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How superstitions spread
A black cat walking on a walkway

Do you change direction when you see a black cat approaching? A game theory-driven model developed by two theoretical biologists at Penn shows how such superstitions can catch on.

How superstitions spread

Superstitious beliefs may seem irrational, but they catch on in a society. Using an evolutionary approach to studying the emergence of coordinated behaviors, Erol Akçay and Bryce Morsky showed how a jumble of individual beliefs, including superstitions, coalesce into an accepted social norm.

Katherine Unger Baillie

How a year in space affects the brain
Astronaut in a space suit on a spacewalk outside the International Space Station.

Astronaut Scott Kelly on his nearly year-long mission on the International Space Station. (Photo: NASA)

How a year in space affects the brain

Penn Medicine’s Mathias Basner discusses the NASA Twins Study, which analyzed astronaut Scott Kelly’s physical and mental health after he spent 340 days in space, and found that Kelly’s performance on a cognitive test battery dropped when he returned to Earth for six months.

Michele W. Berger

Tackling climate change on all levels
Speakers on stage at Perry World House

Quito Mayor Mauricio Rodas, Claudia Vargas of the Philadelphia Inquirer, and PWH Director William Burke-White opened the event. (Photo: Andro Mathewson)

Tackling climate change on all levels

At the Perry World House Global Shifts Colloquium, experts from around the world discussed what governments, and individuals, can do to avoid the ultimate catastrophe.

Gwyneth K. Shaw

Lump-sum pension payments: Who are the winners and losers?
outstretched hand holding several golden eggs on a table

Lump-sum pension payments: Who are the winners and losers?

Wharton’s Olivia S. Mitchell discusses the Treasury department’s move to allow private companies to pay lump-sum pension payments to retirees and beneficiaries, instead of monthly payments.

Penn Today Staff

The Green New Deal: What it says, what it doesn’t say, and how close we are to adopting it
A view looking up into a forest of trees, with light streaming through.

In February, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) introduced a non-binding resolution to Congress known as the Green New Deal. It’s unclear how far it will progress, but it is fueling a long-needed conversation about climate change, according to Mark Alan Hughes of Penn’s Kleinman Center.

The Green New Deal: What it says, what it doesn’t say, and how close we are to adopting it

Mark Alan Hughes, director of the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, discusses the basics of this energy-mobilization proposal.

Michele W. Berger

Chips in Space
Dan Huh and Andrei Georgescu in the lab

Graduate student Andrei Georgescu and Assistant Professor Dan Huh in Huh’s lab. Adapting the organ-on-a-chip technology for a trip to the International Space Station presented Huh’s team with a number of engineering challenges. (Photo: Kevin Monko)

Chips in Space

Microfluidic devices lined with human cells are headed to the International Space Station in early May, part of an effort to understand why astronauts get sick more easily in orbit.

Gwyneth K. Shaw

By the numbers: First-ever image of black hole’s event horizon
inset image of black hole surrounded by a ring of light and a larger image showing where the black hole sits inside a galaxy

By the numbers: First-ever image of black hole’s event horizon

An overview of how scientists from the Event Horizon Telescope collaboration were finally able to see the unseeable, and what it means for the future of astronomy.,

Erica K. Brockmeier

How companies are increasing neurodiversity in the workplace
illustration of rows of face and head profiles with one brain highlighted

How companies are increasing neurodiversity in the workplace

Wharton’s Peter Cappelli discusses how companies are increasing efforts to employ adults with autism, but doing so requires a lot of support and training.

Penn Today Staff