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Published by the Students of Johns Hopkins since 1896
February 3, 2025
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RAYNE ZAAYMAN-GALLANT / CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0
As the new academic year begins, let's dive into the latest breakthroughs and discoveries by scientists and engineers around the globe. This week’s highlights include promising developments in HIV vaccine research, insights into the human microbiome, legislative strides in artificial intelligence (AI) and deepfake regulation and the discovery of new free-floating planetary bodies.
While immunology fascinated him in high school, when Saahith Potluri entered Hopkins, he had no intention of continuing his research interests past college. Now, with graduation only weeks away, he is determined to keep his work alive in the next chapter of his life.
The internet serves as a haven of scientific information, representing an era where the knowledge of anything we wish to know is available at our fingertips. Yet in many ways, accurate, firsthand accessibility to scientific research and comprehensibility of scientific knowledge is severely limited. A substantial overhaul is needed in the way that the general populace accesses scientific knowledge.
Although the semester is wrapping up at Hopkins, science endeavors around the world continue to yield exciting discoveries. This week’s Science News in Review covers new technology to identify the origin of metastatic cancers, the long-term effects of pregnancy complications, novel neural circuitry for food motivation and appreciation for a butterfly in the Amazon.
As the semester begins to slow down, scientific discovery has not. This week’s science news in review explores new findings from the James Webb Space Telescope, the discovery of a nitrogen-fixing organelle, an accident in molecular evolution and the legacy of Peter Higgs.
On Monday, April 8, hundreds of Hopkins students and community members gathered on the Beach to watch the 2024 total solar eclipse. Beginning at 2:05 p.m. and lasting until 4:33 p.m., the eclipse allowed viewers to see a rare sight: the moon passing between the sun and the Earth.
Researchers at Hopkins have used AI to achieve a significant milestone in the battle against COVID-19. The team has developed an automated detection tool capable of identifying patients with the virus from ultrasound images of the lung. This work furthers the use of artificial intelligence in the healthcare professions.
The microbiome refers to the whole sum of microorganisms in a particular environment, such as the collective sum of gut bacteria in a human being. Microbiome research is a new frontier of scientific exploration. Studies that use big data technology to examine whole genomes of hundreds of organisms simultaneously represent a field called metagenomics. As this field matures, scientists are increasingly recognizing the need for sophisticated tools and technologies to decipher the complexities hidden within these microbial ecosystems.
On March 26 at about 1:30 a.m., the cargo ship Dali struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge, causing a disastrous collapse that sent shockwaves through the city of Baltimore and the structural engineering community nationwide. Questions arose about the safety of the bridge and how such a disastrous event occurred. Multiple Hopkins experts were contacted for information on the technical aspects of the collapse. Francis Scott Key was the second longest continuous-truss bridge in the U.S. and the third in the world.
As the semester winds down, take a moment to learn about this week's breaking science news. We learned about scientists’ preparations for studying the total solar eclipse, the rediscovery of the world's first police crime lab, how AI can detect severe floods worldwide and the necessary re-evaluation of air pollution’s impact on public health.
I grew up on Long Island, N.Y., where backyards are perfect for gardening. My grandmother insisted on teaching me her flower-planting technique. I watched her as she put seeds into the ground without much interest in her planting. I went outside to play on my trampoline every day, while also catching a glimpse of the progress of the garden. Little 9-year-old me was not expecting much from a little backyard garden. But, after going outside every day for a year, I witnessed the slow but sure beauty and complexity of plant growth.
On Thursday, March 28, the Department of Civil and Systems Engineering hosted David Friedman, emeritus CEO and board chair of Forell Elsesser Structural Engineers. The talk, titled “The Practice of Structural and Earthquake Engineering Today and Three Unique Structural Engineering Projects," touched on Friedman’s projects and methodologies as well as the challenges posed by the constraints of the environment. Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering Jeremy Brown organized the event.
Welcome back from spring break! To get back into the groove of things, take a moment to learn about the new exciting progress in STEM.
Six months ago, Stanford University Professor Robert M. Sapolsky wrote a book titled Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will, which argues that humans do not have free will. He calls for people to “stop attributing stuff to us that isn’t here.” He also critiques any system in which we punish or reward people because people have no control over their actions. Sapolsky’s thesis is that free will is a myth and, the sooner we accept that, the more just society will be. However, in reality, the science does not debunk but instead supports the existence of free will.
On Thursday, March 7, the Virginia Fox Stern Center for the Study of the Book in the Renaissance, situated at Hopkins Sheridan Libraries, hosted Olivia Weisser, professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston and a historian of medicine. Weisser’s research focuses on health in 16th- to 18th-century Britain, and her lecture titled “Shopping for Pox Cures in Early Modern London” analyzed the process of purchasing treatments for venereal disease, a term that encompasses what are today known as sexually transmitted diseases.
In a recent study, a team of Hopkins researchers analyzed contaminants found in kale grown on Baltimore farms. The findings, published in Environmental Sciences & Technology, are a reassurance that local-grown kale is safe to eat, and the innovative approach used is paving the way for future research in environmental science.
In many ways, joining the Searson Lab has been challenging for me. I began doing research at Hopkins wanting to bring my world to the lab but found the lab a world of its own.
As we approach the final stretch before spring break, let’s look beyond our class content and appreciate how scientists around the world have applied textbook knowledge to generate meaningful research findings. This week’s science news focuses on fascinating biodiversity in nature, humans’ impact on the environment and the potential to restore past lives on Earth.
A recent paper published by a team of Hopkins physicists and astronomers has permanently changed the landscape of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) — in this case, literally. The paper, published in The Astrophysical Journal on Monday, March 4, includes the most detailed observations of the CMB taken from Earth.