Our great friend and colleague Robert A. Frosch passed away 30 December 2020 at age 92. Jesse Ausubel met Bob in November 1977 at the first meeting of the NASEM Climate Research Board, and we cooperated for the next 40 years. Bob chaired the National Academy of Engineering study group that produced the 1989 book Technology and Environment with the opening essay, Technology and Environment: An Overview by Jesse H. Ausubel, Robert A. Frosch, and Robert Herman. A Remembrance will follow.
Area of Research: The Scientific Enterprise
Passing of Janusz Kindler
Polish water resources engineer Janusz Kindler passed away on 8 December 2020 in Warsaw at the age of 86. Janusz served as chief of the Resources and Environment group at IIASA during the early 1980s and thus as Jesse Ausubel’s boss. Jesse has written a Remembrance.
Undergrad interviews Jesse Ausubel about his career
Wake Forest University undergraduate Karina Macosko asks Jesse about climate change, counting fish, and other subjects of his work in a 15-minute video interview.
Jesse’s history of the Partnership for Observation of the Global Ocean (POGO)
“Forming the Ocean Club called POGO” is the title of Jesse Ausubel’s history of the formation of this group, initiated by Charles Kennel (direct or Scripps) and Robert Gagosian (director of Woods Hole) in 1998.
15-minute video interview with Jesse Ausubel
The new website Academic Influence, led by Wake Forest U. physicist Jed Macosko, conducted a video interview with Jesse Ausubel about his career.
Recording posted of seminar on US-Russia Scientific Cooperation
Jesse Ausubel helped open the excellent 3-hour September 15th 2020 on-line symposium on “US-Russia Scientific Cooperation” organized as part of a series honoring the memory of Victor Rabinowitch, who had a long, influential career in science and diplomacy. The Richard Lounsbery Foundation is among the sponsors of the series.
MIT historian of science Loren Graham wrote the discussion paper for the Webinar: Why the Silence? Discussions of US-Russian Scientific Relations . To listen to the Symposium, visit Why the Silence Symposium Recording. Jesse’s four minutes of remarks begin at 17’22”.
9:00 am – 9:45 am INTRODUCTION Welcome and Zoom housekeeping, CRDF Global; Opening remarks for Organizing Committee, Gerson Sher; Video tribute to Victor Rabinowitch Family; Cosponsor remarks: Richard Lounsbery Foundation, Jesse Ausubel; CRDF Global, Tom Callahan; Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Rachel Bronson
9:45 am – 11:45 am PANEL: US-RUSSIA SCIENTIFIC COOPERATION Introductory Remarks (Moderator) Harley Balzer (Georgetown University) Paper Summary: “Why the Silence?” Loren Graham (Mass. Institute of Technology); Panel discussion: Irina Dezhina (Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology); Mikhail Strikhanov (Federal Research Nuclear University – MEPhI); Glenn Schweitzer (The National Academies); Gerson Sher (Retired); Q&A
11:45 am – 12:00 pm CLOSING REMARKS E. William Colglazier (American Association for the Advancement of Science)
Discoveries of the Leonardo Da Vinci DNA Project
Biologists in the Leonardo Da Vinci DNA Project have shared a trio of fascinating, innovative papers.
Manolito G. Torralba, Claire Kuelbs, Kelvin Jens Moncera, and Karen E. Nelson of the J Craig Venter Institute, La Jolla, California, and Rhonda Roby of the Alameda California County Sheriff’s Office Crime Laboratory, used small, dry polyester swabs to gently collect microbes from centuries-old, Renaissance-style art in a private collector’s home in Florence, Italy. Their findings are published open access in the journal Microbial Ecology, “Characterizing microbial signatures on sculptures and paintings of similar provenance.”
Concurrently available are a pair of papers by David Thaler, of the University of Basel and a guest investigator in the Program for the Human Environment. David’s papers are
Thaler’s papers form part of a collection now in press as a book: Actes du Colloque International d’Amboise: Leonardo de Vinci, Anatomiste. Pionnier de l’Anatomie comparée, de la Biomécanique, de la Bionique et de la Physiognomonie, edited by Henry de Lumley, CNRS editions, Paris.
Two major newswires, Agence France Presse and Agencia EFE, each did separate stories:
Manny Torralba et al.
AFP Microbes Could ‘help Save Old Masters’ And Catch Forgers
Agencia EFE Identificar microbios en obras de arte abre la puerta a una mejor preservación
David Thaler
AFP Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘quick eye’ may be key to Mona Lisa’s magnetism
German version Forscher: «Schnelles Auge» half da Vinci beim Zeichnen und Malen
Agencia EFE La rapidez visual “súper desarrollada” de Da Vinci podría explicar la sonrisa de la Mona Lisa
LiveScience, United States Did Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘quick eye’ help him capture Mona Lisa’s fleeting smile?
By Leonardo Da Vinci DNA Project (summary)
Genetic detectives ID microbes suspected of slowly ruining humanity’s treasures
COVID & The World Interview with Jesse Ausubel
The website Human Progress launches a new video series called The Covid Tonic. The series features conversations between renowned scholars and editor, Marian L. Tupy. The interviews focus on the global impact of COVID-19 and the continued importance of rational optimism. Episode 1 features the environmental scientist Jesse Ausubel, a Human Progress Board Member and Director of the Program for the Human Environment at The Rockefeller University in New York City.
Watch the full video here.
2010s verbal Time Machine
Jesse evokes the decade just ended with a verbal time machine.
Yowza!
The kombucha cheeseball airballed flyover states.
A flashmob of microbiomes pinged frenemies with fake news about emojis.
Bestie truthers in gender dysphoria friended crunchy snowflakes with selfies.
Muggles on staycation clickbaited eco grief with chai latte before Brexit.
Digerati on hoverboards vaped Bibimbop while cloud computing their carbon credits.
Locavore hashtags unfriended ringtones.
Bling ransomware exfoliated the deep state over net neutrality.
Sriracha fitbits f-bombed safe spaces with froyo in go-cups.
Uber & Lyft doxx’d bougie Anthropocene woo-woo.
The worstest guac onboarded vegan qubits.
Buzzy connectomes face-palmed oppo memes.
Unplugged vulture capitalists binge-watched paywalls.
Micro-aggressions woke the Alt-right in airplane mode.
Anti-vax traumatology misgendered #MeToo.
Sounds like a plan. OMG LOL fuhgeddaboudit.
Jesse H. Ausubel 8 May 2020
PHE during COVID-19: IQOE, COVID game, deep carbon science
We all continue healthy and working long hours and hard, though mostly from our homes. We are catching up on lots of writing and editing but also trying to seize immediate, unique opportunities.
For example, COVID-19 may have created the reduction of additions of human noise that we dreamed about for the International Quiet Ocean Experiment. IQOE welcomes ideas about how the present quieting of the world economy may advance research in marine sound. High-quality observations of the ocean soundscape, as well as possibly related behavior of marine life during this period, may offer unique opportunities of exceptional value.
Resuming our interest in Serious Games, we are also please to encourage a team at the Indian Institute of Technology in Tirupati that is developing SurviveCovid-19 — A Game for Improving Awareness of Social Distancing and Health Measures for Covid-19 Pandemic
Jesse has also written a foreword for Simon Mitton’s forthcoming history of deep carbon science, From Crust to Core, to be published by Cambridge U. Press. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/from-crust-to-core/E0E2E8FC30B4C784B0FB268AC4AA8371