The National Academies is holding a virtual event this week to collect input for its decadal survey of the “physics of living systems,” making up for a town hall event that was to be held at the APS March meeting. Pictured is a cross section of a plant stem viewed under a microscope.
(Image credit – National Academies)
The American Physical Society’s April Meeting , originally to be held in Washington, D.C., will take place online beginning this Saturday. Many invited and plenary sessions will follow their original schedules, including a public lecture on Saturday evening from Sheperd Doeleman, the director of the Event Horizon Telescope, which captured the first-ever image of a black hole last year. Speakers who do not present live will be able to upload a video recording of their presentation, which will remain available through the conference platform indefinitely. The APS March Meeting was one of the first scientific conferences to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 outbreak when organizers pulled the plug on Feb. 29, less than 48 hours before it was scheduled to begin. Although many were frustrated by the abruptness of the decision, the move proved well founded as instances of significant coronavirus spread have been traced to other conferences held around the same time. Many other scientific societies are also now shifting to virtual meetings and making contingency plans for meetings later in the year that could be impacted.
The National Academies is holding a virtual town hall on Thursday to inform its decadal survey for the “physics of living systems.” Discussing the survey’s goals at a meeting of the study committee this month, study member Clare Waterman emphasized the effort is intended to “establish a new field of physics” rather than cover the traditionally defined field of biophysics. The committee originally planned to hold a town hall at the American Physical Society’s March Meeting and is using this week’s event to solicit input from the APS Division of Biological Physics and the broader scientific community.
The advisory committee for the Department of Energy’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research is holding a virtual meeting on Thursday. The committee will hear program updates from leaders of the office and a presentation on the recently released Safeguarding the Bioeconomy report from the National Academies. It also plans to vote on an as-yet unreleased committee of visitors report assessing the office’s Climate and Environmental Sciences Division. The last such assessment for the division was conducted in 2016.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Science Advisory Board is meeting virtually on Tuesday and Wednesday. Deputy NOAA Administrator Tim Gallaudet will present on the agency’s priorities for the year, which include developing a strategy for mitigating 5G interference with weather satellite observations, monitoring implementation of the Earth Prediction Innovation Center , and increasing partnerships with the private sector. The board will hear updates on the agency’s strategies for applying AI and ‘omics technologies. It will also decide on the scope for a congressionally mandated advisory panel for NOAA’s tsunami program and vote on whether to approve a report outlining research opportunities arising from the sharp decreases in aerosol and carbon emissions caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
The Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group (MEPAG), which provides community input for NASA’s Mars science program, is holding a virtual meeting this Wednesday through Friday. Discussion will cover missions such as the Perseverance rover that are working to meet a critical launch window this summer, as well as the delayed European ExoMars mission, now scheduled for launch at the next opportunity in 2022. The meeting will also include several sessions on future missions as attention turns to developing a sample return mission and a potential “Ice Mapper” orbiter. In addition, there will be sessions on concepts for white papers to be submitted to the upcoming planetary science decadal survey as well as on MEPAG’s recently updated report on goals and priorities for Mars science.
The Butler Library at Columbia University in New York City as photographed on April 10.
(Image credit – Robert / Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
As Congress turns to developing a fourth coronavirus relief package, associations representing research universities and medical schools have doubled their request for funding to address the pandemic’s disruptions to research. In an April 7 letter , the associations call for Congress to provide $26 billion to major federal science agencies, noting their prior request last month “recommended half of this amount based on our best estimate of two months of research slowdowns, laboratory closures, and identifiable harm to our research workforce and capabilities.” The letter states the revised amount reflects a “clearer” understanding that the “duration and harm will be greater than anticipated.” They also propose other emergency relief and tax changes to support institutions and students and are collecting feedback from graduate students on the pandemic’s impacts on their research. Colleges and universities have just started to receive funds from the $14 billion in education relief grants provided through the third coronavirus response package, which was enacted last month.
The management of the International Space Station National Laboratory (ISSNL) is in line for a major shakeup in the wake of a scathing report prepared by an independent review team. Casting blame on both NASA and the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS), the nonprofit contractor that operates ISSNL, the report details dysfunction at essentially every level of ISSNL’s governance, from its strategic direction to how research projects are selected. In particular, it argues there are destructive tensions between the research NASA administers directly and the extramural research projects that CASIS handles, as well as between the goals of supporting research and commercializing low Earth orbit. To resolve such issues, the report recommends replacing CASIS’ CEO and overhauling its governing board, among many other measures. In a statement, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said the agency agrees “significant change is needed” and plans to work with CASIS to bring ISSNL into a “new era.” However, Rep. Kendra Horn (D-OK), chair of the House Science Committee’s Space Subcommittee, hinted she feels stronger actions may be needed, remarking that the report “raises questions” about the role of CASIS in the future of R&D aboard the station.
NASA announced on April 9 that it has awarded a $76 million contract to Masten Space Systems for delivery of nine science and technology payloads to the Moon in 2022. The mission is set to be the third small lander to launch through NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program and the first of these missions to visit the Moon’s south polar region, which is also the destination of a robotic rover scheduled for launch in 2023. The south pole missions are intended to pave the way for subsequent robotic and crewed exploration of the region and the eventual establishment of a permanent facility there called Artemis Base Camp. This focus on south pole exploration is integral to NASA’s larger vision of building a sustained lunar presence that will require international and commercial partnerships and the utilization of resources such as water ice deposited in the Moon’s polar regions. To further encourage commercial interest, on April 6 President Trump issued an executive order reinforcing that the U.S. did not sign a 1979 international agreement governing lunar exploration and will resist enforcement of provisions holding that natural resources on the Moon are the “common heritage of mankind” and not subject to national or private ownership.
As NASA continues to develop its lunar agenda, it is launching a new program to plan its robotic missions called Payloads and Research Investigations on the Surface of the Moon (PRISM). For the first stage of the program, the agency released a request for information on April 10 that seeks ideas about what sorts of scientific instruments and technology demonstrations should be included aboard commercially contracted landers. NASA plans to use those ideas to select future landing sites and then solicit proposals for both site-specific and site-agnostic science and technology payloads through an ongoing series of “stage-2” calls. Steve Clarke, the head of NASA’s Exploration Science Strategy and Integration Office, told an advisory panel last month that the agency expects to issue its first stage-2 PRISM call this summer as well as announce a commercial lander mission that will fly to a non-polar destination in early 2023.
The COVID-19 High Performance Computing Consortium added three members to its ranks last week, with AMD, Nvidia and the National Center for Atmospheric Research joining the effort to pool supercomputing resources to aid coronavirus researchers. The consortium launched on March 22 with participants including six Department of Energy national labs, NASA, and several computing centers based at universities and companies. As of April 7, it had received 35 proposals and matched 19 with a supercomputing partner.
Mauro Ferrari resigned as president of the European Research Council last week after just three months in the role. In his resignation letter , the Italian-American scientist writes he is “extremely disappointed” by the European response to the COVID-19 pandemic, arguing there has been insufficient coordination of healthcare policies between member states and a lack of financial support for research initiatives. He describes his attempt to launch a special funding program for COVID-19 research, which was unanimously rejected by the council on the basis that such an initiative would not align with ERC’s mission of supporting “bottom-up” frontier research. However, ERC’s Scientific Council, the agency’s governing body, issued a statement saying they had unanimously requested Ferrari’s resignation on March 27. They allege that during his tenure Ferrari had “displayed a lack of engagement” with his job and dedicated his attention to external enterprises, such as academic and corporate board positions in the U.S. They also argue that Ferrari did not adequately understand the role of ERC within Europe’s scientific ecosystem and that he used his position to promote his own initiatives rather than drawing on the expertise of the Scientific Council. Regarding COVID-19 research, they said that the European Commission’s Research and Innovation Directorate General is developing new programs to address the pandemic and that many ERC-funded researchers are already conducting coronavirus research.
The publishing giant Springer Nature provisionally announced on April 8 that it is willing to move the “vast majority” of its non-open access journals, including its flagship journal Nature, into compliance with requirements of the Plan S initiative. Plan S is a coalition of funding agencies, based primarily in Europe, that commit to requiring their grantees to only publish in journals that meet certain open access requirements starting in January 2021. Springer Nature’s move came on the same day that the Plan S coalition announced they will ease compliance requirements for hybrid journals, which publish a mix of open and paywalled content. The changes include only requiring that journals switch to full open access once 75% of their content is open access, up from 50%, and no longer mandating that journals must switch by December 2024. Elaborating on its rationale , the coalition stated that while the concessions “may appear insensitive and tone-deaf to some” at a time when the pandemic is underscoring the benefits of open access research, announcing the change now gives publishers “the maximum amount of time to consider this model” in advance of the January deadline.
The Senate Armed Services Committee announced last week it is postponing its planned series of “paper hearings,” which were meant to maintain the panel’s public oversight function during the coronavirus pandemic. The concept involved posting opening statements and sending questions to witnesses at the time of the scheduled hearing, with a target response time of one week. The committee said the Department of Defense had “struggled to respond in a timely manner” to questions from the first scheduled hearing due to its focus on coronavirus response. Accordingly, the committee said it will hold off on additional hearings until it “has more clarity on the COVID-19 situation” and indefinitely postponed a hearing on the Department of Energy’s defense programs scheduled for April 9. However, at least one other committee has moved forward with the concept. The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee held a paper hearing last week to examine “recent uses of aggregate and anonymized consumer data to identify potential hotspots of coronavirus transmission and to help accelerate the development of treatments,” though the event did not include any witnesses from federal agencies.
National Academies: “The Impacts of Racism and Bias on ‘Black’ People Pursuing Careers in Science, Engineering, and Medicine” (continues Tuesday)
NOAA: Science Advisory Board meeting (continues Wednesday) CSIS: “Synthetic Biology and National Security: Risks and Opportunities” 1:00 - 1:30 pm Moon Dialogs: “Research Salon on Scarce Lunar Resources” 2:00 - 3:00 pm New America: “Thinking About Climate Change in the Wake of Coronavirus” 4:00 pm
NASA: Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group (continues through Friday) Johns Hopkins University: “Globalization, Climate Change, and Cleantech Supply Chains in the Age of Covid-19” 10:00 - 11:00 am NSF: STEM Education Advisory Panel meeting 10:00 am - 12:00 pm American Nuclear Society: “Spotlight on Idaho National Laboratory” 11:00 am EPA: “Citizen Science at EPA” 3:00 - 4:00 pm National Academies: “Postsecondary Response to COVID-19: How Can and Are Laboratories Shifting Research Agendas?” 3:00 - 4:30 pm
National Academies: Tracking and Assessing Governance and Management Reform in the Nuclear Security Enterprise Committee meeting (continues Friday) Hudson Institute: “A Conversation with Senator Todd Young (R-IN) on Securing America’s Economic and Security Future Through Technological Innovation” 9:00 - 9:45 am DOE: Biological and Environmental Research Advisory Committee meeting 10:30 am - 2:00 pm EESI: “Bridging the Gap Between Science and Decision-Making” 12:00 - 12:45 pm UMD: “How Can I Make My Science More Policy Relevant?” 12:00 - 1:00 pm DOE: “Women Leading Sustainable Energy Collaborations” 1:00 - 2:00 pm National Academies: Decadal Assessment on the Physics of Living Systems town hall 3:00 - 4:30 pm National Academies: “Postsecondary Response to COVID-19: How Can We Crowd-Source Scientists to Improve Public Information?” 3:00 - 4:30 pm
National Academies: Committee on Biological and Physical Sciences in Space meeting 1:30 - 3:00 pm National Academies: “Postsecondary Response to COVID-19: How Can We Provide Policy Advice to the Nation Faster?” 3:00 - 4:30 pm
American Physical Society: April Meeting (continues through Tuesday)
The news team for the journal Nature is hiring a bureau chief for its coverage of North, Central, and South America. Applicants must have at least five years of experience working as a journalist or editor at a major publication and “enthusiasm for and fluency in science and science policy including the U.S. government agencies that fund research.” Applications are due April 26.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science is accepting submissions for its essay competition on connections between human rights and the professions of science, engineering, and health. Submissions must be from undergraduate or graduate students and are due April 30.
The Department of Defense is accepting applications for its new Technology and National Security Fellowship program, which will embed scientists and engineers in offices at DOD and Congress for a one year term. Applicants must be U.S. citizens who have earned an undergraduate or graduate degree in a STEM-related field. Applications are due May 1.
For additional opportunities, please visit www.aip.org/fyi/opportunities . Know of an opportunity for scientists to engage in science policy? Email us at fyi@aip.org .
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