Author: STEM Community

By Angus Finnegan Despite comprising 17% of the U.S. workforce, only 8% of Hispanic adults are working in STEM jobs. Out of this small percentage, just 3% are Hispanic women. Representation and visibility play a vital role in encouraging Hispanic Americans to pursue a career in scientific and allied fields, according to the Pew Research Center. Against this background, we recently spoke with Ray Lopez and Andrea Espinosa—two inspiring engineers working at global energy company bp—about bridging the Hispanic representation gap and using their voices to encourage those with similar backgrounds to pursue a career in STEM. To start, Ray…

Portland, Maine, USA – Organizers of Commercial UAV Expo, the world’s leading commercial drone trade show and conference, have announced an important addition to this year’s conference program: the Advanced Airspace Summit. Commercial UAV Expo takes place September 5-7, 2023, at Caesars Forum in Las Vegas, and the Advanced Airspace Summit will be held on Wednesday, September 6, as part of the event’s conference program. “There is currently a large gap between crewed and uncrewed aviation,” said Jeremiah Karpowicz, Group Editorial Director at Diversified Communications, organizer of Commercial UAV Expo. “Commercial UAV Expo is working to bridge that gap and…

The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) has announced that Rebecka Peterson, a high school math teacher, is the 2023 National Teacher of the Year. Peterson has taught high school math classes ranging from intermediate algebra to advanced placement calculus for 11 years at Union High School in Tulsa, Oklahoma. A proud immigrant of Swedish-Iranian descent, Peterson is passionate about making mathematics engaging, relevant and accessible to all students, no matter their background. Amid a difficult first year of high school teaching, she founded “One Good Thing,” a collaborative blog for teachers to track the good things happening in their classrooms. She…

There will always be a need in the medical field, especially as new technology arises. If you have a passion for helping others, becoming a doctor or nurse isn’t your only option. In fact, there are numerous jobs in med tech that you can pursue that will help enhance the next generation of healthcare. Here are some of the top jobs in med tech: Nuclear Medicine Technologists Average Salary: $78,760 per year Nuclear medicine technologists prepare radioactive drugs and administer them to patients for imaging or treatment. They provide technical support to physicians or others who diagnose, care for and…

When we think of the ways that art can affect our lives, we tend to think of the mental and emotional supplements it can bring. But thanks to a recent study done at the University of Central Florida, a group of researchers have figured out a way that art can not only help our minds, but save our planet. Debashis Chanda, a professor at the University of Central Florida’s NanoScience Technology Center, and his colleagues have drawn inspiration from butterflies to create the first environmentally friendly, large-scale and multicolor alternative to pigment-based colorants, which the researchers say can contribute to…

An interdisciplinary team of University of Minnesota Twin Cities scientists and engineers has developed a first-of-its-kind, plant-inspired extrusion process that enables synthetic material growth. The new approach will allow researchers to build better soft robots that can navigate hard-to-reach places, complicated terrain and potentially areas within the human body. The paper is published in the “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America” (PNAS), a peer-reviewed, multidisciplinary, high-impact scientific journal. “This is the first time these concepts have been fundamentally demonstrated,” said Chris Ellison, a lead author of the paper and professor in the University of Minnesota…

By Roberto Molar Candanosa A “biocomputer” powered by human brain cells could be developed within our lifetime, according to Johns Hopkins University researchers who expect such technology to exponentially expand the capabilities of modern computing and create novel fields of study. The team outlines their plan for “organoid intelligence” in the journal “Frontiers in Science.” “Computing and artificial intelligence have been driving the technology revolution, but they are reaching a ceiling,” said Thomas Hartung, a professor of environmental health sciences at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Whiting School of Engineering who is spearheading the work. “Biocomputing is an enormous…

By Natalie Rodgers The saying “dress for the job you want” is still crucial advice when it comes to an interview. Even if you have the desired attributes and skillsets to your employer, wearing a sloppy or inappropriate outfit can greatly decrease your chances of being hired and being taken seriously. Picking the right outfit, however, will not only show your potential employer that you care for yourself and the occasion, but will give you the confidence to proceed through the interview as your best self. Here’s what you need to know when it comes to dressing for your interview…

Diversity Alliance for Science (DA4S) is a leading life science organization focused on supplier diversity, bringing together like-minded corporations and suppliers to advance equity and inclusion in the life science/health care global supply chain. The East Coast Conference, held May 2-4 in Newark, New Jersey, featured top-level pharmaceutical executives and CEOs of diverse scientific and clinical enterprises. Over the past 16 years, DA4S has been a wonderful opportunity to foster effective, mutually beneficial partnerships between diverse suppliers and big pharma, biotech, med device and health care companies. DA4S events are designed to bring everyone together through educational programs, keynote and…

Billionaire Robert Hale doled out millions of dollars recently to 2,500 graduates at the University of Massachusetts, Boston — giving each one $1,000 in cash as they accepted their diplomas—the latest billionaire donation for students, as the price of tuition skyrockets. Hale, the commencement speaker at UMass Boston, gave students two envelopes that each contained $500, the Boston Globe reported. The billionaire co-founder and CEO of Granite Telecommunications told seniors to keep one of the envelopes for themselves, and donate the other to a charity of their choice, calling it a “gift of giving”—though whether they donate the money is…