• Security commitmentsFalse economy: Savings from cutting U.S. overseas security commitments dwarfed by lost U.S. trade

    Proponents of U.S. foreign policy “retrenchment” have called for steep reductions in U.S. overseas security commitments, contending that the U.S. commitments are too costly to sustain, allow partner governments to free-ride off the U.S. defense budget, and fail to deliver the promised security and stability. A new study finds, however, that the policy of engagement the United States has followed since the 1940s has contributed greatly to U.S. prosperity by making the world politically and militarily stable, thus fostering international economic stability which has benefitted the United States by increasing trade in goods and services and access to global capital, leading to higher rates of economic growth at home. Reducing U.S. overseas security commitments, including U.S. troops stationed abroad as well as U.S. security treaties, could lead to greatly reduced U.S. trade with other countries, with the economic costs from lost trade estimated to be more than triple any associated savings in U.S. defense spending.

  • Undocumented immigrantsCounting 11 million undocumented immigrants is easier than you think

    By Jennifer Van Hook

    News organizations widely report that there are 11 million unauthorized immigrants living in the United States. But where does this figure come from? Donald Trump has falsely asserted: “It could be three million. It could be 30 million. They have no idea what the number is.” In the third debate, Hillary Clinton said, “We have 11 million undocumented people. They [undocumented parents] have 4 million American citizen children. 15 million people.” The confusion is warranted – but demographers have figured out a simple and effective way to estimate the number of unauthorized immigrants.

  • CybersecurityNICE framework provides resource for stronger cybersecurity workforce

    NIST released a resource that will help U.S. employers more effectively identify, recruit, develop, and maintain cybersecurity talent. The draft NICE Cybersecurity Workforce Framework (NCWF) provides a common language to categorize and describe cybersecurity work to help organizations build a strong staff to protect their systems and data.

  • ForensicsNuclear CSI: Noninvasive procedure could spot criminal nuclear activity

    Determining whether an individual – a terrorist, a smuggler, a criminal — has handled nuclear materials, such as uranium or plutonium, is a challenge national defense agencies currently face. The standard protocol to detect uranium exposure is through a urine sample; however, urine is able only to identify those who have been recently exposed. Scientists have developed a noninvasive procedures that will better identify individuals exposed to uranium within one year.

  • ForensicsNew 3-D crime-scene forensics technology

    Researchers are developing a new type of portable crime-scene forensics technology designed to take precise high-resolution 3-D images of shoeprints and tire tread marks in snow and soil. The system will cost around $5,000, which is about one-tenth the cost of systems commercially available, and represents an alternative to the traditional method of plaster casting.

  • ResilienceBe Prepared: Canada engages youth in disaster resilience

    Large-scale natural disasters have been on the rise worldwide, and while the exact cause is unclear, there is something most scientists, policy-makers, and legislators can all agree with — the increasing global need to invest in disaster preparedness, prevention, and recovery. Canadian experts say they are constantly evaluating and improving Canada’s emergency preparedness and the most effective ways to keep people safe. But some experts are taking a different approach to disaster resiliency: they are engaging youth.

  • Infrastructure protectionUsing electricity to track water which causes degradation of concrete

    Tracking concrete degradation is essential to public safety, and the culprit behind concrete degradation is water. Water contributes to the degradation by itself, or it can carry other chemicals – like the road salt used on bridges – that can expedite corrosion of both concrete and its underlying steel reinforcement structure. Researchers have developed a new technique for tracking water in concrete structures — allowing engineers to identify potential issues before they become big problems.

  • CyberthreatsThe risk of cyber 9/11 or cyber Pearl Harbor exaggerated: Expert

    Addressing the implications of cybersecurity threats for the stability of international world order, an expert acknowledged that states will find it difficult to maintain cybersecurity in an increasingly porous and congested cyberspace, but said that cyber-experts exaggerate the threat to essential state infrastructures.

  • InsurgencyUnderstanding insurgency warfare

    A new book explores the history and details of 181 insurgencies since the end of the Second World War, providing lessons for those fighting insurgent campaigns today in such countries as Syria, Libya, and Iraq. The book finds that there has been a significant increase in the past decade in the number of insurgencies involving extremist Islamic groups. The book also finds that insurgent groups are most likely to lose when they perpetrate large-scale brutality against civilians and fail to secure outside support from great powers.

  • African securityWhy it’s not all about security as West beefs up military in Africa’s Sahel

    By Keith Somerville

    Over the past few weeks the United States and France have pledged considerable extra funds to strengthening their military presence in Africa’s Sahel region – a narrow, arid band of land stretching across the continent from west to east just south of the Sahara desert. This has been prompted by growing Western fears of destabilization. There has been concern that Islamist groups were establishing themselves in the vast spaces between the Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea. But Western interest in the Sahel region is not merely about security. It has also been linked by some to the West’s desire to protect vital natural resources such as oil, gas, and uranium. One geographer and Africa specialist has called this a new scramble for Africa.

  • CybersecurityCybersecurity requires better collaboration between private, public sectors

    A key difference between cybersecurity threats and other security threats is the mismatch between public and private capabilities and levels of authority in responding to these threats. The lack of government resources to defend the private sector from digital threats places businesses on the front lines of the cyber conflict and can put national security, economic vitality, and privacy at risk. A new report calls for increased collaboration between the public and private sectors to use available tools more effectively to disrupt and deter cyber threats, noting the collaboration between the private sector and policymakers is long overdue.

  • CybersecurityNSF awards FSU $4.6 million grant to support cybersecurity scholars

    A new multimillion grant to the Florida State University Department of Computer Science will help dozens of students finance their education and help prepare them for careers in cybersecurity. The NSF awarded the department a $4.6 million grant to help fund the education of students who are specifically pursuing cybersecurity studies. It is the largest grant in the department’s history.

  • Disease outbreaksFactors influencing the timing of infectious disease outbreaks

    The delay between the time when a disease outbreak becomes possible and when it actually happens depends chiefly on how frequently infection is introduced to the population and how quickly the number of cases caused by a single individual increases, according to new research. The research lays the theoretical groundwork for a disease forecasting system that could give public health officials time to prepare for-or possibly even prevent-certain outbreaks in the future.

  • EarthquakesSome early 20th century L.A. earthquakes might have been man-made

    Some early twentieth century earthquakes in southern California might have been induced (man-made) by past practices that were used by the oil and gas industry. During the early decades of the oil boom, withdrawal of oil was not balanced by injection of fluids, in some cases leading to dramatic ground subsidence, and potentially perturbing the sub-surface stress field on nearby faults.

  • STEM educationMath abilities are not innate, but rather depend on many factors

    The prevalent theory today suggests people are born with a “sense of numbers,” an innate ability to recognize different quantities, like the number of items in a shopping cart, and that this ability improves with age. A new theory regarding how the brain first learns basic math could alter approaches to identifying and teaching students with math learning disabilities. The researchers offer a better understanding of how, when, and why people grasp every day math skills.

  • Russian interferenceRussia has “cultivated” Trump, aiming to weaken Western alliance: Ex-spy

    A former Western intelligence official, whose career involved decades in conducting Russian counterintelligence operations, has handed the FBI a batch of memos in which he suggested that there was “an established exchange of information between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin of mutual benefit.” The retired spook consulted with Russian sources, and said that: “Russian regime has been cultivating, supporting, and assisting Trump for at least five years. Aim, endorsed by Putin, has been to encourage splits and divisions in Western alliance.” The FBI asked to former intelligence official for all the information he had on Trump, and specifically asked the former spy how he had come by this information.

  • ISISMore than 500 ISIS militants killed in Mosul so far -- 300 of them child-soldiers

    More than 500 ISIS militants have been killed since the beginning of the campaign to re-retake Mosul. Of the 500 ISIS dead, about 300 are child-soldiers called “Caliphate Lion Cubs.” ISIS militants have killed more than 300 civilians last week alone – some of them members of ISIS suspected of trying to stage a revolt against the jihadists.

  • Border wallTrump’s wall ignores the economic logic of undocumented immigrant labor

    By Lise Nelson

    Donald Trump portrays undocumented immigrants as invading “criminals” supported and abetted by the Mexican government is, and who pose a dire threat to the nation. Trump’s call for building a wall assumes that the cause of undocumented migration originates in Mexico, in the Mexican government, or in the criminal intent of migrants. A border wall makes intuitive sense if you assume the cause of undocumented migration is external to the United States. This is a belief that ignores not only the ease of breaching such a wall, but more fundamentally the economics of low-wage, undocumented labor migration that generated these flows in the first place.

  • Public healthExonerating “Patient Zero”: Debunking the myth of the origins of the 1980s U.S. AIDS crisis

    The genetic testing of decades-old blood samples has demonstrated that Gaétan Dugas, a French-Canadian flight attendant who became notorious as the human epicenter of the U.S. AIDS crisis of the 1980s – and the first person to be labeled the “Patient Zero” of any epidemic – was simply one of many thousands infected in the years before HIV was recognized. In fact, the very term Patient Zero was the result of a misreading: In one of the early cluster studies of AIDS patients in California, Dugas was code-named “Patient O” (for “[O]utside-of-California”) – but some researchers discussing the investigation began interpreting the ambiguous oval as a digit, and referring to Patient O as Patient 0.

  • ConspiraciesThe effects of conspiracy theories

    As a global population we are awash with conspiracy theories. They have permeated every major event, across every level of society; from the French Revolution to the War on Terror. They have attracted devotees in their millions — from lone survivalists to presidential nominees such as Donald Trump. But what effects do conspiracy theories really have on the public as we go about our day-to-day lives? Are they merely harmless flights of fancy propagated by those existing on the margins of society, or is their reach altogether more sinister? Do runaway conspiracy theories influence politicians, decision-makers and, by extension, the public at large? And what effect has the advent of the Internet and mass, instant communication across social media platforms had on the spread of conspiracy theories around the world?

  • Nuclear wasteNanomaterials help solve the problem of nuclear waste

    In the last decades, nanomaterials have gained broad scientific and technological interest due to their unusual properties compared to micrometer-sized materials. Nuclear fuels production, structural materials, separation techniques, and waste management may all benefit from more knowledge in the nano-nuclear technology.

  • InfrastructureMany U.S. dams are obsolete, costly, aging, and unsafe

    As is the case with much of America’s aging infrastructure, many of the country’s estimated two million dams are obsolete, costly, aging, and unsafe. Nearly 4,000 dams around the country have been reported as deficient, and the American Society of Civil Engineers has given America’s dam infrastructure a D rating. “It shouldn’t take a catastrophic failure for the dams in this country to get much-needed attention,” said the author of a new report. “Unfortunately, as is the case with much of our aging infrastructure, we jump from crisis to crisis and fail to plan ahead.”