode of Sustain, Richard Littauer talks with Dawn Wages, former Chair of the Python Software Foundation board and Loren Crary, Deputy Executive Director of the PSF, about how the PSF sustains Python and its community, governance, fundraising, and events like PyCon US, and why they ultimately turned down a $1.5M NSF grant rather than accept new anti-DEI conditions. They walk through what the grant was for, how the decision unfolded, the financial and ethical risks involved, and the overwhelming community response in donations and support, ending with a call to participate in the PSF fundraiser and submit talks to PyCon US 2026. Press download now to hear more! [00:02:41] Dawn explains she just finished her term as Chair at the PSF Board, previously served as Treasurer, and that board seats are elected volunteer toles with three-year terms. [00:03:40] Loren describes her job as Deputy Executive Director, #2 to ED Deb Nicholson. She leads fundraising and revenue strategy, handles internal operations and strategic planning, and she clarifies that the Python Steering Council steers the language itself and mentions PyCon US will be in Long Beach, CA May 2026. [00:05:38] Dawn shares a personal story how PSF funding and local Python user group helped her start in Python a decade ago and encourages listeners to donate and use company matching. [00:06:57] Loren speaks about sponsors and individual donors and plugs the fundraiser and the “cute snake thermometer” on the donate page. [00:08:00] Richard, as a board member of Python New Zealand, underscores PSF's support for Python user groups and conferences. He then pivots to ask about strategy where Loren describes how the board leads strategy. [00:13:34] Dawn reflects on learning to chair the board for the first time, praising staff expertise, and she describes the ‘flywheel' model where staff and board collaborate closely, with staff often joining board meetings to co-develop strategy. [00:15:18] Loren highlights the PSF board and representation. [00:16:59] Richard gives a special shout-out to Phyllis Dobbs as one of the “unsung heroes” of open source, noting her work with OSI and Deb in the past. [00:17:26] The convo turns to the NSF Safe OSE program and what happened with the large grant the PSF was awarded and then declined. Loren details everything that happened and gives a shout-out to Seth Larson, whom she collaborated with. [00:29:00] Loren reads the key clause that PSF would need to affirm, and the board ultimately made the call that it was too risky to their mission to accept the terms. [00:31:42] Dawn explains the board's decision to withdraw and Loren notes that no one on the board or staff ever floated “dropping DEI to take the money.” [00:33:55] Dawn points to Python's reputation as a welcoming, diverse community and DEI is portrayed as “lifeblood,” not an optional extra. [00:35:03] What happened after they said they weren't taking the money? Dawn and Loren recount an outpouring of support after the public statement, and we find out how much money the fundraiser has made so far along including an anonymous donation. [00:38:33] Dawn zooms out to decades of conversations about funding open source, arguing that individual donors and major AI companies profiting from Python should be contributing at scale. [00:41:20] Richard reinforces the ongoing donation, and Loren plugs the PyCon US Call for Proposals (open through December 19) with new AI and security tracks and invites listeners to submit. Quotes [00:07:09] “If you want to know what a nonprofit does, look at who their funders are and that's who they're working for.” [00:12:07] “The board sets a strategy, but there needs to be a ‘flywheel' from the staff to keep things like that going.” [00:18:45] “We dipped our toes into grant funding, and we thought that would be a great way to make our work more sustainable.” [00:32:40] “The $1.5 million is not net worth putting the future health and safety of the language in the organization in jeopardy.” [00:32:58] “I am proud that at no point did anyone float: What if we just stopped doing everything DEI and take the money?” [00:38:09] “I like my boss to be the users.” [00:38:41] “We've been talking about what it means to fund open source for decades…I think this is an interesting arc that we're experiencing. I'm hoping that the numbers will have two or three commas from individual donations.” Spotlight [00:42:15] Richard's spotlight is Phyllis Dobbs. [00:42:26] Dawn's spotlight is PyScript. [00:42:42] Loren's spotlight is The Carpentries. Links SustainOSS (https://sustainoss.org/) podcast@sustainoss.org (mailto:podcast@sustainoss.org) richard@sustainoss.org (mailto:richard@sustainoss.org) SustainOSS Discourse (https://discourse.sustainoss.org/) SustainOSS Mastodon (https://mastodon.social/tags/sustainoss) SustainOSS Bluesky (https://bsky.app/profile/sustainoss.bsky.social) SustainOSS LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/sustainoss/) Open Collective-SustainOSS (Contribute) (https://opencollective.com/sustainoss) Richard Littauer Socials (https://www.burntfen.com/2023-05-30/socials) Dawn Wages Website (https://dawnwages.info/) Loren Crary LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/loren-crary/) Python Software Foundation (http://www.python.org/psf/) PSF Donate (https://donate.python.org/) PyCon US 2026, Long Beach, CA (https://us.pycon.org/2026/) The Philadelphia Python Users Group (PhillyPUG) (https://www.meetup.com/phillypug/) Safety, Security, and Privacy of Open Source Ecosystems (Safe-OSE) (https://www.nsf.gov/funding/opportunities/safe-ose-safety-security-privacy-open-source-ecosystems) PSF Welcomes New Security Developer in Residence with Support from Alpha-Omega (https://openssf.org/blog/2023/06/22/psf-welcomes-new-security-developer-in-residence-with-support-from-alpha-omega/) Seth Michael Larson-GitHub (https://github.com/sethmlarson) Seth Larson Blog post: I am the first PSF Security Developer-in-Residence (https://sethmlarson.dev/security-developer-in-residence) Python Software Foundation turns down $1.5 million NSF grant because of the anti-DEI strings attached (The Verge) (https://www.theverge.com/news/808268/python-software-foundation-turns-down-1-5-million-nsf-grant-because-of-the-anti-dei-strings-attached) The PSF has withdrawn a $1.5 million proposal to US government grant program (PSF Blog post) (https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-funding-statement.html) PSF Board Meeting Minutes Archive (Python) (https://www.python.org/psf/records/board/minutes/) Phyllis Dobbs (https://www.linkedin.com/in/phyllisadobbs/) PyScript (https://pyscript.net/) The Carpentries (https://carpentries.org/) Credits Produced by Richard Littauer (https://www.burntfen.com/) Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound (https://www.peachtreesound.com/) Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound (https://www.peachtreesound.com/) Special Guests: Dawn Wages and Loren Crary.

The dotEDU hosts look back at a year that reshaped higher education in ways few expected back in January. Mushtaq, Sarah, and Jon talk through their top five stories of 2025, including  the push to dismantle the Department of Education, the cuts at NIH and NSF, the sweeping changes in the One Big Beautiful Bill, and Congress's response to it all. Here are some of the links and references from this week's show:  Register now for ACEx, Feb. 25-28, 2026, in Washington, DC  Higher Education & The Trump Administration: Resources Trump Administration Higher Ed Executive Order Tracker Full coverage of the 2nd Trump administration from The Chronicle of Higher Education  The U.S. Is Funding Fewer Grants in Every Area of Science and Medicine The New York Times (sub. req.) | Oct. 3, 2025

 If you're a scientist, and you apply for federal research funding, you'll ask for a specific dollar amount. Let's say you're asking for a million-dollar grant. Your grant covers the direct costs, things like the salaries of the researchers that you're paying. If you get that grant, your university might get an extra $500,000. That money is called “indirect costs,” but think of it as overhead: that money goes to lab space, to shared equipment, and so on.This is the system we've used to fund American research infrastructure for more than 60 years. But earlier this year, the Trump administration proposed capping these payments at just 15% of direct costs, way lower than current indirect cost rates. There are legal questions about whether the admin can do that. But if it does, it would force universities to fundamentally rethink how they do science.The indirect costs system is pretty opaque from the outside. Is the admin right to try and slash these indirect costs? Where does all that money go? And if we want to change how we fund research overhead, what are the alternatives? How do you design a research system to incentivize the research you actually wanna see in the world?I'm joined today by Pierre Azoulay from MIT Sloan and Dan Gross from Duke's Fuqua School of Business. Together with Bhaven Sampat at Johns Hopkins, they conducted the first comprehensive empirical study of how indirect costs actually work. Earlier this year, I worked with them to write up that study as a more accessible policy brief for IFP. They've assembled data on over 350 research institutions, and they found some striking results. While negotiated rates often exceed 50-60%, universities actually receive much less, due to built-in caps and exclusions.Moreover, the institutions that would be hit hardest by proposed cuts are those whose research most often leads to new drugs and commercial breakthroughs.Thanks to Katerina Barton, Harry Fletcher-Wood, and Inder Lohla for their help with this episode, and to Beez for her help on the charts.Let's say I'm a researcher at a university and I apply for a federal grant. I'm looking at cancer cells in mice. It will cost me $1 million to do that research — to pay grad students, to buy mice and test tubes. I apply for a grant from the National Institutes of Health, or NIH. Where do indirect costs come in?Dan Gross: Research generally incurs two categories of costs, much as business operations do.* Direct or variable costs are typically project-specific; they include salaries and consumable supplies.* Indirect or fixed costs are not as easily assigned to any particular project. [They include] things like lab space, data and computing resources, biosecurity, keeping the lights on and the buildings cooled and heated — even complying with the regulatory requirements the federal government imposes on researchers. They are the overhead costs of doing research.Pierre Azoulay: You will use those grad students, mice, and test tubes, the direct costs. But you're also using the lab space. You may be using a shared facility where the mice are kept and fed. Pieces of large equipment are shared by many other people to conduct experiments. So those are fixed costs from the standpoint of your research project.Dan: Indirect Cost Recovery (ICR) is how the federal government has been paying for the fixed cost of research for the past 60 years. This has been done by paying universities institution-specific fixed percentages on top of the direct cost of the research. That's the indirect cost rate. That rate is negotiated by institutions, typically every two to four years, supported by several hundred pages of documentation around its incurred costs over the recent funding cycle.The idea is to compensate federally funded researchers for the investments, infrastructure, and overhead expenses related to the research they perform for the government. Without that funding, universities would have to pay those costs out of pocket and, frankly, many would not be interested or able to do the science the government is funding them to do.Imagine I'm doing my mouse cancer science at MIT, Pierre's parent institution. Some time in the last four years, MIT had this negotiation with the National Institutes of Health to figure out what the MIT reimbursable rate is. But as a researcher, I don't have to worry about what indirect costs are reimbursable. I'm all mouse research, all day.Dan: These rates are as much of a mystery to the researchers as it is to the public. When I was junior faculty, I applied for an external grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) — you can look up awards folks have won in the award search portal. It doesn't break down indirect and direct cost shares of each grant. You see the total and say, “Wow, this person got $300,000.” Then you go to write your own grant and realize you can only budget about 60% of what you thought, because the rest goes to overhead. It comes as a bit of a shock the first time you apply for grant funding.What goes into the overhead rates? Most researchers and institutions don't have clear visibility into that. The process is so complicated that it's hard even for those who are experts to keep track of all the pieces.Pierre: As an individual researcher applying for a project, you think about the direct costs of your research projects. You're not thinking about the indirect rate. When the research administration of your institution sends the application, it's going to apply the right rates.So I've got this $1 million experiment I want to run on mouse cancer. If I get the grant, the total is $1.5 million. The university takes that .5 million for the indirect costs: the building, the massive microscope we bought last year, and a tiny bit for the janitor. Then I get my $1 million. Is that right?Dan: Duke University has a 61% indirect cost rate. If I propose a grant to the NSF for $100,000 of direct costs — it might be for data, OpenAI API credits, research staff salaries — I would need to budget an extra $61,000 on top for ICR, bringing the total grant to $161,000.My impression is that most federal support for research happens through project-specific grants. It's not these massive institutional block grants. Is that right?Pierre: By and large, there aren't infrastructure grants in the science funding system. There are other things, such as center grants that fund groups of investigators. Sometimes those can get pretty large — the NIH grant for a major cancer center like Dana-Farber could be tens of millions of dollars per year.Dan: In the past, US science funding agencies did provide more funding for infrastructure and the instrumentation that you need to perform research through block grants. In the 1960s, the NSF and the Department of Defense were kicking up major programs to establish new data collection efforts — observatories, radio astronomy, or the Deep Sea Drilling project the NSF ran, collecting core samples from the ocean floor around the world. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) — back then the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) — was investing in nuclear test detection to monitor adherence to nuclear test ban treaties. Some of these were satellite observation methods for atmospheric testing. Some were seismic measurement methods for underground testing. ARPA supported the installation of a network of seismic monitors around the world. Those monitors are responsible for validating tectonic plate theory. Over the next decade, their readings mapped the tectonic plates of the earth. That large-scale investment in research infrastructure is not as common in the US research policy enterprise today.That's fascinating. I learned last year how modern that validation of tectonic plate theory was. Until well into my grandparents' lifetime, we didn't know if tectonic plates existed.Dan: Santi, when were you born?1997.Dan: So I'm a good decade older than you — I was born in 1985. When we were learning tectonic plate theory in the 1990s, it seemed like something everybody had always known. It turns out that it had only been known for maybe 25 years.So there's this idea of federal funding for science as these massive pieces of infrastructure, like the Hubble Telescope. But although projects like that do happen, the median dollar the Feds spend on science today is for an individual grant, not installing seismic monitors all over the globe.Dan: You applied for a grant to fund a specific project, whose contours you've outlined in advance, and we provided the funding to execute that project.Pierre: You want to do some observations at the observatory in Chile, and you are going to need to buy a plane ticket — not first class, not business class, very much economy.Let's move to current events. In February of this year, the NIH announced it was capping indirect cost reimbursement at 15% on all grants.What's the administration's argument here?Pierre: The argument is there are cases where foundations only charge 15% overhead rate on grants — and universities acquiesce to such low rates — and the federal government is entitled to some sort of “most-favored nation” clause where no one pays less in overhead than they pay. That's the argument in this half-a-page notice. It's not much more elaborate than that.The idea is, the Gates Foundation says, “We will give you a grant to do health research and we're only going to pay 15% indirect costs.” Some universities say, “Thank you. We'll do that.” So clearly the universities don't need the extra indirect cost reimbursement?Pierre: I think so.Dan: Whether you can extrapolate from that to federal research funding is a different question, let alone if federal research was funding less research and including even less overhead. Would foundations make up some of the difference, or even continue funding as much research, if the resources provided by the federal government were lower? Those are open questions. Foundations complement federal funding, as opposed to substitute for it, and may be less interested in funding research if it's less productive.What are some reasons that argument might be misguided?Pierre: First, universities don't always say, “Yes” [to a researcher wishing to accept a grant]. At MIT, getting a grant means getting special authorization from the provost. That special authorization is not always forthcoming. The provost has a special fund, presumably funded out of the endowment, that under certain conditions they will dip into to make up for the missing overhead.So you've got some research that, for whatever reason, the federal government won't fund, and the Gates Foundation is only willing to fund it at this low rate, and the university has budgeted a little bit extra for those grants that it still wants.Pierre: That's my understanding. I know that if you're going to get a grant, you're going to have to sit in many meetings and cajole any number of administrators, and you don't always get your way.Second, it's not an apples-to-apples comparison [between federal and foundation grants] because there are ways to budget an item as a direct cost in a foundation grant that the government would consider an indirect cost. So you might budget some fractional access to a facility…Like the mouse microscope I have to use?Pierre: Yes, or some sort of Cryo-EM machine. You end up getting more overhead through the back door.The more fundamental way in which that approach is misguided is that the government wants its infrastructure — that it has contributed to through [past] indirect costs — to be leveraged by other funders. It's already there, it's been paid for, it's sitting idle, and we can get more bang for our buck if we get those additional funders to piggyback on that investment.Dan: That [other funders] might not be interested in funding otherwise.Why wouldn't they be interested in funding it otherwise? What shouldn't the federal government say, “We're going to pay less. If it's important research, somebody else will pay for it.”Dan: We're talking about an economies-of-scale problem. These are fixed costs. The more they're utilized, the more the costs get spread over individual research projects.For the past several decades, the federal government has funded an order of magnitude more university research than private firms or foundations. If you look at NSF survey data, 55% of university R&D is federally funded; 6% is funded by foundations. That is an order of magnitude difference. The federal government has the scale to support and extract value for whatever its goals are for American science.We haven't even started to get into the administrative costs of research. That is part of the public and political discomfort with indirect-cost recovery. The idea that this is money that's going to fund university bloat.I should lay my cards on the table here for readers. There are a ton of problems with the American scientific enterprise as it currently exists. But when you look at studies from a wide range of folks, it's obvious that R&D in American universities is hugely valuable. Federal R&D dollars more than pay for themselves. I want to leave room for all critiques of the scientific ecosystem, of the universities, of individual research ideas. But at this 30,000-foot level, federal R&D dollars are well spent.Dan: The evidence may suggest that, but that's not where the political and public dialogue around science policy is. Again, I'm going to bring in a long arc here. In the 1950s and 1960s, it was, “We're in a race with the Soviet Union. If we want to win this race, we're going to have to take some risky bets.” And the US did. It was more flexible with its investments in university and industrial science, especially related to defense aims. But over time, with the waning of these political pressures and with new budgetary pressures, the tenor shifted from, “Let's take chances” to “Let's make science and other parts of government more accountable.” The undercurrent of Indirect Cost Recovery policy debates has more of this accountability framing.This comes up in this comparison to foundation rates: “Is the government overpaying?” Clearly universities are willing to accept less from foundations. It comes up in this perception that ICR is funding administrative growth that may not be productive or socially efficient. Accountability seems to be a priority in the current day.Where are we right now [August 2025] on that 15% cap on indirect costs?Dan: Recent changes first kicked off on February 7th, when NIH posted its supplemental guidance, that introduced a policy that the direct cost rates that it paid on its grants would be 15% to institutions of higher education. That policy was then adopted by the NSF, the DOD, and the Department of Energy. All of these have gotten held up in court by litigation from universities. Things are stuck in legal limbo. Congress has presented its point of view that, “At least for now, I'd like to keep things as they are.” But this has been an object of controversy long before the current administration even took office in January. I don't think it's going away.Pierre: If I had to guess, the proposal as it first took shape is not what is going to end up being adopted. But the idea that overhead rates are an object of controversy — are too high, and need to be reformed — is going to stay relevant.Dan: Partly that's because it's a complicated issue. Partly there's not a real benchmark of what an appropriate Indirect Cost Recovery policy should be. Any way you try to fund the cost of research, you're going to run into trade-offs. Those are complicated.ICR does draw criticism. People think it's bloated or lacks transparency. We would agree some of these critiques are well-founded. Yet it's also important to remember that ICR pays for facilities and administration. It doesn't just fund administrative costs, which is what people usually associate it with. The share of ICR that goes to administrative costs is legally capped at 26% of direct costs. That cap has been in place since 1991. Many universities have been at that cap for many years — you can see this in public records. So the idea that indirect costs are going up over time, and that that's because of bloat at US universities, has to be incorrect, because the administrative rate has been capped for three decades.Many of those costs are incurred in service of complying with regulations that govern research, including the cost of administering ICR to begin with. Compiling great proposals every two to four years and a new round of negotiations — all of that takes resources. Those are among the things that indirect cost funding reimburses.Even then, universities appear to under-recover their true indirect costs of federally-sponsored research. We have examples from specific universities which have reported detailed numbers. That under-recovery means less incentive to invest in infrastructure, less capacity for innovation, fewer clinical trials. So there's a case to be made that indirect cost funding is too low.Pierre: The bottom line is we don't know if there is under- or over-recovery of indirect costs. There's an incentive for university administrators to claim there's under-recovery. So I take that with a huge grain of salt.Dan: It's ambiguous what a best policy would look like, but this is all to say that, first, public understanding of this complex issue is sometimes a bit murky. Second, a path forward has to embrace the trade-offs that any particular approach to ICR presents.From reading your paper, I got a much better sense that a ton of the administrative bloat of the modern university is responding to federal regulations on research. The average researcher reports spending almost half of their time on paperwork. Some of that is a consequence of the research or grant process; some is regulatory compliance.The other thing, which I want to hear more on, is that research tools seem to be becoming more expensive and complex. So the microscope I'm using today is an order of magnitude more expensive than the microscope I was using in 1950. And you've got to recoup those costs somehow.Pierre: Everything costs more than it used to. Research is subject to Baumol's cost disease. There are areas where there's been productivity gains — software has had an impact.The stakes are high because, if we get this wrong, we're telling researchers that they should bias the type of research they're going to pursue and training that they're going to undergo, with an eye to what is cheaper. If we reduce the overhead rate, we should expect research that has less fixed cost and more variable costs to gain in favor — and research that is more scale-intensive to lose favor. There's no reason for a benevolent social planner to find that a good development. The government should be neutral with respect to the cost structure of research activities. We don't know in advance what's going to be more productive.Wouldn't a critic respond, “We're going to fund a little bit of indirect costs, but we're not going to subsidize stuff that takes huge amounts of overhead. If universities want to build that fancy new telescope because it's valuable, they'll do it.” Why is that wrong when it comes to science funding?Pierre: There's a grain of truth to it.Dan: With what resources though? Who's incentivized to invest in this infrastructure? There's not a paid market for science. Universities can generate some licensing fees from patents that result from science. But those are meager revenue streams, realistically. There are reasons to believe that commercial firms are under-incentivized to invest in basic scientific research. Prior to 1940, the scientific enterprise was dramatically smaller because there wasn't funding the way that there is today. The exigencies of war drew the federal government into funding research in order to win. Then it was productive enough that folks decided we should keep doing it. History and economic logic tells us that you're not going to see as much science — especially in these fixed-cost heavy endeavors — when those resources aren't provided by the public.Pierre: My one possible answer to the question is, “The endowment is going to pay for it.” MIT has an endowment, but many other universities do not. What does that mean for them? The administration also wants to tax the heck out of the endowment.This is a good opportunity to look at the empirical work you guys did in this great paper. As far as I can tell, this was one of the first real looks at what indirect costs rates look like in real life. What did you guys find?Dan: Two decades ago, Pierre and Bhaven began collecting information on universities' historical indirect cost rates. This is a resource that was quietly sitting on the shelf waiting for its day. That day came this past February. Bhaven and Pierre collected information on negotiated ICR rates for the past 60 years. During this project, we also collected the most recent versions of those agreements from university websites to bring the numbers up to the current day.We pulled together data for around 350 universities and other research institutions. Together, they account for around 85% of all NIH research funding over the last 20 years.We looked at their:* Negotiated indirect cost rates, from institutional indirect cost agreements with the government, and their;* Effective rates [how much they actually get when you look at grant payments], using NIH grant funding data.Negotiated cost rates have gone up. That has led to concerns that the overhead cost of research is going up — these claims that it's funding administrative bloat. But our most important finding is that there's a large gap between the sticker rates — the negotiated ICR rates that are visible to the public, and get floated on Twitter as examples of university exorbitance — and the rates that universities are paid in practice, at least on NIH grants; we think it's likely the case for NSF and other agency grants too.An institution's effective ICR funding rates are much, much lower than their negotiated rates and they haven't changed much for 40 years. If you look at NIH's annual budget, the share of grant funding that goes to indirect costs has been roughly constant at 27-28% for a long time. That implies an effective rate of around 40% over direct costs. Even though many institutions have negotiated rates of 50-70%, they usually receive 30-50%.The difference between those negotiated rates and the effective rates seems to be due to limits and exceptions built into NIH grant rules. Those rules exclude some grants, such as training grants, from full indirect cost funding. They also exclude some direct costs from the figure used to calculate ICR rates. The implication is that institutions receive ICR payments based on a smaller portion of their incurred direct costs than typically assumed. As the negotiated direct cost falls, you see a university being paid a higher indirect cost rate off a smaller — modified — direct cost base, to recover the same amount of overhead.Is it that the federal government is saying for more parts of the grant, “We're not going to reimburse that as an indirect cost.”?Dan: This is where we shift a little bit from assessment to speculation. What's excluded from total direct costs? One thing is researcher salaries above a certain level.What is that level? Can you give me a dollar amount?Dan: It's a $225,700 annual salary. There aren't enough people being paid that on these grants for that to explain the difference, especially when you consider that research salaries are being paid to postdocs and grad students.You're looking around the scientists in your institution and thinking, “That's not where the money is”?Dan: It's not, even if you consider Principal Investigators. If you consider postdocs and grad students, it certainly isn't.Dan: My best hunch is that research projects have become more capital-intensive, and only a certain level of expenditure on equipment can be included in the modified total direct cost base. I don't have smoking gun evidence, it's my intuition.In the paper, there's this fascinating chart where you show the institutions that would get hit hardest by a 15% cap tend to be those that do the most valuable medical research. Explain that on this framework. Is it that doing high-quality medical research is capital-intensive?Pierre: We look at all the private-sector patents that build on NIH research. The more a university stands to lose under the administration policy, the more it has contributed over the past 25 years — in research the private sector found relevant in terms of pharmaceutical patents.This is counterintuitive if your whole model of funding for science is, “Let's cut subsidies for the stuff the private sector doesn't care about — all this big equipment.” When you cut those subsidies, what suffers most is the stuff that the private sector likes.Pierre: To me it makes perfect sense. This is the stuff that the private sector would not be willing to invest in on its own. But that research, having come into being, is now a very valuable input into activities that profit-minded investors find interesting and worth taking a risk on.This is the argument for the government to fund basic research?Pierre: That argument has been made at the macro-level forever, but the bibliometric revolution of the past 15 years allows you to look at this at the nano-level. Recently I've been able to look at the history of Ozempic. The main patent cites zero publicly-funded research, but it cites a bunch of patents, including patents taken up by academics. Those cite the foundational research performed by Joel Habener and his team at Massachusetts General Hospital in the early 1980s that elucidated the role of GLP-1 as a potential target. This grant was first awarded to Habener in 1979, was renewed every four or five years, and finally died in 2008, when he moved on to other things. Those chains are complex, but we can now validate the macro picture at this more granular level.Dan: I do want to add one qualification which also suggests some directions for the future. There are things we still can't see — despite Pierre's zeal. Our projections of the consequence of a 15% rate cap are still pretty coarse. We don't know what research might not take place. We don't know what indirect cost categories are exposed, or how universities would reallocate. All those things are going to be difficult to project without a proper experiment.One thing that I would've loved to have more visibility into is, “What is the structure of indirect costs at universities across the country? What share of paid indirect costs are going to administrative expenses? What direct cost categories are being excluded?” We would need a more transparency into the system to know the answers.Does that information have to be proprietary? It's part of negotiations with the federal government about how much the taxpayer will pay for overhead on these grants. Which piece is so special that it can't be shared?Pierre: You are talking to the wrong people here because we're meta-scientists, so our answer is none of it should be private.Dan: But now you have to ask the university lawyers.What would the case from the universities be? “We can't tell the public what we spend subsidy on”?Pierre: My sense is that there are institutions of academia that strike most lay people as completely bizarre.Hard to explain without context?Pierre: People haven't thought about it. They will find it so bizarre that they will typically jump from the odd aspect to, “That must be corruption.” University administrators are hugely attuned to that. So the natural defensive approach is to shroud it in secrecy. This way we don't see how the sausage is made.Dan: Transparency can be a blessing and a curse. More information supports more considered decision-making. It also opens the door to misrepresentation by critics who have their own agendas. Pierre's right: there are some practices that to the public might look unusual — or might be familiar, but one might say, “How is that useful expense?” Even a simple thing like having an administrator who manages a faculty's calendar might seem excessive. Many people manage their own calendars. At the same time, when you think about how someone's time is best used, given their expertise, and heavy investment in specialized human capital, are emails, calendaring, and note-taking the right things for scientists [to be doing]? Scientists spend a large chunk of their time now administering grants. Does it make sense to outsource that and preserve the scientist's time for more science?When you put forward data that shows some share of federal research funding is going to fund administrative costs, at first glance it might look wasteful, yet it might still be productive. But I would be able to make a more considered judgment on a path forward if I had access to more facts, including what indirect costs look like under the hood.One last question: in a world where you guys have the ear of the Senate, political leadership at the NIH, and maybe the universities, what would you be pushing for on indirect costs?Pierre: I've come to think that this indirect cost rate is a second-best institution: terrible and yet superior to many of the alternatives. My favorite alternative would be one where there would be a flat rate applied to direct costs. That would be the average effective rate currently observed — on the order of 40%.You're swapping out this complicated system to — in the end — reimburse universities the same 40%.Pierre: We know there are fixed costs. Those fixed costs need to be paid. We could have an elaborate bureaucratic apparatus to try to get it exactly right, but it's mission impossible. So why don't we give up on that and set a rate that's unlikely to lead to large errors in under- or over-recovery. I'm not particularly attached to 40%. But the 15% that was contemplated seems absurdly low.Dan: In the work we've done, we do lay out different approaches. The 15% rate wouldn't fully cut out the negotiation process: to receive that, you have to document your overhead costs and demonstrate that they reached that level. In any case, it's simplifying. It forces more cost-sharing and maybe more judicious investments by universities. But it's also so low that it's likely to make a significant amount of high-value, life-improving research economically unattractive.The current system is complicated and burdensome. It might encourage investment in less productive things, particularly because universities can get it paid back through future ICR. At the same time, it provides pretty good incentives to take on expensive, high-value research on behalf of the public.I would land on one of two alternatives. One of those is close to what Pierre said, with fixed rates, but varied by institution types: one for universities, one for medical schools, one for independent research institutions — because we do see some variation in their cost structures. We might set those rates around their historical average effective rates, since those haven't changed for quite a long time. If you set different rates for different categories of institution, the more finely you slice the pie, the closer you end up to the current system. So that's why I said maybe, at a very high level, four categories.The other I could imagine is to shift more of these costs “above the line” — to adapt the system to enable more of these indirect costs to be budgeted as direct costs in grants. This isn't always easy, but presumably some things we currently call indirect costs could be accounted for in a direct cost manner. Foundations do it a bit more than the federal government does, so that could be another path forward.There's no silver bullet. Our goal was to try to bring some understanding to this long-running policy debate over how to fund the indirect cost of research and what appropriate rates should be. It's been a recurring question for several decades and now is in the hot seat again. Hopefully through this work, we've been able to help push that dialogue along. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.statecraft.pub

The supplement certification landscape is evolving, and Episode #193 of the PricePlow Podcast brings you to the forefront of this transformation. We sit down with Lori Bestervelt, Ph.D., and Thane Campbell from TruShieldâ„¢ Certified, a new certification service that’s challenging the status quo by focusing exclusively on comprehensive banned substance testing. With Lori’s 22 years creating industry standards at NSF International (including the foundational NSF 173 standard) and Thane’s expertise from SMRTL (one of only two WADA-experienced anti-doping laboratories in the United States), they’re introducing a certification approach that tests for well over 400 prohibited substances, including entire drug classes like glucocorticoids and HIF stabilizers that other programs overlook. TruShieldâ„¢ Certified: Finished Product Drug-Testing from an Elite Lab Unlike traditional bundled certification programs that require brands to repeat testing across multiple areas they may already have covered, TruShield takes a streamlined approach by focusing solely on what athletes and tested individuals need most: certainty that their supplements are free from banned substances. The conversation explores the evolution of performance-enhancing substances from prohormones to SARMs to peptides, the challenges of cross-contamination in manufacturing, and why the certification industry hasn’t kept pace with modern supply chain realities. Whether you’re a brand looking to protect athletes or a consumer wanting transparency about what’s in your supplements, this episode delivers critical insights into the future of supplement safety. Subscribe to the PricePlow Podcast on your favorite platform and sign up for TruShield Certified news alerts on PricePlow before we dive into the details! https://blog.priceplow.com/podcast/trushield-certified-193 Video: Introducing TruShieldâ„¢ Certified with Lori Bestervelt and Thane Campbell https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-m-QHg6nDk Detailed Show Notes: TruShieldâ„¢ Certified’s Approach to Banned Substance Testing (0:00) – Introductions and Background (3:00) – The Problem with Bundled Certification Services (5:00) – Industry Evolution and Current Gaps (7:00) – Thane’s Background and SMRTL’s Role (9:00) – The Evolution of Banned Substances (11:00) – Consumer Safety and Informed Decisions (15:00) – Testing Methodology and Laboratory Capabilities (20:30) – The Lot-by-Lot Certification Process (25:45) – Cross-Contamination Challenges in Manufacturing (32:15) – Cost Considerations and Accessibility (35:30) – Early Adopters: CON-CRÄ’T, RedLeaf Biologics, and Vireo (40:45) – International Expansion and Geographic Availability (47:15) – League Endorsements and Adoption (53:00) – The Competitive Landscape (58:45) – Manufacturing Partnerships and Supply Chain Transparency (1:04:30) – Future Trends and Emerging Substances (1:09:15) – The Caffeine Question and WADA Regulations (1:13:45) – Partnership with Eurofins and Closing Thoughts Where to Follow Lori B… Read more on the PricePlow Blog

In this episode Seth Larson gives us a cornucopia of topics relating to Python security. Seth discusses the Python Software Foundation's decision to reject a significant grant NSF. Diversity is a big deal to python, so this was a no brainier. We discuss the upcoming PyCon US conference, featuring a new security track that fosters collaboration between developers and security experts. Josh is a huge fan of having a security track at developer conferences. And we close on a paper about zip and tar archives Seth wrote. It seems like we should have zip and tar security figured out by now, but we don't. Thankfully Seth is working on it. The show notes and blog post for this episode can be found at https://opensourcesecurity.io/2025/2025-11-python-security-seth-larson/

Online video games have evolved into vast financial ecosystems where real and virtual value mix at scale. This presentation shows how these spaces serve as efficient laundering channels, converting illicit funds from organized crime, sanctions evasion, terrorist financing, and digital fraud into assets that appear legitimate. Illicit value typically enters via card not present transactions, stolen digital wallets, and scam revenues before it is routed into platform marketplaces. From there, funds convert into tradeable virtual assets such as cosmetics, currencies, loot boxes, and content bundles, which can be divided into thousands of rapid microtransactions. Widely cited estimates place illicit financial flows at 2 to 5 percent of global GDP (roughly $800 billion to $2 trillion a year), while in game spending will reach $74.4 billion in 2025, providing liquidity, speed, and plausible deniability. About the speaker: Stephen Flowerday is a Professor in the School of Computer and Cyber Sciences at Augusta University. His research focuses on cybersecurity management, cybercrime, behavioral information security, and human-centric cybersecurity at the intersection of technology, processes, and people. His work has been supported by IBM, THRIP, the NRF, SASUF, Erasmus, and GMRDC. He serves as an associate editor and frequent reviewer for leading journals and conferences, and has reviewed grants for the Israeli NSF, the South African NRF, the U.S. NSF, and Bahrain's DHE.

In this episode of The Executive Room Podcast, host Kimberly Afonso sits down with Timothy Menard, Founder and CEO of LYT, an AI-powered smart city platform transforming how municipalities manage traffic, transit, and emergency response.A former Tesla engineer who helped develop the Model S, X, and 3, Tim has built a company that blends cutting-edge technology with a vital, human-centered mission: creating safer, more efficient, and more connected cities. Under his leadership, LYT received two NSF grants totaling $1.75 million and has been deployed in many major U.S. metropolitan areas. The company has also been recognized on the INC 5000 list of fastest-growing companies, and Tim himself was named to Mass Transit's 40 Under 40 for his contributions to public sector innovation.Listen in as Tim shares insights on building an honest business, leading with authenticity, and balancing visibility with purpose. He opens up about his journey from introvert to industry thought leader and the legacy he hopes to leave.Subscribe to The Executive Room Podcast for more conversations with visionary leaders.

In this powerful wrap-up episode, Eric Coffie holds nothing back. He reminds listeners that opportunity doesn't just knock—it shows up at your event and waits for you to walk through the door. From the Department of Defense's Acting Deputy Chief Digital AI Officer to Central Command and the National Science Foundation's Cyber Infrastructure Director, Eric reveals how he brought top-tier federal decision-makers directly to his community—and most people still didn't show up. He shares a transparent look into his own network-building approach, proving that access, generosity, and opportunity are everywhere for those willing to participate. Key Takeaways: Access is earned by showing up: The DoD AI Chief, Central Command, and NSF all attended Eric's event—and only a handful of people seized the chance. Generosity builds trust: The same partners who spoke at his event sponsored the bar tab—proof that strong relationships lead to goodwill and access. Visibility beats anonymity: If you're hiding behind "LinkedIn User," no one can find or help you—visibility builds credibility. Learn more: https://federalhelpcenter.com/ https://govcongiants.org/  Listen to the FULL Youtube Live here: https://youtube.com/live/CSj43yA6vcI  All the video links discussed. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zEcjpP-CcDTdVggNyY1qsJUGECZNGZeW9luftdAS39U/edit?usp=sharing

If you've heard the hammering of a woodpecker in the woods, you might have wondered how the birds can be so forceful. What does it take to whack your head against a tree repeatedly, hard enough to drill a hole? A team of researchers wondered that too and set out to investigate, by putting tiny muscle monitors on eight downy woodpeckers and recording them with high-speed video as they pecked away in the lab.Integrative organismal biologist Nick Antonson, co-author of a report on the work, joins Host Flora Lichtmen to peck away at the mystery.Plus, you can take two ant eggs with the exact same genes, and one can grow up to be a queen, the other a worker. Neuroscientist and evolutionary biologist Daniel Kronauer joins Flora to share recent research into how an ant becomes a queen.Guests: Dr. Nick Antonson is an NSF postdoctoral research fellow in the department of ecology, evolution, and organismal biology at Brown University.Dr. Daniel Kronauer is the Stanley S. and Sydney R. Shuman Professor in the Laboratory of Social Evolution and Behavior at The Rockefeller University in New York.Transcripts for each episode are available within 1-3 days at sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

- Chip Restrictions in China - Quantum Computing: IBM, Quantinuum, D-Wave, US DOE, UK NMI-Q, Julich - SDSC 40th Anniversary, the original 5 NSF centers - SC25 glance ahead [audio mp3="https://orionx.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/HPCNB_20251117.mp3"][/audio] The post HPC News Bytes – 20251117 appeared first on OrionX.net.

For three decades, conservatives abandoned science policy. Now they have a chance to rebuild it.That rebuilding effort comes with political challenges. Republicans' trust in science dropped thirty points over those decades. DOGE recently  slashed budgets at the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health. And HHS Sec RFK jr. is casting doubt on the efficacy of vaccines to the alarm of many Republicans in Congress. But beyond the politics, American science is also facing a competitive threat from China. The Middle Kingdom invests tens of billions in biotech and quantum computing, and outpaces the U.S. in PhD STEM grads.Meanwhile, American research became a system that rewards process over results. Researchers spend 42% of their time on paperwork. Only 46% of cancer studies could be replicated. And our guest today argues that perverse incentives and bureaucracy led to decades wasted on Alzheimer's research that turned out to be fraudulent—among other misfires.Ian Banks is Director of Science Policy at the Foundation for American Innovation, which recently established the science program he leads at the organization. He and Evan discuss his vision for a renewed conservative approach to science—one that learns from diversified investment portfolios that maintain safe bets while also making room for moonshots. They get into the political challenges created by hot button issues like climate change and COVID response, how to properly fund science in the era of DOGE, and what the proper role for politics in science should be.Previously, Banks served in research roles at the Conservative Coalition for Climate Solutions, the American Enterprise Institute and as a legislative aide to Rep. Bill Posey, where he focused on science, energy, and health policy. His Oxford master's thesis examined the replication crisis, and he brings firsthand experience navigating these questions during COVID from his time working on the Hill.

Topics covered in this episode: The PSF has withdrawn a $1.5 million proposal to US government grant program A Binary Serializer for Pydantic Models T-strings: Python's Fifth String Formatting Technique? Cronboard Extras Joke Watch on YouTube About the show Sponsored by us! Support our work through: Our courses at Talk Python Training The Complete pytest Course Patreon Supporters Connect with the hosts Michael: @mkennedy@fosstodon.org / @mkennedy.codes (bsky) Brian: @brianokken@fosstodon.org / @brianokken.bsky.social Show: @pythonbytes@fosstodon.org / @pythonbytes.fm (bsky) Join us on YouTube at pythonbytes.fm/live to be part of the audience. Usually Monday at 10am PT. Older video versions available there too. Finally, if you want an artisanal, hand-crafted digest of every week of the show notes in email form? Add your name and email to our friends of the show list, we'll never share it. Brian #1: The PSF has withdrawn a $1.5 million proposal to US government grant program Related post from Simon Willison ARS Technica: Python plan to boost software security foiled by Trump admin's anti-DEI rules The Register: Python Foundation goes ride or DEI, rejects government grant with strings attached In Jan 2025, the PSF submitted a proposal for a US NSF grant under the Safety, Security, and Privacy of Open Source Ecosystems program. After months of work by the PSF, the proposal was recommended for funding. If the PSF accepted it, however, they would need to agree to the some terms and conditions, including, affirming that the PSF doesn't support diversity. The restriction wouldn't just be around the security work, but around all activity of the PSF as a whole. And further, that any deemed violation would give the NSF the right to ask for the money back. That just won't work, as the PSF would have already spent the money. The PSF mission statement includes "The mission of the Python Software Foundation is to promote, protect, and advance the Python programming language, and to support and facilitate the growth of a diverse and international community of Python programmers." The money would have obviously been very valuable, but the restrictions are just too unacceptable. The PSF withdrew the proposal. This couldn't have been an easy decision, that was a lot of money, but I think the PSF did the right thing. Michael #2: A Binary Serializer for Pydantic Models 7× Smaller Than JSON A compact binary serializer for Pydantic models that dramatically reduces RAM usage compared to JSON. The library is designed for high-load systems (e.g., Redis caching), where millions of models are stored in memory and every byte matters. It serializes Pydantic models into a minimal binary format and deserializes them back with zero extra metadata overhead. Target Audience: This project is intended for developers working with: high-load APIs in-memory caches (Redis, Memcached) message queues cost-sensitive environments where object size matters Brian #3: T-strings: Python's Fifth String Formatting Technique? Trey Hunner Python 3.14 has t-strings. How do they fit in with the rest of the string story? History percent-style (%) strings - been around for a very long time string.Template - and t.substitute() - from Python 2.4, but I don't think I've ever used them bracket variables and .format() - Since Python 2.6 f-strings - Python 3.6 - Now I feel old. These still seem new to me t-strings - Python 3.14, but a totally different beast. These don't return strings. Trey then covers a problem with f-strings in that the substitution happens at definition time. t-strings have substitution happen later. this is essentially “lazy string interpolation” This still takes a bit to get your head around, but I appreciate Trey taking a whack at the explanation. Michael #4: Cronboard Cronboard is a terminal application that allows you to manage and schedule cronjobs on local and remote servers. With Cronboard, you can easily add, edit, and delete cronjobs, as well as view their status. ✨ Features ✔️ Check cron jobs ✔️ Create cron jobs with validation and human-readable feedback ✔️ Pause and resume cron jobs ✔️ Edit existing cron jobs ✔️ Delete cron jobs ✔️ View formatted last and next run times ✔️ Accepts special expressions like @daily, @yearly, @monthly, etc. ✔️ Connect to servers using SSH, using password or SSH keys ✔️ Choose another user to manage cron jobs if you have the permissions to do so (sudo) Extras Brian: PEP 810: Explicit lazy imports, has been unanimously accepted by steering council Lean TDD book will be written in the open. TOC, some details, and a 10 page introduction are now available. Hoping for the first pass to be complete by the end of the year. I'd love feedback to help make it a great book, and keep it small-ish, on a very limited budget. Joke: You are so wrong!

44% of supplements FAIL testing! Dr. Glenn, Head of Science at SuppCo, reveals which supplements don't contain what they say, how to spot red flags, and why even expensive brands might be lying about what's in the bottle. Learn the 3 essential rules before buying ANY supplement.Think your supplements contain what they claim? Think again. Dr. Glenn, Head of Science at SuppCo, drops a bombshell: 44% of supplements they've tested have failed - meaning they contain less than 95% of the active ingredient listed on the label. Many have ZERO active ingredients at all.In this eye-opening interview, Dr. Glenn exposes the dark side of the $70 billion supplement industry, including creatine gummies on Amazon with no creatine, urolithin A products with less than 1% of the active ingredient, and why products with better reviews often contain nothing at all.Learn which certifications actually matter (NSF, USP, cGMP), the red flags to watch for when shopping, why gummies are particularly risky, and how SuppCo's trust score system helps consumers navigate the overwhelming world of supplements. Plus, get Dr. Glenn's 3 essential tips every supplement buyer needs to know before making their next purchase.

In this solo episode of the Female Athlete Nutrition Podcast, host Lindsey Elizabeth Cortes addresses recent concerns about lead in protein powders. She draws from an October 2025 Consumer Reports article which revealed that out of 23 tested protein products, over two-thirds contained lead levels higher than recommended for daily intake.   Lindsey explains the significance of this finding, the implications for various demographics including children and pregnant women, and offers practical advice on choosing safer protein powder alternatives while simultaneously admitting that the consumer reports article created unnecessary fear mongering as the limits which Consumer Reports set for lead was much lower than any other current standards. She emphasizes the importance of whole foods over supplements and encourages informed consumer choices. Additionally, Lindsey provides updates on her website services and partnerships aimed at supporting female athletes.   Episode Highlights: 03:17 Today's Topic: Lead in Protein Powders 04:40 Consumer Reports on Lead in Protein Powders 08:53 Understanding Lead Exposure and Its Risks 23:48 Recommendations for Protein Powder Consumption 44:32 Conclusion and Final Thoughts   Resources and Links: Protein Powders and Shakes Contain High Levels of Lead FDA Lead in Food and Foodwares NSF for Sport Sport Supplement Safety For more information about the show, head to work with Lindsey on improving your nutrition, head to: http://www.lindseycortes.com Join REDS Recovery Membership: http://www.lindseycortes.com/reds WaveBye Supplements – Menstrual cycle support code LindseyCortes for 10% off: http://wavebye.co Previnex Supplements – Joint Health Plus, Muscle Health Plus, plant-based protein, probiotics, and more; code riseup for 15% off: previnex.com Female Athlete Nutrition Podcast Archive & Search Tool – Search by sport, condition, or topic: lindseycortes.com/podcast Female Athlete Nutrition Community – YouTube, Instagram @‌femaleathletenutrition, and private Facebook group

Rory McGowan sits down with Samantha Duffy, a Senior Manager of Global Water Programs at NSF to talk about some disturbing findings that reveals that thousands of people across the UK may have illegal water fittings, and that not only could they be contaiminating their water but also how the law leaves homeowners liable for legal reprocussions for the consequences. Samantha talks about how you can check your water fittings and how bad water fittings can contaiminate your water as someone who helps run a water testing non-profit facilitiy that tests taps and certifies their safety. There is also discussion about how the law could change to protect homeowners from unknown illegal water fittings.

Emily is an Assistant Professor at MDI Biological Laboratory where she studies neurodegenerative disease-associated genes using super-resolution imaging of living, adult worms. Emily earned her Ph.D. at the University of Maine while embedded in the Jackson Laboratory and during her post-doc at MDI Bio Lab, she was recognized by the National Institutes of Health as an “Outstanding Scholar in Neuroscience”.This conversation was recorded in September 2025. ~~~~~The Maine Science Podcast is a production of the Maine Discovery Museum. It is recorded at Discovery Studios, at the Maine Discovery Museum, in Bangor, ME. The Maine Science Podcast is hosted and executive produced by Kate Dickerson; edited and produced by Scott Loiselle. The Discover Maine theme was composed and performed by Nick Parker. To support our work: https://www.mainediscoverymuseum.org/donate. Find us online:Maine Discovery MuseumMaine Discovery Museum on social media: Facebook Instagram LinkedIn Bluesky Maine Science Festival on social media: Facebook Instagram LinkedInMaine Science Podcast on social media: Facebook Instagram © 2025 Maine Discovery Museum

Send us a Note or Ask a question Here! Include your name and where you're from and we may just read it on an Upcoming Podcast!Ever turned on a campground spigot and… it ran brown? Same.In this episode I sat down with Corbin Collet, CEO of Blu Tech, to talk about making RV water actually safe (and tasty) without killing your water pressure.We get into why those cheap inline “blue canister” filters are basically bouncers that only stop big dirt (20µm), how Blu Tech's 0.2µm + full-flow UVC setup works, and why using stainless + NSF-certified parts matters from the faucet all the way to your rig. We also hit the surprisingly underrated stuff: leak-free quick-connects, a smarter black-tank flush, the Qi Tank for chlorine/H₂S/iron, and the new Under-Sink UVC for a simple extra layer at your kitchen tap. Plus, a cool origin story: the company's COVID-era UVC work that pivoted into RV water.If you've ever said “my water still tastes weird,” there's a good chance your lines/tank just need a proper sanitize—we cover that, too. Fewer plastic bottles, better coffee, fewer headaches. Let's go.Want to learn more about Blu Tech, Click here: https://goblutech.com/?ref=millersDisclosure: we may earn from qualifying links at no extra cost to you. Opinions are our own.#rvlife #waterfiltration #blutechChapters 00:00 Why we went to Blu Tech (and brown spigots)01:00 The origin story: COVID UVC → RV water03:10 Stainless vs plastic + why NSF parts matter04:35 Cheap inline filters vs 0.2µm + UVC (pressure safe)07:20 The surprise hits: quick-connects & black-tank flush09:00 Certifications, bad taste fixes & sanitizing lines11:05 Softener + Qi Tank (chlorine/H₂S/iron) explained13:10 New Under-Sink UVC (simple install, extra protection)15:05 Beyond RV: home/off-grid, defense & disaster relief16:40 Where to buy, shows you'll find them, final thoughts

In this episode of The Pulling Curls Podcast, hosts Hilary Erickson and Dr. Janene Fuerch, a neonatologist at Stanford, dive into what every pregnant family should know about the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit). They discuss why it's important to understand NICU basics—even if you're planning a smooth delivery—and share practical tips on how to cope if your baby needs extra care, including ways to stay connected, manage stress, and support bonding. The episode also highlights exciting innovations aimed at making NICU stays safer and more comfortable for babies and families, plus insights on hospital levels and advocacy for neonatal advancements.   Big thanks to our sponsor Laborie -- LifeBubble® Umbilical Catheter Securement System LifeBubble is made of a Soft Medical Grade Silicone to minimize skin irritation, Reduces the Risk of Catheter Migration and Early Discontinuation, and Protects the Insertion Site of our most vulnerable patients. Find them on Instagram @laborie_ob Today's guest is Janene Fuerch, MD. She is a Clinical Associate Professor of Pediatrics, Division of Neonatal and Developmental Medicine, Associate Director of the Biodesign Innovation Fellowship Program at Stanford University, and Co-Director of Impact1 where she mentors and advises entrepreneurs in the pediatric and maternal space through all aspects of medical device development, from identifying clinical needs to commercialization. Her specific areas of investigational interest include the development and commercialization process of neonatal, pediatric and maternal health medical devices. She is a national leader in neonatal resuscitation, ECMO, device development and has been an AHRQ, FDA and NSF funded investigator. But her work extends outside of the academic realm to industry having co-founded EMME (acquired by Simple Health 2022) an award-winning reproductive health company, medical director for Novonate (acquired by Laborie 2023) a neonatal umbilical catheter securement company and notable consultant for Vitara (EXTEND - artificial environment to decrease complications of prematurity), Laborie, Ceribell, Novocuff and Avanos™. Janene is passionate about improving the health of children and newborns through medical device innovation and research. Links for you: Previous Laborie Episode on Forceps (260) Timestamps: 00:00 NICU Challenges: Bonding & Separation 06:55 Choosing the Right Hospital Level 09:47 Bonding with Baby After Separation 14:06 NICU Innovation: Challenges and Opportunities 15:14 Umbilical Catheter Infection Solution 18:17 NICU Bonding and Communication Tips 21:59 Premature Baby Care Innovations 25:04 Prioritizing Investment in Children's Future Keypoints: Many families are surprised when their baby needs to go to the NICU, so it's important for all pregnant families to know some basics about what to expect. The NICU can range from having just a couple of extra staff in the delivery room to having 15 people if a baby needs help, making the birth experience much more intense and involved. Planning ahead with your partner about who will go with the baby in case of separation can help make a stressful situation a little easier. About 10% of babies need some help breathing at birth, but most recover quickly; only a small percentage require NICU care beyond the basic interventions. NICUs are graded by levels (I-IV), and knowing what level your hospital offers can help families prepare—higher-level NICUs can treat more complex issues but aren't always necessary for uncomplicated births. If your hospital isn't a level III or IV, babies needing higher-level care may need to be transferred, which could mean temporary separation from parents; hospitals always work to reunite families as quickly as possible. NICU nurses are passionate, skilled, and deeply care about the babies and their families, creating a loving and safe environment even during stressful times. Parents can support their recovery and milk production by getting rest and using NICU technologies (like webcams) to stay connected—it's okay to take breaks and trust the NICU staff. Emerging technologies like Labry's Life Bubble are making NICU stays safer and more comfortable, allowing parents to hold their babies even when special catheters are in place. Skin-to-skin contact in the NICU is highly beneficial for both babies and parents, helping with bonding, milk production, and even neurodevelopment; parents are encouraged to ask staff about timing and any concerns about wires or tubes. Producer: Drew Erickson Keywords: NICU, neonatal intensive care unit, premature babies, neonatologist, types of NICU levels, level 1 NICU, level 2 NICU, level 3 NICU, level 4 NICU, hospital delivery, separation from baby, bonding with baby, skin-to-skin contact, umbilical catheters, infection prevention, NICU innovations, Labry, Life Bubble, technology in NICU, neonatal health, maternal health, NICU nurses, milk production, pumping breast milk, trauma of NICU stays, baby monitoring, necrotizing enterocolitis, artificial womb therapy, premature birth complications, hospital transfer, parental tips for NICU, emotional impact of NICU  

Welcome to the second episode in our mini-series on the alternative asset market.Gennaro Leo is a sports executive and the co-founder of Austin Sports Ventures, a firm that partners with venture capital and private equity firms to invest in and operate assets across professional sports leagues, teams, and high-growth technology startups.In this episode of Tuesdays with Morrisey, we discuss how sports ownership is changing and growing into a sophisticated asset class that combines real estate, technology, media and entertainment.Top Takeaways1. Sports ownership has evolved from a passion-driven pursuit into an institutional asset class. What began with local owners now attracts private equity and global investors seeking stable, outperforming returns.2. Media and entertainment continue at the center of sports. Many consider sports to be the last frontier of live entertainment, and the emergence of deals like Amazon's Thursday Night Football, shows like Netflix's Drive to Survive, and the popularity of TikTok sensation Savannah Bananas show the convergence of modern media and sports. This was a central theme in our 2024 episode with Ari Temkin, “Why Live Sports Dominate Streaming and Audio Is Thriving”.3. Stadiums and sports-related real estate development serve as community anchors, hosting concerts, graduations, and local events nearly every day of the year. Venues like SoFi Stadium and The Star in Dallas showcase how sports infrastructure fuels real estate and community growth.4. Italian soccer has become a case study in global sports ownership, with American investors now owning more than half of Serie A clubs. Gennaro's experience at AS Roma and Hellas Verona highlights the need for process, discipline, and respect for tradition when foreign owners enter a league.5. As ownership and media distribution models continue to evolve, opportunities open up for players, fans, and investors. We're seeing athlete-led venture funds to architecturally significant mixed-use developments, and increasingly, the convergence of sports with media, tech, and real estate.Full List of Topics CoveredGennaro's career spanning tech, media, real estate and sports ownershipThe evolution of stadiums as community and economic hubsU.S. investment in European football and its impactHow media innovation drives sports growthThe intersection of sports, tech, and real estateBuilding sustainable value in a global sports ecosystemThe future of the player and fan experience, and ownership modelsGennaro Leo is an accomplished operator and investor with expertise spanning venture capital, private equity, sports management, and technology commercialization. He co-founded Austin Sports Ventures, partnering with Next Coast Ventures and Presidio Investors to manage and invest in professional sports assets and high-growth companies, including leading the acquisition and commercial strategy for Hellas Verona FC. Previously, he held senior roles at CAA ICON and A.S. Roma, overseeing major stadium and venue projects, and earlier in his career, he helped commercialize over 100 NSF-backed startups through the Innovation Accelerator & National Innovation Fund.

Visit stonewallmind.academy/goaliesciencepodcast A complete mental performance training course built on real research and science. Learn the same mental performance strategies used by elite goalies worldwide. Master pregame routines, eliminate slumps quickly, and build unshakeable confidence. _________ 1st Phorm Discount link: https://1stphorm.com/68e7ffdc802b2 Topics Covered: Stick saves: necessary skill or outdated tactic? Why young goalies with soft pads give up more rebounds Should goalies rotate their stick to elevate pucks? When coaches say “I develop every player”… do they really? How to measure improvement when results don't show it Development vs. performance in AAA hockey When do elite goalies stop getting better? Why every athlete should use NSF-certified supplements Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In this sidebar episode Eric interviews Malin Lilley (Texas A&M University-Central Texas), Dawn Weatherford (Texas A&M University-San Antonio), and Ho Huynh (Australian National University). They discuss the development and impact of the Psychology Research Experience Preparedness (PREP) program. Designed by three psychology colleagues, PREP aims to equip undergraduates with the knowledge and confidence needed to participate in research experiences early in their academic careers. The program includes various modules covering essential topics like the research process, ethics, professionalism, and more. The creators emphasize its potential as an equalizer for students at different preparedness levels and highlight its utility for instructors by integrating it into their courses. Funded by NSF, PREP is free, openly accessible, and tailored not just for top-tier students but for all who might benefit from early exposure to research. For more on PREP: https://tinyurl.com/PREPPSYC [Note. Portions of the show notes were generated by Descript AI.]  

Astronomers have long predicted that the cloud forming chemical should be found in the atmospheres of brown dwarfs and gas giants. Silane had eluded detection until now. In this podcast, Dr. Aaron Meisner recounts how silane was discovered in the atmosphere of a brown dwarf nicknamed “The Accident”. The Accident (WISEA J153429.75-104303.3) was discovered by citizen scientist Dan Caselden, who was using an online program he built to find brown dwarfs in NEOWISE data.   Bios:  Rob Sparks is in the Communications, Education and Engagement group at NSF's NOIRLab in Tucson, Arizona. Aaron Meisner is an astronomer at NSF NOIRLab affiliated with the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, and also a 2025-2026 Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard University. He specializes in building astronomical maps using large data sets at visible and infrared wavelengths.  These maps are used to search for moving celestial objects, like new neighbors to the Sun and hypothesized planets in the far reaches of our own solar system. To this end, Aaron co-founded the popular Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 citizen science project and the Backyard Worlds: Cool Neighbors project.   Press release: https://noirlab.edu/public/news/noirlab2526/?nocache=true& https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/images/pia24578-an-accidental-discovery/ https://aasnova.org/2021/07/02/observing-the-accident-an-enigmatic-brown-dwarf/   We've added a new way to donate to 365 Days of Astronomy to support editing, hosting, and production costs.  Just visit: https://www.patreon.com/365DaysOfAstronomy and donate as much as you can! Share the podcast with your friends and send the Patreon link to them too!  Every bit helps! Thank you! ------------------------------------ Do go visit http://www.redbubble.com/people/CosmoQuestX/shop for cool Astronomy Cast and CosmoQuest t-shirts, coffee mugs and other awesomeness! http://cosmoquest.org/Donate This show is made possible through your donations.  Thank you! (Haven't donated? It's not too late! Just click!) ------------------------------------ The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by the Planetary Science Institute. http://www.psi.edu Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at info@365DaysOfAstronomy.org.

Mike Palmer welcomes back Friend of the Show, AJ Gutierrez, the pioneering co-founder of Saga Education, now CEO of Equal Opportunity Schools (EOS). AJ shares his transition from direct service to a focus on systemic change, detailing the crucial, often overlooked, mission of EOS: identifying and accelerating equitable opportunity for high-potential students. Historically, education equity conversations focus on raising students to grade level; EOS tackles the issue of "stranded brilliance" by finding students—disproportionately Black and Brown students experiencing poverty—who are ready for advanced coursework but are being overlooked. AJ cites compelling research from Mathematica demonstrating that students placed in AP classes through the EOS process perform just as well as control groups, confirming they were ready all along. The conversation pivots to the broader K-12 landscape, touching on threats to federal data infrastructure (e.g., IES, NSF funding) and the role of AI. AJ stresses that while technology is a powerful tool for decision support, summarization, and translation (like with IEPs), it's not a silver bullet. He outlines his vision for the "next derivative" of EOS—leveraging their extensive student and teacher survey data (300,000 students surveyed annually) to act as a crucial data backbone for districts. This involves connecting district leaders with high-leverage information to evaluate the return on investment across specific initiatives (e.g., STEM, absenteeism) and empowering families with simple, accessible data to shape their children's educational trajectories. Key Takeaways: Addressing "Stranded Brilliance": Equal Opportunity Schools (EOS) focuses on finding and placing high-potential students who are overlooked into advanced coursework, a crucial and effective pathway for systemic equity. Data Backbone for Districts: The next phase of EOS involves using its large survey dataset to serve as a central source of strategic data for district leaders, connecting initiatives, vendors, and outcomes. AI as Decision Support: Generative AI's greatest educational utility lies in summarizing complex data and translating information (like IEPs) for better family accessibility, not in replacing human decision-making. The Power of Policy & Practice: True systems change requires demonstrating successful practice (like high-impact tutoring) to inspire policy shifts and empower districts to sustain effective models locally. Why You Should Listen: If you are concerned about educational equity, the integrity of educational data, or how district leaders can make smarter investment decisions with limited resources, this episode is a must-listen. AJ offers an optimistic and evidence-based perspective on how to leverage data to shake up the status quo, ensuring that every student who is ready for advanced opportunity gets the chance to pursue it. Subscribe to Trending in Ed wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss a conversation like this one!

Big thanks to Matthew Allen from NSF for joining the show as we talk about certifications and what they mean for us in packaging!Key Takeaways (The Juicy Stuff):* The Origins of Safety: NSF started 80 years ago (around the 1940s) out of a need to create scientifically-backed standards for new public consumption—think soda fountains, public swimming pools, and the rise of mass food processing. It all started with simple standards that are now the bedrock of safety regulations.* Safety & Sustainability Are Linked: This is the core theme. The drive to make packaging lighter (for a smaller transport carbon footprint) immediately challenges the original food safety testing and compliance that was based on thicker, older materials. Every change in packaging material requires re-testing to ensure it's still safe and effective.* The Global Compliance Nightmare (and how NSF helps): As supply chains globalize, a product's packaging has to comply with different regulations and standards in Texas, Germany, and Kuala Lumpur. NSF provides the testing, certification, and advisory services to navigate this complex, ever-changing landscape of national and international standards.* The Microplastics Connection: NSF's focus extends to the interaction of materials with food and health, touching on hot topics like microplastics originating from materials like kitchen cutting boards—showing just how deep their mandate goes.* The Complicated Reality of Compostability: We hit on the difficulty of certifying what is truly “home compostable” for a hobby farmer like Matthew versus what works in a suburban setting. We also discussed the challenge for commercial composting facilities that may not want packaging, even if it's certified, as it can degrade the quality of their final compost product.* Why You See the NSF Mark: The NSF logo is a mark of trust—often seen on kitchen equipment, water filters, and food containers—mandated by elevated safety standards in food service and retail to ensure material quality and sanitation.Guest Info & Call to Action:* Guest: Matthew Allen, Global Managing Director of Consulting, Training, and Sustainability at NSF (NSF.org).* Connect: If you're a food packaging pro, you need to understand the standards that govern your industry. Check out NSF.org and connect with Matthew to keep your compliance game tight.* P.S. We might have another episode on the future of compostable packaging soon! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.packagingisawesome.com

Space has long been considered bi-partisan domain in the US, but is it becoming more political? Our guest is Kevin Kelly. Kevin is a former Senate appropriations staffer who oversaw funding for NASA, the NSF, and 25 other agencies. Now a partner at Actum, he advises some of the most influential players in science and defense. His career has spanned everything from nuclear tech and climate systems to the tools we use to monitor near-Earth threats, and he shares his thesis on why space is becoming more political. Remember to leave us a 5-star rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Be sure to follow T-Minus on LinkedIn and Instagram. Want to hear your company in the show? You too can reach the most influential leaders and operators in the industry. Here's our media kit. Contact us at space@n2k.com to request more info. Want to join us for an interview? Please send your pitch to space-editor@n2k.com and include your name, affiliation, and topic proposal. T-Minus is a production of N2K Networks, your source for strategic workforce intelligence. © N2K Networks, Inc. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At long last, Jeff Alstott, the fairy godfather of DC AI policy, joins the show. He's the founding director for RAND's center for technology and security policy, TASP, worked at NSC, NSF and IARPA, and has a PhD in complex networks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, I'm joined by Brian Keller, co-founder and CEO of Rorra.    Prioritizing design excellence, Rorra sells user-friendly water filters that deliver cleaner, safer drinking and bathing water — backed by NSF testing and transparent performance reports.   In this episode, we discuss building trust in the water filtration category.   We also cover:   Design and UX philosophy Direct-to-consumer vs. retail strategy Educating consumers without scare tactics   Subscribe to the podcast → insider.fitt.co/podcast   Subscribe to our newsletter → insider.fitt.co/subscribe   Follow us on LinkedIn → linkedin.com/company/fittinsider    Rorra's Website: https://rorra.com/  Rorra's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rorrawater/  Rorra's X: https://x.com/rorrawater  Rorra's Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rorrawater    -   The Fitt Insider Podcast is brought to you by EGYM. Visit EGYM.com to learn more about its smart workout solutions for fitness and health facilities.   Fitt Talent: https://talent.fitt.co/  Consulting: https://consulting.fitt.co/  Investments: https://capital.fitt.co/   Chapters:  (00:00) Introduction  (00:25) Brian's background and founding story behind Rorra  (02:30) Researching existing water filtration options and market gaps  (05:15) Product development challenges and manufacturing in stainless steel  (07:15) Building business model and raising capital pre-product  (09:35) Design philosophy and user experience considerations  (11:30) Consumer education and "What's in Your Water" platform  (14:10) Messaging strategy around microplastics and forever chemicals  (16:20) Positioning as health and wellness vs. kitchen appliance  (18:15) Customer segmentation from biohackers to new mothers  (20:15) Partnership strategy with health and wellness influencers  (23:20) Direct-to-consumer vs. retail distribution considerations  (25:40) Filter replacement strategy and subscription model  (28:10) Future product roadmap and staying focused on water  (30:35) Long-term vision as trusted water quality information source  (31:05) Conclusion  

Hey listeners! Got plans for October 10th and 11th? Well, clear your calendars, because the FACTS About Fertility Virtual Conference is coming in hot and you won't want to miss it. Listen in today to Dr. Marguerite Duane and all the incredible work she is doing with FACTS, but also she is now the Director of the first ever Fertility Awareness Based Medical program in a medical school, Duquesne University! We're talking TWO days of inspiring talks, real connection, and expert insight—all from the comfort of your favorite sweatpants.

Dr. Stephen Beaton is Co-founder and CEO of Circularity Fuels, which develops compact reactors that turn waste carbon streams into high-value fuels and chemicals. Rather than compete with fossil fuels from the start, Stephen identified high-purity methane for lab-grown diamonds as a beachhead market—where Circularity's product is 80–90% cheaper than incumbents while proving the core technology needed for clean liquid fuels.Stephen earned a chemistry PhD at Oxford and built deep expertise in synthetic fuels during his U.S. Air Force career, including overseeing jet fuel quality control in the Middle East and launching the Air Force's e-fuels program. His insight: build a fuels company that doesn't begin with fuel.Today, Circularity Fuels operates demonstration reactors in diamond facilities and is scaling toward biogas-to-SAF production using the same reactor platform. The company has raised $3M in venture funding, including from DCVC, plus $5M in grants from ARPA-E, NSF, and the California Energy Commission. MCJ is proud to be an investor.Episode recorded on Aug 12, 2025 (Published on Sept 16, 2025)In this episode, we cover: [03:09] Dr. Beaton's background in clean fuels[07:31] His work with Air Force petroleum in the Middle East[10:12] A brief overview of hydrocarbons[13:08] ESAF as resilience for Pacific operations[16:22] What e-SAF really means and why it matters[19:24] Circularity Fuels' origin story[21:20] The company's three principles[23:04] High-purity methane for diamonds as a beachhead[27:46] Recycling diamond exhaust with microwave-sized reactors[30:40] Building a fuel company without fuel as the initial product[34:35] Hardware sales vs metered methane service model[39:05] Biogas-to-SAF pathway via Fischer-Tropsch[42:38] Circularity's progress to date[44:01] Competing with fossil jet and carbon removals[48:41] How Circularity secured non-dilutive funding Enjoyed this episode? Please leave us a review! Share feedback or suggest future topics and guests at info@mcj.vc.Connect with MCJ:Cody Simms on LinkedInVisit mcj.vcSubscribe to the MCJ Newsletter*Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant

Since their first detection, powerful bursts of X-rays from distant galaxies, known as fast X-ray transients (FXTs), have mystified astronomers. FXTs have historically been elusive events, occurring at vast distances away from Earth and only lasting seconds to hours. Einstein Probe (EP), launched in 2024, is dedicated to observing transient events in the X-ray and is changing the game for astronomers looking to understand the origin of these exotic events. In this podcast, Dr. Robert Eyles-Ferris discusses a recent FXT and what it reveals about the deaths of massive stars.    Bios:  - Rob Sparks is in the Communications, Education and Engagement group at NSF's NOIRLab in Tucson, Arizona. - Dr. Rob Eyles-Ferris is a research associate at the University of Leicester who works on high energy transients to understand the largest explosions in the universe. His particular research interests include tidal disruption events, fast X-ray transients and gamma-ray bursts.   Links: NOIRLab press release University of Leicester press release Northwestern press release   NOIRLab social media channels can be found at: https://www.facebook.com/NOIRLabAstro https://twitter.com/NOIRLabAstro https://www.instagram.com/noirlabastro/ https://www.youtube.com/noirlabastro   We've added a new way to donate to 365 Days of Astronomy to support editing, hosting, and production costs.  Just visit: https://www.patreon.com/365DaysOfAstronomy and donate as much as you can! Share the podcast with your friends and send the Patreon link to them too!  Every bit helps! Thank you! ------------------------------------ Do go visit http://www.redbubble.com/people/CosmoQuestX/shop for cool Astronomy Cast and CosmoQuest t-shirts, coffee mugs and other awesomeness! http://cosmoquest.org/Donate This show is made possible through your donations.  Thank you! (Haven't donated? It's not too late! Just click!) ------------------------------------ The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by the Planetary Science Institute. http://www.psi.edu Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at info@365DaysOfAstronomy.org.