these digital volunteers use the “zooniverse” forum to click through aerial photographs and count the number of iguanas in order to inform future conservation practices. such conservation practices matter for marine iguanas, who can lose anywhere from 10 to 90% of their population to starvation during warm-water el niño years. in this story, naturalists explain how “imps of darkness,”  in spite of their extreme boom-and-bust population cycles, offer crucial insights into adaptation, resilience, and evolution.

to continue reading, click on the full story below!

editor’s note: lindblad expeditions, our planet forward storyfest competition partner, made this series possible by providing winners with an experiential learning opportunity aboard one of their ships. we thank lindblad expeditions for their support of our project.

while abundant, inspiration can be fleeting and ungraspable. i lived in south texas, a region diverse in culture and ideology, but eternally linked to mistakes of the past; thus persists a narrative that leads some circles to resent science, even fear it. particularly within the latinx community in the region, against whom science and twisted methodologies have been weaponized.

making an impact

it is hard to be inspired to change the world for the better when the tools you are given are enshrouded with fear. but as a latina of that community, it fell upon my shoulders to erode that trauma that still resides deep in our daily lives, so my inspiration emerged as two objectives: 1) create pathways for students to become familiar with conducting research and normalized to the advantages and limitations of science, and 2) to create something impactful. 

in 2018, i developed a strain of bacteria capable of detecting the explosive tnt, and when it decomposes, dnt. in 2019, i founded herodotus research and development for my 17th birthday. the goal is to implement domestically in the united states to make a fool-proof highly resilient and uncompromisable product that can be shipped around the world to regions afflicted by war-related hazards. why? because of the number 17,000; that’s about how many people around the world are killed or injured by landmines and “remnants of war” each year.

also, because of the number 15 million; that’s how many acres of land in the united states are polluted by those “remnants of war” or munitions-related chemicals. i encountered these statistics as a descendant of veterans. these statistics are haunting, and they present a profound conclusion that innovation cannot right the wrongs of history, but innovation can right the future. 

an innovation for the earth and for community

i founded a program in which high school students accompanied me to the university to conduct their research on topics applicable to their interests. this grew into a class in which middle schoolers shadowed the high schoolers and conducted research. my community was eager to learn, but nobody tried to learn with them, and science became inaccessible. there was hope for technology changing lives for the better, and there was a desire to lead those discoveries. i went from presenting alone at the state science fair to accompanying a team of proud latinx students to their blue ribbons. 

the innovation in this video is not just a way of detecting and removing dangerous chemicals in the environment. this video was recorded in the av closet of my high school with my business partner and a few friends who all believed they were contributing to something impactful. my community felt the value of increasing accessibility to science education. this is a true innovation, empowering others to innovate, and it can be applied everywhere on the globe. 

chanel la sat at the front of the nanomaterials class ready for the first day of her ph.d. studies six years ago. she brought four pencils, several pens and a water bottle for exam day. she read her answers over and over again. 

chris tonge sat all the way in the back of the classroom and seemed more “chill.” he showed up to class with one pencil for an exam and was one of the first to finish, la said. 

they both were attending the university of british columbia pursuing doctorate degrees in chemistry. then one night, la needed to get into the nuclear magnetic resonance room, a lab with a giant magnet that allows for visualization of molecular structure. there’s only one room like it that all the graduate students shared and la needed to drop off her sample. la forgot her keys in her lab so she texted the group chat seeking help from another first-year student. 

she asked if anybody could let her into this room. everyone responded they were already home, since it was 10 o’clock, except tonge. so, tonge let her in and they had their first real conversation. 

“i was surprised that he worked so hard,” la said, considering he was the only one who was still working in the lab. after that conversation, they planned to go on a date to the aquarium and to get ramen. 

“the rest is history,” tonge said. 

la’s mom is from malaysia and her dad is from vietnam. tonge’s dad is from england and his mom is from spain. la sat in the front of the class and tonge in the back.

but the chemistry is there. “we just mesh really well,” tonge said. 

and chemistry is taking their research in innovative directions. during their ph.d. program, they both focused on making polymers, organic compounds with a sequence of units repeated. la focused on protons as a building block. and tonge? electrons. a proton is a positively charged subatomic particle and an electron is negatively charged. it’s as if their differences and the natural pull of negative charge to positive charge drew them together.  

they also made discoveries within their own research during their studies. la created a library of drug molecules and one of them is promising for helping dissolve blood clots without the problematic side effect of promoting bleeding. tonge helped create experimental emitters for oleds, or organic light-emitting diodes, that could make televisions more efficient with capabilities to last longer, save energy and create purer color.

focusing on protons and the discovery of a new drug molecule to help with thrombosis

la’s high-school science teacher piqued her interest in chemistry, which led her to continue studying chemistry in graduate school and focus on molecules to help decrease blood clots.

depending on where they move in the bloodstream, blood clots can lead to strokes, heart attacks and breathing problems. surgery and several physical conditions increase the risk of blood clots from forming. while current antithrombotic agents are available such as heparin, they can increase the risk of bleeding, said jayachandran kizhakkedathu, la’s professor at ubc and principal investigator of the research. 

the goal of la’s research was to create a drug molecule that can prevent thrombosis, or clotting of the blood inside a blood vessel, without the side effects of bleeding. 

to reach this goal, la worked with experts who focused on enzymes and proteins within the clotting cascade. the clotting cascade is “the series of enzymatic events that occur for a blood clot to form,” la said. 

previous research from james morrissey, a biological chemistry professor at the university of michigan, discovered that polyphosphate, a naturally occurring, negatively charged biopolymer, plays multiple roles within the clotting cascade, and primarily speeds up the clotting process. 

la explains how many current anticoagulants target key factors within the clotting cascade such as thrombin. other drugs can inhibit different key enzymes within the clotting cascade, kizhakkedathu said. la was looking to design polymers that inhibit and target polyphosphate. 

“if you can inhibit polyphosphate, you’re not inhibiting one of the key factors like thrombin, and you may have reduced bleeding as a side effect,” la said.  

previous studies show positive polymers like polyethyleneimine do bind to polyphosphate. however, because these polymers are extremely positively charged, they not only bind to polyphosphate but other essential negative polymers in the body. this can be toxic and ultimately lead to other side effects. 

so, la designed and synthesized a library of polymers. the core of the polymer is globular and she functionalized it with “positive partners that would bind to the polyphosphate.”

the goal was to have enough positive charge on the molecule that it can bind to polyphosphate without binding to the other essential negative ions within the blood that can lead to toxic side effects. 

“you’re trying to find that balance. positive enough, but not too positive,” la said. 

the next step was to conduct research with in vitro studies, studies within the lab, and in vivo studies, or studies using living animals. three of the drug molecules did well in vitro and moved on to in vivo studies with mice. 

la traveled to michigan where she worked with morrissey to look at the drug molecule more closely. she looked at whether the drug by itself would induce bleeding by administering the drug to a mouse and letting it circulate for five minutes. then she cut the tail and measured the bleeding time and quantity of blood loss. this is compared to a control using saline and heparin.

based on this work, la’s university and university of michigan have since applied for a provisional patent on these set of drug molecules and researchers are studying the effects in large animal models. after getting the patent, the next steps are to build a body of evidence to show the efficacy and safety of the drug, la said. then the drug molecule will hopefully be tested with humans.

“the holy grail for thrombosis treatment is to develop a drug molecule which could prevent thrombosis, but also won’t have any side effects such as bleeding,” kizhakkedathu said. “we are close to that, but we don’t know,” considering more evaluation needs to be done on larger animals and then humans. this process can take years.

“the basis of the technology is to adapt beyond polyphosphate and is a valuable platform to design more positive polymer therapeutics,” la said.

focusing on electrons and making emitters and complex polymer structures 

tonge’s love for chemistry started when he was in middle school. he loved doing experiments where significant visual changes were observed, such as foaming and color changes. this love of chemistry led him to pursue a ph.d. in organic chemistry, where he focused on developing and producing emissive compounds of many different colors.

besides making multicolored fluorescent compounds, he also worked closely developing “complex polymeric structures” using these emitters to simulate multilayer organic electronic devices such as an organic solar cell or an organic led.

a typical led television can be simplified to two key layers. one layer is a light emitting layer that functions as a backlight and the other layer is a color filter, which changes the color of the light to give you a pixel. basically, these led televisions have a part that makes “white” light across the color spectrum and another that selectively removes or tunes the color from that light to leave the color you see, tonge said. 

on the other hand, an organic led, or oled, makes light by specifically designing fluorescent emitters to address the colors that are being emitted by the screen. this creates very vibrant colors as well as deep black colors that are desirable to consumers. these emitters generate light by generating an excited state on an emitter using electricity followed by quenching of that excited state to emit light. 

with these oleds, manufacturers design panels with very small, emissive pixels, the smallest subunit of the panel that “can make all the colors that you’re trying to display.”  when electricity enters a pixel, it glows a specific color based on the emissive properties of the dyes used and the specific energy levels of the emitters to create the image seen on the screen. so, when you want the pixel to be red, just the red lights up. this also allows for very deep black colors because when it’s black, it just turns off. this is different than a normal televisions where the light is still on behind the color filter, leading to a slight glow even when the pixel is turned off, tonge said. 

the experimental emitters he made throughout his doctorate started off with simple electron transport and hole transport polymers for emissive devices. when working with these compounds, he found several highly emissive donor-acceptor intermediates that drew his interest. these emissive compounds emit light as electrons fall “from an excited state to a non-excited state,” tonge said. “the color that’s emitted is defined by the energy gap from the excited state to the ground state.”

to generate high energy blue light, a high energy gap from excited state to ground state is needed. tonge explained it’s harder to make blue pixels that last for a long time because it’s a very high energy emission. the high energy excited states required are unstable leading to emitters decomposing. when it comes to red light, it’s a “very small energy drop,” so small that the excited states can quench without emitting light. “sometimes, instead of emitting light, your excited electron just dissipates as heat,” tonge said. the easiest color to make with high efficiency is green as these emitters are less likely to decompose because of high energy states.

one of the highlights of tonge’s work included designing and synthesizing a super high-efficiency red emitter. what tonge was doing in the lab was “proof-of-concept work and not focused on making something commercially viable.” the emitter is more stable, more efficient and has higher color purity than many emitters on the market. despite these advantages, the low-yielding synthesis makes the cost of this emitter to be very high, about “$10,000 a gram, and they need about a gram per tv,” tonge said. 

“when things break down inside an oled, it’s because of undesired side reactivity happening that was not anticipated,” tonge said. this usually means something in a high energy state reacts with something else instead of emitting light or even undergoes a spontaneous rearrangement that results in decomposition of the emitters. tonge’s contributions focused on developing emitters were more “rigid” and less likely to undergo side reactions. he did this by bridging adjacent groups and by blocking the positions of the molecules where side reactions happen most frequently.

besides simple emitters, he also worked on some more complex polymers, specifically focusing on large macromolecules called a bottlebrush polymer. picture a pipe cleaner where there is a wire in the middle and many hairs or brushes perpendicular to that wire along its length. for his project he made a bottlebrush polymer by connecting norbornene, or a specific “handle people use to build polymers, building blocks to generate the wire in the middle of the brush. these norbornenes were modified with short, polymeric semiconductors to simulate a multilayer electronic device in a single polymer chain. in this way, he would attach a series of polymers tuned to glow specific colors or have specific properties.

“like a tree of christmas tree lights,” tonge said. 

he gives this example of an application of bottlebrush polymers. he was able to demonstrate that if the “brush” side arms of these polymers were segregated by electronic properties, it was possible to directly allow or prevent charge transfer between adjacent arms in the solid state. this can be observed by choosing two polymers that emit one color when they are prepared in a film, but form a complex when mixed together in a film that emits a different color. by making bottlebrushes that are separated into two distinct regions, it prevents the two polymers from mixing. simply put, this means a mixed film can be forced to glow as if the polymers were not mixed at all. 

the ability to control how components of organic semiconductors mix in the solid state is important for designing devices with long life spans and consistent performance over the life of the device. 

the benefits of tonge’s emitters include longer lifespans for the device, higher efficiencies and improved color purity. his creations aren’t used commercially, but the lab continues to explore the use of these emitters and polymer architectures for additional applications. 

while certain devices may not last forever, the future for la and tonge looks bright. they live together with their dog chuckles in chicago and their bond continues to get stronger with each year that passes. 

the next step? picking out a ring to solidify their bond and the magnetic force that drew them together. 

because of this broad influence, google is considered a global megacorporation, as well as an internet monopoly. amazon and johnson & johnson are other examples of contemporary megacorporations. the concept, while mostly used in science fiction stories, originated in the 1600s with global trading companies such as the dutch east india company and the british east india company. in many ways these conglomerates have become untouchable, they have the power and resources to rise above liability. however in recent years the concepts of corporate responsibility and stakeholder theory have prevailed, forcing companies to be accountable to the public, in addition to shareholders. the influence of the public has implored these corporations to confront and resolve issues such as human rights violations and environmental damage.

the environmental community has learned to be wary of initiatives from large corporations. we’ve been burned before by companies like volkswagen and exxon. like many large corporations, google has made numerous claims about their environmental sustainability and mitigation efforts. in order to determine the validity of these claims, i interviewed a current google employee about this topic, as well as conducting my own research.

podcast transcript:

lily john  0:05  

i’m planet 世界杯欧洲预选赛免费直播 lily john, and recently i’ve taken interest in the issue of corporate social responsibility, specifically at google. the company is ostensibly environmentally conscious, but i wanted to take a more critical look at these claims.

as you listen, please keep in mind that i’m no expert in this field, and this is by no means an exhaustive evaluation. i should also mention that my stepmom, who i’ll be interviewing later in this podcast, has been a google employee for almost four years. she has enjoyed her time there, but found elements of the company’s practices to be in conflict with our family’s strong environmental values. 

today, we’ll be taking a deeper dive into the world of corporate sustainability by way of my research and an interview with a current google employee. to begin, let’s review google’s environmental accomplishments and sustainability goals. their website states, “by organizing information about our planet and making it actionable through technology, we help people make even more positive impact, together.” environmentalism has long been a core value at google. they were the first company to become carbon neutral in 2007, and the first to match all energy use with renewable energy in 2017. this is accomplished through carbon offsets, or investments in carbon sequestration, which help eliminate the company’s carbon legacy. their next moonshot is using 100% carbon free energy in data centers and campuses by 2030. the company has also committed to adopting a circular economy model for its physical products. this means reusing and repurposing products to eliminate waste from their supply chain. google has also committed to being water positive. that is putting more water into the environment than they import for facilities. this is done by restoring and protecting water sources. another more recent aspect of google sustainability initiative is providing tools that encourage individual action. for example, when doing a google search for flights, there will be information about the rate of carbon emissions to inform the consumer of the less impactful option. 

as part of my research, i conducted an interview with my stepmom, erin hoffman-john, who is a current google employee.

hi erin, i’m going to have you begin by introducing yourself and telling us what you’ve done in your time at google.

erin hoffman-john  2:44  

hi, my name is erin hoffman-john, and i’m a senior staff interaction designer for google working in google research now. i previously joined google in 2017. worked on google stadia.

lily john  2:54  

okay, great. thank you. i have been doing research about sustainability at google. there is a fair amount of information of course from the company. they’re pretty transparent with sustainability reports, as well as criticism and commentary from outside parties. what is your general take on sustainability at google?

erin hoffman-john  3:19  

you know, because i come from video games, i don’t have a whole lot to compare it to. so for me, google’s commitment to sustainability seems really remarkable.

lily john  3:26  

are you aware of any criticisms about sustainability from within the company?

erin hoffman-john  3:32  

it’s a huge company. and there’s lots of people with many different perspectives. people pay attention to the external critiques that we hear. and there’s a lot of conversation about the impact of big tech on the environment. and i think it’s, it’s a really tough ethical conversation about “wow much is tech improving our ability to solve problems?” versus “how much is it creating new environmental problems?” there are definitely regular updates on, “here’s how our sustainability policies are evolving” that get, i think, quite a lot of attention. i certainly pay close attention to them.

lily john  4:06  

and do you expect that other companies will follow google’s example? because i know in silicon valley, google is pretty on top of their game in comparison with other companies tn terms of sustainability. do you see that spreading?

erin hoffman-john  4:22  

i would hope so i think to some extent it has because google is so large, it has a lot of advantages that it can push in that domain. and a lot of companies in silicon valley are very small, very scrappy, they’re not really able to do those things. so i think, especially for many rising tech companies, it’s a question of what services can google provide to take on some of that burden?

lily john  4:46 

what would you say is the most promising aspect of the sustainability initiative at google?

erin hoffman-john  4:54  

i think that there were milestones like the 100%, clean energy goals, and the most ambitious of which is definitely the carbon free by 2030, which is, i think, a pretty remarkable statement that speaks to the urgency that people feel for how quickly we need to solve these problems, if we can. i think that the design of some of the new buildings and the way that google was using its sort of real estate footprint to innovate on sustainable technologies, like the dragonscale solar, is really exciting. and i’m hoping that that also spreads.

lily john  5:34  

from your perspective, not working in the sustainability department, what are google employees’ attitudes about sustainability? and how much involvement is there?

erin hoffman-john  5:46  

yeah, i think there’s a wide range. clearly, there are people that are especially passionate about sustainability, even beyond the ones that are just working in that part of the organization, and are constantly asking questions. can we do this? can we reduce waste in the offices? and all of that kind of thing. i do think in general, although it’s a wide range, i hear a lot of concern. i have certainly never heard anybody say it’s not a big deal. and so i think, as it is, in the general population, there are people who feel like they don’t know what to do, and they don’t know what can be done, but they certainly believe that it’s important and want to do what they can. people who work at google are very passionate. it’s a value of the company to challenge the status quo. and sometimes that status quo is the people who run the company so challenging leadership, to work harder and go further.

lily john  6:35 

now that we’ve gotten the inside scoop, let’s move on to criticisms mounted from outside the company. as we all should know, by now, information presented to the public is not always accurate and trustworthy. when companies reach a certain size and value, they become somewhat immune to scrutiny and punishment, thanks to the resources available to protect their image. 

one of the criticisms of google’s sustainability claims is their relationship with total oil, one of the world’s largest oil companies. in this partnership, google provides ai software that interprets subsurface graphs and allows for the most effective extraction process, which has brought profits for the company. fortunately, google has recently committed to sever this partnership and revoke the use of their tools for the sake of the environment. 

another criticism concerns the google pixel four, one of their smartphones released in 2019. this phone includes recycled materials but cannot actually be fully reused, thus removing it from the circular economy model as it creates waste. and like most smartphones, these days, the pixel is replaced by a better model each year, thus encouraging planned obsolescence. 

google data centers also use incredible amounts of energy. surprisingly, the cloud doesn’t actually exist in the sky, but in google’s 23 massive data centers across the globe, a great deal of the energy required for these data centers has transitioned to renewable sources. however, there is still some reliance on fossil fuels. the company maintains its net zero carbon emission status by purchasing carbon offset credits. these credits count as compensation for pollution released by the company’s activities. so essentially, they are making up for their greenhouse gas emissions but not actually eliminating them. but the question remains, what environmental impacts is google or any other company for that matter responsible for fixing or remediating and to what extent? 

one of the biggest roadblocks to the much needed action on climate change is a lack of accountability and responsibility. all in all, i have to say i was pleasantly surprised by my findings. i expected to come across cover ups of environmental scandal or misrepresentation of company efforts as has become the status quo for large corporations. by my amateur evaluation, it seems that google has put a significant amount of resources towards environmental action, which will likely inspire competitors to do the same. 

that being said google is not without its faults and shortcomings in environmental issues. it is essential that corporations are held accountable for the damage they’re doing to the environment. it is becoming increasingly evident that governments cannot be relied upon to make the changes necessary to prevent catastrophic warming and other environmental disasters. i believe that our best and perhaps only option is to target the polluters themselves. they may have the government in their pocket, but not all of us.

––

transcribed by https://otter.ai

image by geralt via pixabay.

music track is “better days” by lakey inspired.

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creating new techniques and ways to capture the audience to teach them about the marine environment is important in helping us preserve this resource for years to come.

“people are interested in technology, and developing technology that really maximizes opportunity is critical,” said richard vevers, ceo of the ocean agency, a non-profit organization geared towards raising awareness for effective ocean protection. 

creating these techniques is a long-term goal of vevers. the university of rhode island teamed up with the ocean agency to investigate new habitats and bring public awareness to the sea.

inspired by 360-degree cameras utilized by google street view, the ocean agency developed the hammerhead camera, a similar camera designed to be used in an underwater environment, according to vevers.

the prototype camera was utilized in the catlin seaview survey, the most comprehensive underwater photographic survey that captured over one million images and allowed them to be analyzed. this prototype camera has captured photos of many unique ocean environments, but it was not originally designed for scientific research. 

however, the ocean agency recognized the research potential of the hammerhead camera for monitoring environments including coral reefs to see how they change over time. 

often sites cannot be surveyed multiple times because of numerous external factors (including weather, tides and visibility), but having a camera that can capture images will allow for more comprehensive and tangible visualizations of these sites for a potentially unlimited amount of time. 

“this camera permits us to get stereo imagery that can be reconstructed on a [three-dimensional] model of the place that was surveyed,” said vevers.

while working alongside uri, the ocean agency is fleshing out issues that have been found in previous models of the hammerhead camera. vevers said that two versions of the camera have existed so far: seaview 1 and seaview 2. seaview 1 was a massive camera that weighed over 80 kilograms. when it came time to re-thinking and re-designing the device, size was a primary consideration due to difficulties with transportation. 

in future prototypes the goal is to synthesize three-dimensional and four-dimensional models to allow monitoring of fish populations. to date, no scientist has combined the two in an attempt to monitor the full scope and scale of being at that location.  

vevers hopes to achieve two central objectives with the current model of the camera. the first involves demonstrating how reef restoration is accountable and captures how fast the corals are growing, while also showing that fish populations are returning to these reefs. 

the second purpose of this camera is to bring awareness to the public about diverse underwater environments. currently, there is an international push for coral reef monitoring as a key method to measure and incentivize action to save coral reefs. 

coral reef ecosystems are the most endangered ecosystems due to climate change. according to the ocean agency website, “advances in science and monitoring technology are allowing researchers to make strides toward reef conservation.” 

vevers made a point towards getting more media attention around the issue as well as finding solutions to problems that are currently underdeveloped.

protecting the ocean and conserving this resource is crucial. vevers said that people have a growing interest in technology and believes that right now is a pivotal time for coral reefs and ecosystems –– this camera and upcoming technology will allow us to share the imagery that it collects. 

engaging people with the story of what is unfolding in our environment, while covering the work that is being done to protect and restore ecosystems, is one of the primary means by which we can highlight the urgency of this project. 

to learn more about the ocean agency and the work they are doing visit their website at: https://www.theoceanagency.org 

but what garneau is really scouting for is roadkill. 

when coming upon a flattened porcupine or lamentable roadside squirrel, garneau pulls over. grabbing her smartphone, she opens up inaturalist, a social network that allows users to map and share global observations of biodiversity. she enters data into her device, noting the date, time, species, weather, road type, location, habitat surrounding, and more. snapping a picture, she uploads her photo to numerous studies taking place on the app. in recent years, her observations, and those of other citizen participants, have been added into global wildlife connectivity and roadkill long-term surveys. some of those projects include inaturalist’s global roadkill observations project and adventure scientists wildlife connectivity project, and squirrelmapper. 

the global roadkill observation study’s more than 15,000 international contributors have identified 3,641 species of roadkill globally. species from the crab-eating fox in cumaral, columbia to a black copper rat snake hin yung, thailand were documented with research-grade identifications. this plethora of global wildlife documentation, which garneau contributed to 227 times, will be used by scientists around the world to understand important conservation questions. the study’s page emphasizes that they are collaborating with “organizations globally to record roadkill observations as both evidence of a species occurrence and of wildlife-vehicle conflict.” 

as her prolific contributions suggest, garneau is not new to the rising world of road ecology. she has been studying and documenting roadkill since 2008. her awareness of the questions surrounding road ecology started from an education standpoint. she is one of several researchers in the area with projects that focus on roadkill patterns; others include dr. erika barthelmess at st. lawrence university and dr. tom langen at clarkson.

“i found a need in my courses, students were curious,” garneau said. “it is a good project to learn about wildlife using roadkill as an index of species abundance in the region. it helps students gain skills in animal id and spatial analysis using geographic information systems (gis). it also has the potential for community engagement and service learning.” 

garneau recalled the first launch of her initial wildlife monitoring study. 

“a former student had mentioned she rarely sees virginia opossum near suny plattsburgh during school, while in the albany region she sees a lot,” garneau said. “we were discussing dr. erika barthelmess’ roadkill research paper and commented on how interesting it was that opossum were common roadkill in st. lawrence county, in contrast to their rarity in clinton/essex county during our roadkill surveys since arriving at suny.” 

with the help of her students and dr. curt gervich, an environmental planner and fellow suny-plattsburgh professor, they commenced a survey of workers in the region who are on the roads for their jobs. school bus drivers, delivery drivers and mail carriers filled out the forms. the team started mapping for opossum hotspots. 

over the years, as the project developed, garneau went through trial and error to find a way to keep all of the data together. at first she used a handheld gps and camera to document specimens while adding relevant information to a huge excel sheet. as this became increasingly cumbersome, she then moved onto epicollect, a data-gathering smartphone platform. eventually, she even created her own project using the epicollect app. featured on npr, the epicollect project, titled roadkillgarneau, successfully documented garneau’s findings, as well as other contributors spanning the globe. in fact, in the early stages of the app project, an austrian professor reached out to translate the roadkillgarneau project, and use it in his classroom and research in austria. 

unfortunately, the app project has not been active since 2019 due to smartphone technology rollouts not keeping pace with the app code. garneau was discouraged by the issues outside of her control, but did not stop the research. instead, garneau switched to the inaturalist app, which contributes daily observations from a global network of citizen scientists. 

“(data gathering) got a lot easier with the help of inaturalist participation,” garneau said. “opossum are now one of the top roadkill species logged on my daily drive to work. the increase in frequency of opossum roadkill in essex and clinton counties likely reflects an increase in abundance –– indicating resident populations that are reproducing. we are continuing to pursue contributing factors to this trend. perhaps they are capitalizing on regional land-use changes, including on urban and agricultural habitat. it also offers us an opportunity to mitigate wildlife losses by informing the public and engaging with local organizations.”

garneau sees her roadkill research as a practice of citizen science, a new and growing field of research helping create new scientific knowledge through the collaboration of citizens in scientific research. 

according to garneau, “scientists have learned to understand the value of community participation for engagement, as well as to grow the scope of observations of particular species of interest.”

this is an important step toward helping communities understand the value of science. according to a 2015 analysis, “the direct involvement of the public in research projects ensures that they are less concerned about the findings and purpose of science as well as exposing them to the scientific process. this has the potential to combat the public skepticism of science when confronted with debates in areas such as climate change.”

beyond aiding different scientific circles with essential research, citizen science is having a tangible effect in increasing public safety and conservation impact.

a 2020 article from the journal of nature conservation found that citizen science platforms are helping to mitigate roadkill collisions on european roads. the authors found that the rise in platforms allowing citizens to report roadkill has the potential to increase public participation in both traffic safety and nature conservation. the study notes, “volunteers contribute significantly to collecting data on species that are not typically recorded in official databases.”

research like this supports that everyday citizens can have a direct impact. as of the 2015 analysis, “the term ‘citizen science’ is increasingly appearing in peer reviewed journals, indicating the wider use and acceptance of this term.” now, garneau has noticed a rise in citizen science app usage, even in her non-scientific circles.

pandemic-fueled boredom may have led to an increase in families wanting to identify the backyard birds they have been seeing more of. or, maybe people are beginning to see tangible effects of climate change in their hometowns, and they want to help in any way possible. or, perhaps more and more educators, like garneau, are introducing these growing technologies into their classrooms so students can feel a part of the change. 

want to try citizen science yourself? if roadkill doesn’t suit your interest, you can document the animated birds in your backyard, catalog the critters running around at your local park or search for mollusks in nearby water bodies. plant species can also be documented. turn citizen science into a family weekend outing or a unique date idea. there are a myriad of projects to discover and impacts to be made.

however, the central arizona project is working on several initiatives to make arizona’s water supply more reliable. one of those initiatives is a recent partnership with an israeli company called n-drip. according to n-drip’s chief sustainability officer, seth siegel, their technology brings a new irrigation system that could help save 50% of the water used in arizona’s agriculture.

volunteer researchers, more commonly known as “citizen scientists,” are everyday people who lack formal training in scientific fields yet contribute to scientific work. citizen scientists, now more than ever, are volunteering and collaborating with university research labs and government agencies, like the national oceanic and atmospheric administration (noaa), by assisting with data collection and field research. 

shark scientists rely on the use of citizen scientists for data collection to monitor population growth and habitat shifts. local citizen scientists notice something’s amiss and contact the appropriate agencies and facilities. for example, californian citizen scientists noticed an influx of juvenile white sharks (carcharodon carcharias) in bays and along beaches within the last several years as their coastal waters warm. these juvenile shark populations were observed much further north than usual. 

salvador jorgensen, a research associate at the institute of marine sciences at the university of california, santa cruz, recently co-authored a paper in the journal scientific reports on this range shift of juvenile white sharks. the monterey bay aquarium led the research, and jorgensen and colleagues incorporated data that citizen scientists gathered.

juvenile white sharks are endotherms. they need to stay in water that is warm enough to maintain their core temperature but not too warm to elevate it, jorgensen explained.

“i kind of call it ‘the goldilocks zone’ for juvenile white sharks. it’s between 60 and 70 degrees [fahrenheit],” he said.

juvenile white sharks were mostly found in the warmer waters south of point conception, the headland where the pacific ocean and santa barbara channel meet, according to jorgensen. this is considered the point that separates southern and central california. however, during the 2014-2016 north pacific marine heatwave, juvenile white shark sightings reached unprecedented rates in central california. despite the marine heatwave ending five years ago, juvenile white sharks are still spotted along central california beaches.

kisei tanaka, a research marine biologist for noaa and lead author of the paper, said that the primary source of their data came from online open-access databases where people can use a website or phone application to take photos of a plant or animal for identification and upload the information to free public sources. scientists may even have the latitude and longitude of the species sighting if someone geotagged the uploaded photo with the exact location.

tanaka and jorgensen looked at the public access databanks along the california coast over the last five years to confirm the uptick of juvenile white shark sightings further north of point conception. then, marine scientists conducted their scientific survey expeditions looking for juvenile white sharks. the public access databanks utilized, like inaturalist, allowed the scientists to pinpoint which areas appeared to be the most juvenile white shark heavy, based on citizen scientist sightings.

“this [method of data collection] is very novel and effective in terms of capturing the change in the species distribution that weren’t affected by the scientific survey [our research team conducted] but may be able to be conducted at a much more local scale by more participants,” said tanaka.

 through the research described in their paper, the shark scientists determined that juvenile white sharks are moving poleward as their initial nursery ranges, like south of point conception, are too hot for their temperature-sensitive bodies. while rising ocean temperatures have been a concern to marine scientists for years now, citizen scientists quickly caught the attention of researchers with the influx of juvenile white sharks spotted further north and submitted to these databases.

“white shark is a very charismatic species that a lot of people pay close attention to, and they happen to be the one that responds to the climate very abruptly,” said tanaka.

tanaka discussed how sharks tend to capture the eye of the public which makes them one of the best species to use as a flagship for conservation initiatives regarding climate change. the international union for conservation of nature red list of threatened species categorizes white sharks as “vulnerable” and were last assessed in november 2018.

chelsea black is a ph.d. student studying marine conservation at the university of miami’s shark research and conservation program. as the shark satellite tracking coordinator, black monitors all their satellite-tagged sharks and verifying that the transmissions are accurate. she also works as the adopt a shark program manager. if someone donates the amount of a satellite tag, black assigns them their “adopted” shark. the donors can then name the shark and create an origin story of said name. the donors can then check up on their tagged shark at sharktagging.com.

before the covid-19 pandemic, black’s lab actively engaged the public to try more hands-on citizen science by having designated days where groups, such as corporate organizations or students on field trips, go on their boats and help with shark tagging. during these expeditions, citizen scientists get to measure sharks, attach a satellite tag to sharks, take a biological sample of a fin clip and write down field data. they even hold special expeditions where they take young girls out for tagging events with an all-female crew. the program is called females in the natural sciences (fins), and the goal is to excite young girls about shark science and demonstrate that science needn’t be a male-dominated field.

“it’s really cool seeing people come out on the boat with us who sometimes have never been on a boat, have never seen a shark. we will have people who are, you know, kind of afraid of sharks or are not sure what to expect, and by the end of the day, everyone is just like, ‘that was so amazing! i didn’t realize how calm sharks are.’ they’ll see us handling the sharks, obviously very safely, but without fear of the shark harming us,” said black.

for black, changing people’s opinions on sharks while contributing to scientific data collection is one of her favorite parts of working with the shark research and conservation program. she believes that informing and engaging the public in citizen science is crucial for shark conservation.

“we’re losing sharks at such a significant, you know, percentage each year that it will be in our lifetime that we will see species go extinct,” said 27-year-old black.

according to black, if you look at the data, there was a massive spike in shark killings after “jaws” came out in 1975. however, the rise in concern over sharks led to more shark research facilities. after over forty years of adverse publicity, white shark perceptions are finally changing for the better.

christopher lowe is a professor of marine biology, co-author of the juvenile white shark research paper, and has worked as the director of the shark lab at california state university, long beach since 1998. lowe said that for the first time in years, he feels hopeful about shark populations returning thanks to conservation initiatives. he feels that people are genuinely excited about protecting and celebrating sharks.

“i would argue that sharks are now as much a part of our [american] culture as baseball and the fourth of july,” said lowe.

lowe believes conservation citizen science is growing because people are interested in “reconnecting with nature.” according to lowe, some people want more than seeing a piece of nature at face value but to learn something about it.

white sharks are “apex predators;” they reside at the top of the food chain. they prey but are not preyed upon, and they remain a crucial part of oceanic ecosystem conservation by keeping all the other levels of the food web in check. if the apex predators disappeared, the ecosystem’s natural balance would fall. lesser predators would grow in population thus until their prey was depleted, leading to mass die-outs. by protecting white sharks, whole ecosystems are being sustained.

“if we are conserving ecosystems and we’re interested in health of the ocean, for example, we should be concerned with the health of all the species from the smallest, lowliness of phytoplankton all the way to its top predators,” said jorgensen.

with the popularity of a range of volunteer monitoring growing, marine scientists are feeling cautiously optimistic about the future. many shark species are returning to the american coasts. but for marine life, current conservation efforts may not be enough if the symptoms of climate change continue to worsen.

“it’s going to take the planet. it’s going to take everybody, and that is a bigger challenge,” said lowe.

the research says that if sharks, and marine ecosystems as a whole, want to persist, humans have to combat climate change. shark populations are shifting and reacting to people changing the planet explained jorgensen. as ocean temperatures continue to rise, it is up to humankind to save sharks from extinction.

when it comes to big questions about the origins of the universe, scientists are looking to some of its smallest particles for answers. 

fermi national accelerator laboratory is a 6,800-acre laboratory located less than an hour west of chicago, illinois. its mission is to be the leading center for particle science, a field that revolves around understanding and controlling the most basic building blocks of the universe.

over the years, the tools developed to drive this science — complex accelerators that collide particle streams and sensitive detectors that sort through the resulting subatomic debris — have found applications in a variety of other fields as well. in medicine, for example, mris use electromagnetic fields to peer inside the human body and many medications and therapies are developed using particle accelerators. even the touch screen in your pocket was developed using particle research.

superconductors that are impossible to resist

fermilab’s particle accelerator uses strong magnets to bend and focus beams of particles so that they can interact.

scientists have been building particle accelerators for nearly a century, and use them to investigate fundamental particles and the forces that act between them. to increase the energy levels of these particle beams while using as little electrical power as possible, fermilab pioneered superconducting radio-frequency (srf) cavities.

think of srf cavities as boxes that are excellent resonators for electromagnetic energy. sam posen, a scientist at fermilab, equated the process to pushing someone on a swing.

“you’re not giving them such large pushes that they immediately go to the top of their possible swing, but if you keep giving them pushes at the right time, then it can build very large amplitudes on the swing,” he said.

in an srf cavity, an electric field oscillates between positive and negative values billions of times per second, building in amplitude. the cycles are carefully choreographed so that the particles always see a large accelerating electric field as they go through each cavity. in this way, the particles can be propelled to near light speed.

fermilab’s work with srf cavities has lent itself to several other areas of physics research as well. with the technology of these next-generation particle accelerators, for example, researchers can also advance the rapidly changing field of high-energy computing.

quantum computers you can count on

last summer, fermilab was selected to receive $115 million in funding from the u.s. department of energy to build a beyond-state-of-the-art quantum computer using  superconducting technologies developed at the lab over the past several decades.

quantum computers are based on quantum bits, or qubits. while classical computer bits operate like a light switch that is either on or off, a single qubit can exist in multiple states at the same time, a property called superposition.

think of a qubit as an engineered ‘atom’ that can be held in your hand.

“these circuits behave quantum mechanically just like atoms,” said northwestern university physicist james sauls, deputy director at fermilab’s center for superconducting quantum materials & systems. “quantum mechanics allows the atom to be in a superposition state, and we can construct a physically realizable state of this atom, which is both one and zero.”

by stringing together a large number of qubits, a quantum computer can run parallel operations on both states of the atom. the result is an exponential growth of computing power. 

but atoms are small — less than one-billionth of a meter in diameter — and even a tiny amount of interference can make it hard to keep a qubit in this superposition state. today’s highest-performing qubits maintain information for just milliseconds.

“the presence of thermal noise is having photons that can tickle the atom in its high energy state and force it to make a transition,” sauls said. “and then you lose the superposition property.”

the better protected a qubit is from thermal noise in its environment, the better its coherence, or amount of time scientists can control its superposition. improved coherence is achieved somewhat by lowering the temperature of the computer to hundreds of degrees below 0 °f, but srf cavities are the star player that fermilab is ready to put in the game.

by combining srf cavities with state-of-the-art computer chips, the scientists have achieved coherence times of several seconds. sauls said they aim to produce qubits whose computing powers are orders of magnitude beyond what is currently possible.

such powerful quantum computers could someday be useful in machine learning, materials discovery and particle physics research.

a bright future for dark matter detection

the same technology being used to expand qubit coherences has also found a home in the world of dark matter research.

dark matter earned its name because its particles don’t absorb, reflect or emit light. in fact, the only evidence scientists have of its existence is the visible impact it has on other objects, such as the expansion and rotation of galaxies.

at fermilab, scientists are interested in detecting the never-before-seen particles that compose dark matter, such as axions. it’s harder than one might think.

“if it were easy to find dark matter, somebody would have already stumbled onto it throughout other observations,” posen said. “[our detection] methods involve looking at remarkably small signals, and this is where quantum computing aspects come into play.”

although srf cavities have been used in particle acceleration research for about 50 years, they have only recently begun to be used in dark matter research. and unlike in particle acceleration research, posen and his colleagues don’t use them to build intense electromagnetic fields.

“we’re sort of turning that idea on its head and using these things, because they’re such great resonators, to look at very, very tiny amounts of photons,” posen said. “and because they’re such good resonators, we can store [the photons long enough to detect them].”

hypothetically, dark matter constantly flows through every part of the galaxy, including you and me. that means it might also find its way inside an axion haloscope, a device built from srf cavities. scientists at fermilab hope the haloscope’s electromagnetic field will one day trap a stray dark matter axion and convert it into something observable: a particle of light called a microwave photon.

“it’s a very rare process, but if axions do exist, then the models say it should happen,” posen said. “if we tune the frequency of our cavities to match the mass of these axions, and if our detector is sensitive enough, then we should be able to find them.”

he equated the process to trying to find a tiny island in the middle of the ocean when the only proof of its existence is a few strange ocean currents. if that island is ever found, however, don’t expect life to change too drastically right away. 

“i don’t think we’ll be getting ‘dark matter iphones’ in the near future,” posen said, chuckling.

although, he is optimistic that the proof of concept will push the boundaries of quantum technology for other near-term applications and help lay the foundation for even bigger developments down the road.

circumstances may have reached a new junction as one main project is underway on u.s. soil, and a $205 billion national hsr system proposal was recently introduced into congress. more importantly, studies show that hsr is a smart, economic and green plan; a case analysis for one proposal found that the system would create an 8:1 return on investment. 

what remains is determining which player is going to take on this long-awaited task: should the government or private entities fund development?  

why trains are so bad in the united states 

it may be hard to believe, but the u.s. was once the global poster child of railway transportation. cities were filled with street cars, and most people did not yet live in suburbs or own a car, making it sensible to travel from city to city on steam engines. 

but according to andy kunz, the president of the national high speed rail association (nhsra), that began to change after the world war ii economic-boom. the american lifestyle became associated with living far away from city centers and owning an automobile to get from place to place. by 1940, 60 percent of americans owned a car, and the government began relocating money in 1955 to build our current interstate highways.

“amtrak is basically the remnants of our history: leftovers after cuts from this and that,” kunz said. “since the government has spent trillions of dollars on building highways that connect every inch of america, there has been an anti-rail bias coming from congress, the white house, and the u.s. department of transportation.”

it was not until former president barack obama’s administration that $8 billion was set aside for the development of an hsr system. kunz said although he is more than appreciative of the funding, that money is just a fraction of what would be needed for a trans-continental system. 

unlike construction in other parts of the world, american developers face several bureaucratic hurdles and costs when building such large-scale projects, kunz added, namely environmental regulations and private land battles. 

“it’s like building a new highway: you can’t do it overnight,” he said.

the projects currently underway

despite bureaucratic and political pushback, enthusiasm from leaders like obama and rep. alexandria ocasio cortez has transformed american hsr from some fantasy into an expected service within the next couple of decades. 

the most ambitious publicly led effort is the california high speed rail association’s project, which is currently under phase one construction in the state’s central valley. according to boris lipkin, the authority’s northern regional director, the current goal is to have the train connect san francisco with los angeles by 2033 and expects to run on 100 percent clean energy, which would reduce between 1.5 to 1.8 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions by 2040. 

“i know california certainly likes to compare itself to other countries, but this kind of state-wide scale and magnitude is equivalent to what other nations have done,” lipkin said. 

once in operation, california’s trains will operate at over 200 miles per hour, which would be among the fastest in the world. to take on such a tremendous project, lipkin said the authority already has created 50,000 job years (which also represents employees who only worked for a few months), including 4,000 construction workers. 

the director added that despite covid-19 hurdles, california gov. gavin newsome’s executive order designates construction workers as essential employees. there are currently about 1,000 construction workers on site every week. 

“this is having big effects in the central valley, where many people in these communities have been hit hard and have been historically poorer than the rest of the state,” he said. 

although there are no private companies to break ground on a brand-new hsr system, the two most prominent efforts underway are the texas central railway to connect houston with dallas and virgin trains’ (formerly brightline trains) xpress west project connecting las vegas with los angeles. nevada recently allocated a $200 million bond to virgin trains, and the company said it plans to break ground by the end of 2020.

today’s debate: public or private hsr?

the question now isn’t whether we should be developing hsr: it’s now about who should oversee the development. 

some potential american hsr users, like transit-geek nathaniel zhu, believe american technological development is rooted in capitalism, and he said he believes hsr initiatives should observe current american space technology programs, where several private actors like virgin galactic, spacex, and boeing compete among one another to produce the best and most affordable technology. 

“the united states would be such a more efficient country if it had a high speed rail system,” zhu said. “for such a technologically advanced country, it’s a shame we don’t already have one.”

however, he said there is a distinction between innovation and economic sustainability and added that an american hsr would probably not help reduce automobile and plane use if ticket prices are not competitive.

having lived in both china and europe, he said the reason he used hsr in both places was because it was often a much more affordable and convenient alternative to flying or driving, and he acknowledged that publicly operated hsr systems do make hsr cheaper.

“until it’s treated as a public service and (while) ticket prices are still expensive, i don’t think i would even take a train from say chicago to minneapolis,” he said. 

others, like california’s boris lipkin, argue that the public sector is necessary for development because the government has a strong incentive to economically link together several communities it tresspasses, not just create a link between two cities.

unlike the project in texas, where both the houston and dallas stations are planned to be constructed on the city outskirts, lepkin said the california project will provide easy access to downtown stations and stop along smaller cities between san francisco and los angeles.

although more expensive, lipkin said the goal is to provide economic opportunities for the historically marginalized communities in the central valley — an investment that will offset the costs tremendously. 

“from an economic, equity, and connectivity standpoint, we want fresno to be an hour away from san jose; we want bakersfield to be an hour away from los angeles,” lipkin said. “that changes the entire way the state operates; it changes the way our economy works.” 

and in a few decades, it is quite possible that americans could have an hsr that would connect them from cities all across the country. in may, rep. seth moulton introduced a $205 billion economic recovery bill into congress that would provide the foundations for a national high speed rail system.

ultimately employing up to 1.16 million people, moulton’s plan would build off existing federal transit administration plans to provide new transportation alternatives for business commuters between large, innovative cities like chicago to milwaukee, portland to seattle, and dallas to oklahoma city.  

lipkin added the federal government historically has helped navigate transportation projects like the interstate system, so he said he would not be surprised if a future administration or congress would take on the project.

“federal funding will be a necessary component to finishing that project — i have no doubt in my mind about that,” he said.