The SciTech Lawyer Perspective

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, host Donata Stroink-Skillrud talks with Jon Sands about how plants help solve crimes. They discuss cases in which botanical evidence was used to solve cases, plants used as poisons, and the illegal trafficking of plants, as well as evidentiary rules and what attorneys should look for when it comes to plant evidence.

What does it really mean to be an AI-native law firm? In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, host Aaron Gothelf sits down with Logan Brown, founder and CEO of Soxton, to explore how AI-native legal services differ from traditional firms that simply use AI tools. Logan shares her journey from Cooley to launching an innovative startup, discusses why flat-fee, attorney-in-the-loop legal services are reshaping the market, and explains how AI-first workflows are changing hiring, pricing, client service, and the role of lawyers. Together, they examine whether established firms can truly become AI-native, where human judgment remains indispensable, and what the future of legal practice looks like as artificial intelligence becomes increasingly embedded in the profession.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, Host Donata Stroink-Skillrud sits down with Kent Anderson and Joy Moore to explore how the Internet, social media, and Artificial Intelligence are transforming the way scientific information is created, shared, and consumed.

The discussion examines why misinformation often spreads faster than credible research, how generative AI may accelerate both scientific discovery and fraud, and how the growing influence of technology platforms is shaping public understanding of science.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, host Aaron Gothelf sits down with David Fisher, Founder and CEO of Integra Ledger, a blockchain technology company focused on secure interoperability and trusted digital transactions for the legal industry, to discuss his paper, Identity, Trust, and the Legal Foundations of Agentic Commerce: A Proposal for Trust in Depth, coauthored with Bridget McCormack, President and CEO of the American Arbitration Association.

The conversation explores how AI agents are rapidly transforming commerce by autonomously negotiating, transacting, and making decisions. At the same time, the trust infrastructure that has historically enabled markets to function, including identity, legal accountability, enforceable agreements, and dispute resolution, has not kept pace. Fisher explains the paper's proposed four-layer "trust in depth" framework, which connects AI agents to human identity, legal entities, enforceable agreements, and authorized delegation. The framework is designed to help agentic commerce scale within the legal and institutional foundations that have long supported human commerce. The original article can be accessed at: https://www.adr.org/news-and-insights/trust-framework-for-agentic-commerce-disputes/.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, Host Donata Stroink-Skillrud sits down with Nikolas Guggenberger to discuss his concept of "consent as friction." The episode explores why modern digital consent often fails and how laywers, companies, and regulators should rethink the role of consent online.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, Host Aaron Gothelf sits down with immigration attorney James Chesser and Kit Walsh of the Electronic Frontier Foundation to discuss James' Immigration and Human Rights Law Review article, "The Expanding Digital Border: AI, Surveillance, and the fight for Justice." The episode explores how borders are evolving into AI-driven "digital filters" that predict risk and intent, reshaping what it means to cross and raising urgent questions about accountability. The speakers examine whether these systems make immigration fairer or simply more opaque—and whether their errors are becoming harder to challenge. The original article can be accessed at: https://scholarship.law.uc.edu/ihrlr/vol7/iss1/2/

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, Host Donata Stroink-Skillrud sits down with Ravy Uong to discuss the work of American Bar Association's Rule of Law Initiative and its various projects defending the rule of law and Internet Freedom. They explore projects in Southeast Asia and Africa and how lawyers can help defend the rule of law. Invest in Justice, Build a Better World. For more information about ABA Rule of Law Initiatives or to support any ABA project, please visit the ABA Fund for Justice and Education webpage.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, host Donata Stroink-Skillrud sits down with Shannon Ralich, Vice President of Compliance and Chief Privacy Officer at Machinify, to explore why siloed governance models fail and how organizations can build integrated, future-ready programs.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, American Arbitration Association Commercial Vice President Aaron Gothelf interviews ABA Science & Technology Law Section's Chair-Elect, Matt Henshon to discuss his new book, "A Lawyer's Guide to AI: Ten Essential Concepts." The conversation traces AI's development from early predictive models to modern generative tools, emphasizing the role of data, pattern recognition, and prediction. Matt examines what distinguishes generative AI from earlier forms of machine learning, how data quality shapes AI outcomes, and why challenges such as overfitting and opacity pose problems for AI users. From a legal perspective, the episode examines algorithmic accountability, the adequacy of existing legal frameworks, and the issues lawyers and policymakers should be paying the closest attention to.

In this episode of The SciTech Lawyer Perspective, host Donata Stroink-Skillrud sits down with Gert Taeymans, founder of Tymans Group, for an in-depth discussion of two of the European Union's most consequential technology regulations: DORA and NIS2. Together, they break down what these regulatory frameworks entail, when and how they apply to U.S. companies, and why they matter beyond the EU. The conversation highlights how themes such as operational resilience, third-party risk management, and executive accountability are redefining cybersecurity and governance expectations, with implications that are increasingly global in scope.

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