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Clara Sousa-Silva, assistant professor of physics at Bard College, addressed the United Nations on September 20 as a panelist at “Summit of the Future,” which brings world leaders together to forge a new international consensus on how we deliver a better present and safeguard the future. The panel discussion, “Activating Young Scientists for Trust in Science,” was hosted by the Scientific Advisory Board of the Secretary-General at the UN Headquarters and focused on exploring ways of advancing trust in science globally among young people. The discussion was moderated by Latif Nasser, cohost of RadioLab, and the panel consisted of Sousa-Silva, Tshilidzi Marwala, the UN under-secretary-general, Andrea Hinwood, chief scientist of the UN Environment Programme, and Mohammad Hosseini, research ethicist at Northwestern University, and member of Global Young Academy. 

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Evolutionary traps are problems, most often human-created changes to the environment, which animals encounter and are not prepared for through natural selection. For example, toxic plastics that look like food or artificial lights that mimic stars in the night sky but have no navigational value. Animals lack the behavioral tools to handle them and thus make maladaptive choices that make it difficult for them to survive. Discover magazine talks to Bard Associate Professor of Biology Bruce Robertson and cites his research on some of the most concerning evolutionary traps, such as sea turtle hatchlings heading inland instead of into the water due to being confused by beachfront lights or Australian death adders poisoning themselves by preying on non-native toad species. “Traps will cycle populations toward extinction extremely rapidly,” Robertson says. “They’re like demographic black holes.” 

Bard Associate Professor of Biology Gabriel G. Perron and Bard Associate Professor of Chemistry Swapan S. Jain have received $46,000 from the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture to study the impact of farming practices on the nutritional content and microbial diversity of fermented vegetables, which complements existing funds of $50,000 from Hudson Valley Farm Hub to study soil health. “Getting support from such an important organization not only enables us to continue our work on agroecology, but also gives us visibility at the national level,” said Gabriel G. Perron. Both Perron and Jain are also associated with the Center for Environmental Sciences and Humanities at Bard.

The Stone Barns Center funds will be used to study and document the impact of frost on the nutritional value of raw and fermented cabbage. Perron and Jain will also be investigating how frost impacts the microbial communities developing during fermentation, which affects the probiotic qualities of fermented cabbage (e.g. sauerkraut). This project will be conducted in collaboration with farmers at Stone Barns, chefs at Blue Hill at Stone Barns, and Bard College researchers Perron and Jain. Former Bard student Pearson Lau ’19, who recently published his Senior Project on the effect of chlorination on sourdough starter cultures, will also be part of the research team. Professors Perron and Jain plan to involve current Bard undergraduates in their research project. This collaboration has also made it possible to bring students from Bard and Bard NYC to visit Stone Barns and Blue Hill at Stone Barns as part of their respective classes.

“We are very excited about this wonderful collaboration with farmers and chefs in our local community. This work will help us in addressing important questions related to nutrition and the overall health of our food ecosystem,” said Swapan S. Jain.

Felicia Keesing, David and Rosalie Rose Distinguished Professor of Science, Mathematics, and Computing at Bard, has published a study in Science with coauthor Richard S. Ostfeld examining diseases that are spread to people by rodents, and how our destruction of the environment makes those diseases more likely.

“Rodents as a group are infamous as disease-transmitters,” says Keesing. “But not all rodents are created equal. We were able to discern clear patterns in which ones are dangerous, which ones are not, and why.” Ostfeld adds, “Not only are the disease-bearing species predictable, so too are the environmental changes that help them proliferate.”

Many people think of all rodents as vermin, but only a small percentage (about 12%) of rodent species carry pathogens that can make us sick. These disease-causing rodents, including the city rats and house mice that infest human-occupied spaces around the world, tend to thrive when we destroy the natural environment. When biodiversity declines, the species that prosper are typically hosts for pathogens that can also infect people. In their review in Science, Keesing and coauthor Ostfeld explore what we know about this pattern, and how it plays out for three rodent-borne diseases that are all surging in the 21st century—Lassa fever, Lyme disease, and the plague. The results of their synthesis point to the importance of protecting and restoring biodiversity as a critical strategy for protecting our own health.

In their review, Keesing and Ostfeld focus on key traits of rodents that share pathogens with us, including “synanthropy” (living with and benefiting from human environments), while also considering the potential impact of drivers of global change such as climate change and biodiversity loss. Lassa fever, for example, mostly affects people living in West Africa who become sick each year through exposure to a virus shed in the feces and urine of a widespread rodent, the multimammate mouse. Keesing and Ostfeld show that environmental correlations between the virus and the rodent host’s ability to thrive may lead to increasing numbers of people at risk for Lassa fever as suitable habitat expands under global climate change.

Lyme disease, which was first described in the northeastern United States, is also strongly linked to rodents. The disease is caused by a bacterium that is shared with people through the bite of infected ticks. The animal that infects the greatest proportion of ticks is the white-footed mouse, with an infectivity of more than 90%. These mice thrive in human-impacted habitats from which other mammal species have disappeared, another example of how human impacts on the environment often have negative effects on our health.

Plague has caused notorious pandemics in past centuries, but cases of this rodent-borne disease are also surging in the 21st century, particularly in East Africa, northern Asia, and Madagascar. Hundreds of species of rodents can be infected with the bacterium that causes plague, but past pandemics are strongly linked to the spread of black and brown rats, which are also implicated in modern plague hotspots. These rats thrive in human habitats where other animals cannot.

The authors focus their review on rodent-borne diseases but the patterns they describe are true of other diseases as well, including diseases affecting wildlife, livestock, and plants. Species that thrive when we destroy natural habitats tend to be species that are also likely to spread pathogens. This gives renewed urgency to efforts to protect and restore natural environments around the world. Keesing states: “This review affirms that we need to act now on the knowledge that damaging the environment increases disease transmission and threatens our health.”

Suzanne Kite, aka Kite, distinguished artist in residence, assistant professor of American and Indigenous Studies, and director of the Wihanble S’a Center for Indigenous AI at Bard, was interviewed by ArtNews about her work in ensuring that Indigenous artists are involved throughout the development of AI systems. “I think that what we call AI is soon going to be split into its many, very separate systems, instead of this blanket calling everything AI,” said Kite, an Oglála Lakȟóta artist who has been using machine learning in artwork since 2018. “There are so many different things happening. If there is not diversity of thought, even basic cultural thought—but real diversity of thought—then we will just end up at a dead end with things.” Kite discusses earlier models of machine learning which she used to create art, how her work at Bard focuses on developing ethical AI frameworks deeply rooted in indigenous methodologies, and her public art project Cosmologyscape, in collaboration with Alisha B Wormsley, which solicits dreams from the public that are translated into quilting patterns generated from 26 Black and Lakota symbols and which will debut as sculptures at Ashland Plaza in Brooklyn from September 22 to November 3.

Felicia Keesing, the David and Rosalie Rose Distinguished Professor of Science, Mathematics, and Computing at Bard College, is the recipient of the 2024 C. Hart Merriam Award from the American Society of Mammalogists. The award, given to eminent scholars in recognition of outstanding research in the study of mammals over a period of at least 10 years, honors Keesing for her scholarly contributions to the fields of disease ecology and community ecology, all while keeping the role of mammals in ecological processes front and center. As recipient, Keesing is invited to address the Society in a plenary session at the 2025 annual meeting, as well as to prepare a manuscript for publication in the Journal of Mammalogy.

The Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) has announced that Bard math alumna Mona Merling ’09 has won the 2025 AWM Joan and Joseph Birman Research Prize in Topology and Geometry. Merling was recognized for her innovative and impactful research in algebraic K-theory, equivariant homotopy theory, and their applications to manifold theory.

“I would not be here today without the many amazing women I was lucky to have as role models at every step of the way: from my math teacher back in Romania, Mihaela Flamaropol, who ignited my passion for math competitions; to my undergraduate mentor at Bard College, Lauren Rose, who early on inspired me about both research and teaching; to some of the senior leaders in my field who initiated and fostered the Women in Topology Network, Maria Basterra, Kristine Bauer, Kathryn Hess, and Brenda Johnson, who I was very privileged to be able to collaborate with as part of these workshops and who have always served as a huge inspiration and a source of endless support to me and other younger women in homotopy theory,” said Merling, who is currently associate professor of mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania. She was previously a J.J. Sylvester Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematics at Johns Hopkins University, and received her PhD in Mathematics at the University of Chicago in 2014.

In a statement, AWM wrote: “Merling is an exceptional researcher whose work in algebraic topology has both depth and breadth. She is a recognized authority on equivariant homotopy theory and its applications to equivariant manifolds. Her recent work generalizes and reinterprets results in differential topology in the equivariant context. Her work is the first progress seen in decades on certain foundational questions about equivariant manifolds.”

The AWM Joan & Joseph Birman Research Prize in Topology and Geometry serves to highlight to the community outstanding contributions by women in the field and to advance the careers of the prize recipients. The prize is awarded every other year and was made possible by a generous contribution from Joan Birman, whose work has been in low dimensional topology, and her husband, Joseph, who was a theoretical physicist specializing in applications of group theory to solid state physics.

Antonios Kontos, associate professor and director of physics at Bard College, has been awarded a research grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Kontos’ proposal, titled “Stray Light Control for Cosmic Explorer,” has been awarded a total of $351,951 in funding over a period of three years, which will also cover student salaries, travel, and equipment.

“Try to imagine a telescope that can hear every collision between two stars in the universe. That is what we are creating with the Cosmic Explorer detector,” said Kontos. “This award will allow students at Bard the opportunity to contribute to this remarkable project over the next three years.”

Gravitational-wave astronomy, a subfield of astronomy focusing on the detection and study of gravitational waves emitted by astrophysical sources, has now opened a new window to the universe, which—along with conventional telescopes—significantly broadens our understanding of astrophysics and cosmology. The Cosmic Explorer project is a concept for a next-generation gravitational-wave observatory in the US, which will enable the detection of nearly every black-hole collision in the observable universe. The NSF award will allow a team of scientists and engineers to produce this initial conceptual design, and to develop technologies to facilitate the eventual realization of the Cosmic Explorer. The project will be undertaken in collaboration with the California Institute of Technology, which received a separate grant for the initiative.

The NSF is an independent federal agency that supports science and engineering in all 50 states and US territories. It was established in 1950 by Congress to promote the progress of science, advance the nation’s health, prosperity and welfare, and to secure the US national defense. Its investments account for about 25% of federal support to US colleges and universities for research driven by curiosity and discovery. NSF aims to keep the US at the leading edge of discovery in science and engineering, to the benefit of all, without barriers to participation.