With each day, the so-called fiscal cliff looms larger as Congress and President Obama work to come to agreement on a federal-deficit compromise, which so far has proven elusive. Absent such an agreement by year\’s end, far-reaching spending cuts will be triggered as result of the Budget Control Act of 2011, through a mechanism called […] … learn more→

Many robotic designs take nature as their muse: sticking to walls like geckos, swimming through water like tuna, sprinting across terrain like cheetahs. Such designs borrow properties from nature, using engineered materials and hardware to mimic animals’ behavior. Now, scientists at MIT and the University of Pennsylvania are taking more than inspiration from nature — […] … learn more→

In addition to novels, I always bring a stack of scholarly books on our annual summer vacation. I bring books in my field, books not in my field, books in fields I might be ready to explore, books I might like to teach and books that I read so that I will be a better […] … learn more→

What has been the impact of the invention of the telescope? What has been the impact of Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity, or the splitting of the atom? Yes, that’s right: the idea of measuring the “impact” of research is back in a big way. Within the research community and within government, plenty of people […] … learn more→

Fundamentally, there are two big motives for research. On the on hand there is intellectual ambition: the desire to know and understand the word, to appreciate the best that has been said and thought on the topics that grip our imaginations. In one of C.P. Snow’s Cambridge novels there’s an elderly character who looks back […] … learn more→

The huge changes in the earth’s crust that shaped the face of the African continent are being re-defined according to research published in Nature Geoscience. The Great Rift Valley of East Africa – the birthplace of the human species – may have taken much longer to develop than previously believed. Lead author Dr Eric Roberts, […] … learn more→

Crocodiles have been put through their paces on a treadmill as part of a James Cook University research project to help determine which muscles they use to breathe. Led by the Townsville-based Dr Suzy Munns, the research was conducted on five young estuarine crocodiles to test the role of the diaphragmaticus muscle, also known as […] … learn more→

As leaders in government and business search for ways to strengthen the U.S. recovery, new research from faculty at Harvard and Columbia indicates that elementary school teachers have an impact on how much their students earn as adults and, by extension, on the nation’s economy. “If an elementary school student has an excellent teacher even […] … learn more→

La Trobe University is a multi-campus university based in Victoria, Australia. With learning, teaching and research designed to enrich the world and a history of academic innovation, La Trobe is leading the way in higher education. … learn more→

After studying U.S. energy innovation for three years, Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) researchers have recommended nearly doubling research and development spending and pushing private industry to adopt new technology by putting a price on carbon emissions. The report, “Transforming U.S. Energy Innovation,” was released by the Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group in the Kennedy […] … learn more→