What does a carnivorous plant have in common with the design for a water-saving toilet? What about a hungry cell with surgical equipment? It may be surprising to learn that engineers still turn to the natural world for inspiration. For Tak-Sing Wong, a professor of engineering at The Pennsylvania State University, nature is a constant source of inspiration. In our November SciCafe, Wong introduces two cutting-edge technologies that have been directly modeled after natural phenomena. 

A video version of this SciCafe will be available on the Museum’s YouTube channel on Saturday, November 24.

Subscribe to the Science@AMNH Podcast on iTunes, Soundcloud, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

The SciCafe Series is proudly sponsored by Judy and Josh Weston. 
SciCafe: Engineering Technologies Inspired by Nature and related activities are generously supported by the Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA) program of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

SciCafe: Technology Inspired by Nature with Tak-Sing Wong

Current science and the latest research from scientists at New York City’s American Museum of Natural History and guest speakers.

Science

The worlds’ oceans have changed dramatically in the 50+ years that marine ecologist Jeremy Jackson has been studying them. Overfishing, pollution, and climate change have converted once-thriving ecosystems like coral reefs and mangrove forests into slime-covered wastelands. But Dr. Jackson has shed his former nickname of ”Dr. Doom” and now focuses on the remarkable resilience of the oceans–if only humans can give them time and space to recover.

This SciCafe took place at the Museum on June 5, 2019.

SciCafe: The Future of Our Oceans with Jeremy Jackson

The Titanosaur, Patagotitan mayorum, is the largest-known dinosaur to ever walk the Earth—weighing more than 10 African elephants. How did it get so big? How did it dominate the prehistoric landscape for millions of years? And what can this extinct animal teach us about our own future on this planet? Join paleontologist Diego Pol as he explores these questions and recounts his journey leading the team that discovered the Museum’s Titanosaur.

This SciCafe took place at the Museum on May 1, 2019.

SciCafe: Why Dinosaurs Matter with Diego Pol

Climate change may be affecting populations around the world in different ways, but the sobering state of our shared environment should worry everyone. How can we as a global community make changes to our economic, leadership, and policy models to panel of experts discuss the complex realities of climate change and the importance of putting aside cultural and political differences to address the environmental and human costs of our changing ecosystems. 

This panel is moderated by Ana Luz Porzecanski, director of the Center for Biodiversity and Conservation at the American Museum of Natural History. Panelists include student and activist Vic Barrett;  Erle Ellis, professor of geography and environmental systems at the University of Maryland; Afua Bruce, director of engineering for New America’s Public Interest Technology program; Spencer Glendon, senior fellow at the Woods Hole Research Center ; Larry McDermott, executive director of Plenty Canada and Algonquin from Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nation; and Paavo Järvensivu, researcher of economic culture at the BIOS Research Unit in Helsinki, Finland.

This lecture, New Science, New Solutions: Leadership, Economics, and Governance Under Climate Change, was generously supported by the Abel Shafer Public Program Fund, a fund created by the Arlene B. Coffey Trust to honor the memory of Abel Shafer.

This program was presented in collaboration with the Museum’s Center for Biodiversity and Conservation.

How Policy Can Help Us Fight Climate Change

Only a fraction of the oceans’ floors has been explored, yet scientists already know that microbial communities are thriving in the extreme and often bizarre landscapes of the deep sea. Harvard University geobiologist Jeffrey Marlowe shares findings from his expeditions to the bottom of the oceans—including investigations of microbes that consume 90 percent of the methane coming up from the seafloor—and highlights the growing need to protect these communities which we’re only just beginning to understand.   

To see Marlowe’s photos and videos of these rarely-seen landscapes, watch the video version of this SciCafe on the Museum's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQr790zKBW8

The full transcript of this SciCafe is available here: https://www.amnh.org/explore/news-blogs/podcasts/podcast-scicafe-microbial-worlds-of-the-deep-sea-with-jeffrey-marlowe

This program was made possible by OceanX, an initiative of the Dalio Foundation, as part of its generous support of the special exhibition Unseen Oceans and its related educational activities and public programs.

SciCafe: Microbial Worlds of the Deep Sea with Jeffrey Marlowe

What can science reveal about bias in our education, healthcare, and other social systems? It turns out, quite a bit. This series of short talks from experts in the fields of medicine, law, education, and business explores where bias comes from, the importance of facing the fraught history of bias, and how we might benefit from striving to be “good-ish” rather than “good.” 

Speakers include: Dolly Chugh, professor at New York University's Stern School of Business; Marianne J. Legato, physician and director of the Foundation for Gender-Specific Medicine; Daniel Braunfeld, Associate Program Director for Special Projects at Facing History and Ourselves; and Jonathan Kahn, the James E. Kelly Professor of Law at Mitchell Hamline School of Law.

This lecture took place at the Museum on November 28, 2018, under the title “New Science, New Solutions: The Biology of Bias and the Future of Our Species.”

This lecture is generously supported by the Abel Shafer Public Program Fund, a fund created by the Arlene B. Coffey Trust to honor the memory of Abel Shafer.

SciCafe: Technology Inspired by Nature with Tak-Sing Wong

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