How did participating in STS impact your life?
Competing in STS was a transformative event in my life. I grew up in Riverside, Calif., and while I felt that my public high school helped foster my interest in science and writing, I didn鈥檛 know how my knowledge compared with other students. When I arrived at STS, I immediately felt impostor syndrome and felt that someone must have made a mistake. Over time, however, I realized that the judges placed a higher value on how quickly and eagerly I could learn, as opposed to how much I knew as a high school senior. That鈥檚 a lesson that has strongly influenced my career.

I think the short answer to your question is this: The end result of having a good experience during STS and being named a finalist was gaining confidence in myself.

What initially drew you to science?
Frankly, it was studying bugs and plants in my backyard. I鈥檝e always been introverted, and for me, an ideal way to spend an afternoon in the warm California weather was in my backyard, looking at insects and plants and trying to understand how they functioned, how they behaved and how they could communicate with each other. I began to do what I now realize were experiments, but back then I was just following my curiosity.

You are a pioneer in developing techniques to treat genetic disorders, notably base and prime editing, otherwise known as CRISPR. How do these technologies differ?
CRISPR, as it evolved in nature, is really DNA-cutting scissors. CRISPR is a bacterial immune system that cuts DNA to defend bacteria from viral infection. CRISPR proteins such as Cas9 find a target DNA sequence that matches a sequence in its guide RNA, and then it cuts the DNA double helix into two pieces, literally cutting a chromosome into two pieces. That鈥檚 a very effective way to disrupt genes, which is after all exactly what CRISPR-Cas9 evolved to do in nature. Around 2013, I became particularly interested in treating genetic diseases. But most genetic diseases cannot be treated by disrupting a gene, and instead require correcting the mutations that cause the disease.

So together with Alexis Komor, then a new postdoc, we decided to try to develop a new form of gene editing that uses the DNA targeting mechanism of CRISPR. Instead of disrupting genes, we would precisely fix genes on an individual DNA base in the genome at a specific site.

Base editors, which we first reported in 2016, were the first direct way to convert one genetic base pair into another base pair in living systems, including in animals and in human patients. In 2019, we reported on prime editing, which I鈥檒l explain like this: If you think of CRISPR-Cas9 DNA as cutting scissors and base editors as DNA letter rewriting pencils, then prime editors are sort of like DNA word processors. They perform true search and replace editing where you can take a specific segment of DNA and replace it with any other segment of DNA that you specify.

What is the therapeutic potential of these technologies?
Collectively, base editing and prime editing can correct the vast majority 鈥� more than 90 percent 鈥� of all known pathogenic human mutations. There are more than 200,000 mutations known now that collectively cause 10,000-plus genetic diseases. Of course, correcting the mutation doesn鈥檛 necessarily mean that you can cure the disease, but it鈥檚 an important step toward treating the root cause. Base editing and prime editing have been involved in at least 23 clinical trials around the world.

In 2022, Alyssa Tapley, a 13-year-old T cell leukemia patient, became the first person to receive a base-edited therapeutic. Her T cell leukemia was cleared by CAR T cells, which are T cells that are engineered to kill cancer cells. The CAR T cells Alyssa received were modified with three critical base edits, which enabled those CAR T cells to kill her cancer, but not her healthy tissues, and not each other. She is now a healthy teenager.

You have cofounded multiple biotech companies. How do you see the role of academia evolving in translating cutting-edge research to real-world therapies?
Academia plays an essential role, especially in the risk-averse environments like we鈥檙e facing right now. Generally, companies are not founded to develop completely new ways of doing things. Instead, therapeutics companies take well-validated research and try to industrialize and commercialize it. If academics hadn鈥檛 developed the kinds of gene-editing technologies that we鈥檝e talked about in this conversation, it is unlikely that an existing pharmaceutical or biotech company would鈥檝e taken the concept from interesting observation all the way to a drug.

What do you see as the biggest misconception the public has about gene editing? And how can this technology be deployed ethically and responsibly?
The public鈥檚 initial reaction to the knowledge that we could edit genes was a fear of some kind of dystopic science fiction-like GATTACA future, in which super soldiers and designer babies ruled the world. That鈥檚 a misconception for several reasons, most importantly because there鈥檚 no simple way to create edits that ensure a human suddenly has traits as complex as athletic ability, intelligence or the ability to be a good soldier.

Looking back, did you receive any advice that you still carry with you today? What is your approach to mentorship?
All my mentors encouraged me to pursue what I was most curious about, not what anybody thought my field should be. During my 26-year academic career as a chemist, I鈥檝e seen chemistry go through periods where people were uncertain as to what chemistry should be. I always ended up pursuing what I was most curious about because that鈥檚 how I could do my best work. Whether you鈥檙e successful or not, as one of them said, you want to succeed or fail doing David Liu science, not doing the science that somebody else told you to do.

With the current climate in higher education, how would you qualify the importance of investment into basic research?
There are few investments that the U.S. can make that pay a bigger return to the country, to the economy and to our quality of life than investing in science and science education. For all the gene-editing technologies we discussed, the key innovations were largely the result of U.S. federal investment in science research. We seem to be at a critical moment in which science is in jeopardy, even as other countries are doubling down on their investment in science. There are more clinical trials using base editing or prime editing in China right now than there are in the U.S., even though those two technologies were developed in my lab, funded by U.S. taxpayers.

What gives you hope for the future?
That鈥檚 an easy question. The best part about being an educator is I get to have a lab of 30 or so graduate students and postdocs, and I get to teach classrooms full of students. They fill me with optimism about the potential of our future. These young people are bright and motivated and are poised to become the next generation of world-changing scientists. We must ensure that we continue to support them and continue to support the science that they feel so passionate about.

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The Regeneron Science Talent Search scholars were selected from 1,949 applications from 627 high schools across 48 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and four other countries. Scholars were chosen based on their outstanding research, leadership skills, community involvement, commitment to academics, creativity in asking scientific questions and exceptional promise as 中文无码 leaders demonstrated through the submission of their original, independent research projects, essays and recommendations. The 300 scholars hail from 194 American and international high schools in 35 states and China.  

The full list of scholars can be viewed here: Top 300 STS Scholars  

鈥淐ongratulations to the top 300 scholars in this year鈥檚 Regeneron Science Talent Search,鈥� said Maya Ajmera, President and CEO, 中文无码 and Publisher, Science News. 鈥淭he enthusiasm and quality of projects from this year’s participants were just outstanding. Each year, I am tremendously impressed by the ingenuity that the students bring to the competition. Their hard work, creativity and perseverance should be applauded.鈥� 

The Regeneron Science Talent Search recognizes and empowers our nation鈥檚 most promising young scientists who are generating innovative solutions to solve significant global challenges through rigorous research and discoveries. It provides students with a national stage to present new ideas and challenge conventional ways of thinking. Now in its one hundred and first year, 中文无码 has played a significant role in educating the public about scientific discoveries as well as in identifying future leaders in science, technology, engineering and math. Regeneron has sponsored the Science Talent Search since 2017 as part of its deep commitment to 中文无码 education and to supporting young scientists. 

This year, research projects cover topics from analyzing the impact of the Russia-Ukraine war, to developing eco-friendly biofuel, and improving methods used to detect diseases and neurological disorders such as Alzheimer鈥檚, bladder cancer, monkeypox, autism and more. Other students chose to focus on social issues, such as exploring ways to reduce social media-induced emotional distress and violence, as well as studying how mask mandates impact how accurately people can recognize emotion on others鈥� faces. With a total of 21 research categories, the top 5 categories among scholars鈥� projects this year include:   

鈥淲e celebrate this year鈥檚鈥痵cholars鈥痜or their exceptional work and unmatched motivation to use the power of鈥痵cience, technology, engineering and mathematics (中文无码)鈥痶o make a meaningful mark on the world,鈥� said Christina Chan, Senior Vice President, Corporate Communications & Citizenship at鈥�. 鈥淭hrough our partnership with the 中文无码, it is our goal that鈥痶he鈥疪egeneron鈥疭cience Talent鈥疭earch鈥痚levates young scientists and underscores鈥痶he鈥痵ignificance of鈥形奈蘼� in solving society鈥檚 biggest challenges. We commend the scholars鈥� inspirational and thought-provoking projects and look forward to what the future has in store for each of these budding innovators.鈥濃�� 

On January 24, 40 of the 300 scholars will be named Regeneron Science Talent Search finalists. The finalists will then compete for more than $1.8 million in awards during a week-long competition in Washington, D.C., taking place March 9-15. 

For over eight decades the Science Talent Search has rewarded talented high school seniors who dedicate countless hours to original research projects and present their results in rigorous reports that resemble graduate school theses. Collectively, STS alumni have received millions of dollars in scholarships and gone on to be awarded Nobel Prizes, Fields Medals, MacArthur Fellowships and numerous other accolades. 

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How did STS impact your life? You went to Bronx High School of Science, a school where many students have competed in STS over the years.

My STS project was the first large project that I completed on my own. It was ambitious, and it forced me to think broadly about what I wanted to work on for a few months. I also recall hoping that my project would amount to something. It was a great experience.

Was your project focused on engineering or mathematics?

I did a math project centered on number theory and how to think about math.

Growing up, your father was a mathematician and your mother was an accountant and an entrepreneur. Did your parents鈥� background and expertise shape your aspirations?

My parents had a large influence on how I grew up and how I spent my time. When I was in grade school, my father would quiz me in math tables after dinner. That鈥檚 how math became something that I enjoyed. I also enjoyed understanding how things work, especially physical things.

My brother had these model car toys that sometimes would stop working and I was interested in understanding why. I would open them up, take them apart and realize: 鈥淥h, there鈥檚 a loose wire there. If I connect this wire, then the car will start working again.鈥� So that was how I got into engineering and developed the desire to fix and work on things.

Beginning with your time as a student at MIT, much of your career has been spent improving semiconductor technology and leading teams in those efforts. When did you know that you wanted to focus on engineering? When did the business piece come into play?

MIT was a great experience and I enjoyed being surrounded by other people who had similar interests. I majored in electrical engineering, which was the most popular major as well as the most difficult major at the time.

I thought it was so cool that during our introductory classes, we were actually building circuits, building computers and programming things. I enjoyed that aspect of engineering.

My mother was an entrepreneur who started her own business, and I had a chance to observe her experience. When it came time to lead my own company, it was fun to put together both the process of building things and the process of running businesses.

Semiconductors are an essential component of nearly every electronic device. What is it about the field that continues to interest you? What keeps you excited and motivated?

The beauty of semiconductors is that they really do touch every aspect of your life. When I started in this field more than 25 years ago, it wasn鈥檛 that obvious. I don鈥檛 think everybody understood how important semiconductors were. Now, everything in our lives runs on processors built with semiconductors, including computers, phones and washing machines. What I found really interesting was that, through a process of basic fabrication, you are able to build something that鈥檚 very complex.

This field has continued to be as exciting as it was 25-plus years ago because we keep improving the capabilities of semiconductors. I love the idea that something I worked on or that we worked on as a team can show up in your house.

When you were named CEO of AMD, the company faced steep challenges. Since then, AMD has grown substantially and cemented itself as an industry leader. How did you get the company back on track?

In our industry, it鈥檚 all about making long-term bets. What was most important for me and for my team was having a long-term vision of where the semiconductor road map was going to go. We knew it would take three to five years to really see the results of some of the directional decisions that were made. Beyond that, sometimes it鈥檚 about deciding what you鈥檙e not going to do.

Less than 10 percent of Fortune 500 companies are led by female CEOs. As one of those leaders and the first female CEO of AMD, what do you think needs to happen to increase representation at the highest levels of industry?

First, there are fewer women in engineering than men. A lot of the work needs to be done in 中文无码 education to expand access and bring women into the engineering workforce. While no one can guarantee career success, more opportunities are helpful.

I was helped along the way by people who gave me opportunities and put large problems in front of me. I am a big believer in giving women and underrepresented minorities, or frankly just high-potential people, really challenging opportunities early on in their career.

We鈥檙e not there yet 鈥� by a long shot 鈥� but I think there鈥檚 a lot more constructive dialog taking place now than there ever has been before.

Last year, you received the Robert N. Noyce medal, the highest honor bestowed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Looking back on your career, what accomplishment are you most proud of?

I am a product person through and through. So launching a new processor is probably my proudest moment. Out of all of the processors that I鈥檝e launched during my career, probably the first generation of our Zen processor was my favorite. But honestly, they鈥檙e all like my kids, so I love all my products.

The nature and complexity of your work requires forecasting the needs of the market several years down the road. Where do you see the field of computing technology heading?

It is pretty much like a crystal ball, trying to figure out what鈥檚 going to happen over the next decade. I do think that there are several important computing trends, including high-performance computing, which is providing more performance at lower power, as well as artificial intelligence, which has an amazing array of applications. The other aspect is recognizing that for us to continue the pace of innovation that we鈥檝e been experiencing, we need more interdisciplinary development 鈥� hardware folks working with software folks working with system designers 鈥� to really optimize the entire system.

Who inspired you as a young person, and who inspires you today?

That may be the same. My inspiration has always been my mother. She and my dad immigrated to the United States right after I was born, in 1969. Watching her work hard to build her own business and to build her life here in the United States was an inspiration and continues to be an inspiration to me. It鈥檚 amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it.

What advice do you have for young people just starting out in higher education or their careers?

I would encourage young people to dream big and be ambitious about what they can do. You have to dream it to actually achieve it. Plan your career, your education or your life in five-year segments. It鈥檚 hard to know where you want to be in 25 years, but you can certainly identify things you would like to accomplish in the next five years. Share those ambitions with people because they will want to help you if you鈥檙e open about your ambitions.

Lastly, the best piece of advice I got as a young engineer was from one of my mentors who advised me to run toward problems. You will learn an incredible amount. It鈥檚 been one of the best pieces of advice because, if you think about it, there are a lot of talented individuals in the world. But what you need is a combination of being smart, working hard and being in the right place at the right time. Running toward problems helps you be in the right place at the right time.

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Congratulations to geneticist, . President Biden elevated the position of OSTP director to be a cabinet-level position for the first time in history.

Eric Lander has strong ties to the 中文无码. In the 1974 Westinghouse Science Talent Search he placed first with a project titled, 鈥淨uasiperfect Numbers,鈥� a concept which he explains more .

Before joining the Biden Administration, Eric was president and founding director of the Broad Institute, a biomedical research institution focused on genomic medicine at MIT and Harvard. He was also professor of biology at MIT and professor of systems biology at Harvard Medical School.  He is a MacArthur Fellow and a Breakthrough Prize Laureate in Life Sciences, among a countless number of other accolades.

Eric is also no stranger to participating in government. Between 2009 and 2017, he co-chaired the President鈥檚 Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), a panel consisting of the brightest minds in science and technology who advised the president. He is well-known for playing a pioneering role in all major aspects of the reading, understanding and medical application of the human genome and was one of the principal leaders of the Human Genome Project from 1990 to 2003.

In his letter to Eric, inviting him to take on this role, President Biden says, 鈥淚 believe it is essential that we refresh and reinvigorate our national science and technology strategy to set us on a strong course for the next 75 years, so that our children and grandchildren may inhabit a healthier, safer, more just, peaceful and prosperous world. This effort will require us to bring together our brightest minds across academia, medicine, industry and government鈥攂reaking down the barriers that too often limit our vision and our progress, and prioritizing the needs, interests, fears and aspirations of the American people.鈥�

In , President Biden also tasked Eric and his colleagues at OSTP to address the following five key questions:

1. 鈥淲hat can we learn from the pandemic about what is possible鈥攐r what ought to be possible鈥� to address the widest range of needs related to our public health?鈥�
   
2. 鈥�How can breakthroughs in science and technology create powerful new solutions to address climate change鈥攑ropelling market-driven change, jump-starting economic growth, improving health and growing jobs, especially in communities that have been left behind?鈥�
   
3. 鈥淗ow can the United States ensure that it is the world leader in the technologies and industries of the future that will be critical to our economic prosperity and national security, especially in competition with China?鈥�
   
4. 鈥淗ow can we guarantee that the fruits of science and technology are fully shared across America and among all Americans?鈥�
   
5. 鈥淗ow can we ensure the long-term health of science and technology in our nation?鈥�

We look forward to watching as this accomplished STS alum addresses these weighty questions and challenges.

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You are an alum of the 1993 Science Talent Search with a project entitled 鈥淭he Peg Solitaire Army.鈥� Are there any particular moments that stand out for you from that week?

We got to meet President Bill Clinton. All the finalists had the opportunity to get in line, shake his hand and have a small photo op. If I remember correctly, I did not actually shake his hand, because I was trying to stand out. But not in the way you think. I had just read in a magazine that Bill Clinton was a big fan of crossword puzzles, and I had just written my first crossword puzzle. It wasn鈥檛 a very good crossword puzzle in retrospect, but it was a perfectly fine one. So I said, 鈥淢r. President, I heard you really liked crossword puzzles. I wrote one, and I鈥檇 like to see if you would enjoy this.鈥� And during the photo op, he鈥檚 talking with me with a big smile, holding my crossword puzzle. 中文无码 two months later, I got a letter from the White House with a completed crossword puzzle that was signed by him.

When did you figure out that you were going to have a career as a professional puzzler? How did that happen?

It wasn鈥檛 really a 鈥渇igure it out鈥� thing, as much as a 鈥渢his was something I was always interested in and wanted to create puzzles.鈥� So, it started out as a hobby. When I eventually left my actual job as a software engineer at Google, and decided not to work full-time, I turned to making puzzles and games. I鈥檓 fortunate that I did very well at Google and could take that route.

Your team, Left Out, won the 2019 MIT Mystery Hunt, a contest you have participated in since 2006. What was the 54-hour-long event like?

The Mystery Hunt is probably the largest puzzle hunt, or at least, it鈥檚 one of the most prestigious and hardest ones. It started at MIT in the 1980s and continues to grow larger each year. Originally, it was just for MIT students, but as those students graduated and moved on, they continued to play in the event.

So as winners of the hunt, your team came up with the 2020 theme Penny Park. Can you explain this theme?

Every year, the winning team gets the honor 鈥� or the onus 鈥� of designing next year鈥檚 hunt. The hunt, which took place in early 2020, has now evolved to the point where it is beyond just puzzles. The hunt includes non-puzzle challenges, often a scavenger hunt. It鈥檚 much better if you have a framing story for the event. So our team, Left Out, developed a theme about a dilapidated theme park, with teams vying to fix the theme park.

As a puzzler, you鈥檙e exposed to lots of different cultures. Can you share one of the favorite places you鈥檝e visited?

I was on the American World Puzzle team for several years and on the American Sudoku team for several years, which exposed me to a lot of different cultures. The World Sudoku Championship and the World Puzzle Championship are held in a different country every year. I鈥檝e been to probably about 20 or 30 different countries throughout.

I recall one time when we were in the Croatian city of Dubrovnik, staying in a beautiful hotel with a view of the Adriatic. You could look out your big hotel room window and the Adriatic waves would just be lapping on.

One day, we saw thunderstorms in the far distance and it was just beautiful.

You鈥檝e worked with Will Shortz, the well-known New York Times crossword puzzle editor. I鈥檇 love to hear more about the experience.

I would say that certainly, being able to write a puzzle for the New York Times is considered one of the most prestigious things in the puzzle world.

How many times have you had a crossword puzzle published in the New York Times?

This is a strange question to answer. The part that actually has the prestige is the crossword puzzle. I鈥檝e only written one crossword puzzle for Will, and he accepted it. So the minus is that I鈥檝e only done it once; the plus is I have a 100 percent acceptance rate.

My puzzle expertise tends more to be in logic and numbers and less so in crosswords. A few years ago, the New York Times Magazine redesigned the puzzle section and wanted to include a full page with lots of other small puzzles. Will wanted a number logic puzzle, and the page was designed so that every issue of the magazine has a number logic puzzle in the upper right corner of that page. I wrote that puzzle for about two years, starting with the launch of the redesigned page until my children were born.

What other puzzles are you working on currently?

I work with a company called ThinkFun that makes a lot of little mechanical puzzle toys. Their most famous one is a game called Rush Hour, which involves pushing cars back and forth along a grid. I鈥檝e been working with them for nearly 10 years, developing some challenges for certain products, such as Laser Maze and Gravity Maze.

What books are you reading right now? And what books did you read when you were young?

When I was young, I read a lot of science fiction. I was a really big fan of Isaac Asimov. And certainly, I鈥檝e always amassed a growing collection of puzzle books. It鈥檚 not reading in the same sense as a novel. But honestly, these days, almost all of my reading is done online, and I often end up reading news. There are certain political blogs I like following, such as electoral-vote.com.

And in terms of being a political junkie, I read vox.com. I also read fivethirtyeight.com, which does a lot of statistical analysis and works to be objective. They very rarely give opinions, instead stating, 鈥淗ere鈥檚 what the numbers actually say.鈥� I really respect that aspect of their reporting.

But in terms of physical books, I have a lot of comic books and graphic novels.

What advice do you have for young people just starting college or their professional careers?

A good decision doesn鈥檛 always lead to a good outcome. To give a little bit more exposition to that, it鈥檚 that because of the vagaries of luck or opportunity or situation, sometimes you can make the choice that is the best option, in terms of the information you have, but the outcome doesn鈥檛 always turn out the way you think it should.

At that point, you should still keep that faith that you actually made the correct decision, even though the results didn鈥檛 turn out the way you were hoping they would be.

My last question to you is that there are so many challenges in the world today. What keeps you up at night?

It鈥檚 strange for a puzzle person to say this, and most people don鈥檛 expect it, but I am not a good problem-solver. There is a large distinction between a puzzle and a problem, a distinction that has become more and more clear to me over the years. A puzzle is a fun diversion, where somebody knows what the correct answer is and they set up a trail or path for you to find that solution.

Whereas a problem is something where nobody knows for sure what the right solution is. We can do our best to get there and maybe in some fields, like mathematics or physics, the solution actually exists and when you get it, you鈥檇 know that you are right. But there are also problems like economic inequality or pandemics, where we will have solutions that are better and better at solving a problem, but we won鈥檛 necessarily know when we have the perfect solution.

As a person who wants to help the world to solve problems, but only does puzzles, all I can do is use some of my resources to support and help the people out there who are solving problems. Supporting and enabling people who solve the world鈥檚 problems can be just as important as solving the problems yourself.

It鈥檚 why helping the disadvantaged, the needy and the unfortunate is important, but shouldn鈥檛 come from a position of what people 鈥渄eserve鈥�; it鈥檚 because you don鈥檛 know if the next person you help will end up being an important future problem-solver, to curing the pandemic or fixing global warming. I really fear that too many people focus on compensating for the wrongs of the past, when instead they should be looking at the wrongs of the past as a cautionary tale to avoid doing bad things in the future.

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You are an alum of the 1965 Science Talent Search. How did the competition impact your life, and are there any particular moments that still stand out for you?

The Westinghouse Science Talent Search was the first time I was recognized nationally. President Johnson had just been elected and we met him at the White House. He told us his goal was that our generation would never see the horrors of war.

The Science Talent Search was also the first time I had an opportunity to learn about other high-level research projects. There was no internet, and no way to find out about other students鈥� research. For my project, I built a computer and programmed it to find melodies and to invent new melodies.

You鈥檝e had an extraordinarily varied career, from inventor to researcher to author, including your current role at Google. Can you tell me more about your journey and how you ended up where you are?

I can actually start the century before me, the 19th century, because it was a strong motivator in my life. My mother鈥檚 mother鈥檚 mother, my great-grandmother, created a school for women. If you were a girl in mid-19th century Europe and went to school at all, it would not go past ninth grade. My great-grandmother鈥檚 school went from kindergarten through the first two years of college. It was considered very controversial. Why would you want to educate a girl? My great-grandmother traveled through Europe and lectured about the importance of educating women.

My great-grandmother and my grandmother ran the school for 70 years, from 1868 to 1938. After that, my family left Europe because of Hitler鈥檚 advance into Vienna. When I was 5, my grandmother showed me a typewriter and explained how it worked; this experience led to me become an inventor.

I would collect small devices left around my neighborhood, from broken bicycles to broken radios, and I would put together a compilation of all the devices I found. I had this idea that if I could just figure out how to put things together, I could solve every problem 鈥� how to overcome disease, how to go into outer space.

By the time I was 12, I found computers. While that鈥檚 hardly remarkable today, at that time there weren鈥檛 many computers around.

You have had a large role in inventing a dizzying array of technologies, from the synthesizer to the flatbed scanner. What invention are you most proud of?

I would have to say the reading machine for the blind because it had the biggest impact, in terms of seeing the results of real users. It follows the idea that you can substitute one sense for another.

What is your advice for young people?

It鈥檚 in high school where students first start getting very serious ideas. In the last generation we saw college students who dropped out and started companies like Apple and Google, and we鈥檙e seeing many students doing that today. It鈥檚 really a time to be inventive. Not every invention has to be successful, but we now have technology that enables every age to be creative.

Technology has so many different capabilities, and there are many more opportunities than certainly when I started. I encourage young people to imagine how things could be different if the technology available was a little more advanced, and then try to imagine how the technologies will advance. If you go through my technology projects, each one was done at a time where the technology would be feasible a few years from the date that I conceived of it.

As a futurist, you popularized the idea of singularity, when artificial intelligence overtakes human thinking. Can you talk a little bit about that theory and what you expect the future to look like?

I got into futurism because often inventions are developed at the wrong time. They are created too late 鈥� when many other people have something similar. Or they鈥檙e done too early and you never get where you鈥檙e going in a reasonable amount of time.

But as a futurist, I can talk about where technology will be in five years, 10 years, 20 years. One thing that has become clear to me is that computers will take over human thinking, although not all at once. As computers get more capable, they will ultimately be able to do everything that people can do.

What we have found is that once a computer can do something, such as play a board game, it performs way beyond any human. The expectation is that computers will pass the Turing test, meaning that computers will be able to think like a human, by 2029 and at that point computers actually will do everything that humans can do far better than any human.

People view computers as something we鈥檙e competing with, but we will actually integrate with this intelligence by extending our human neocortex with them. By the early 2030s, I believe we鈥檒l be able to integrate our neocortex to the cloud, which will have advanced AI. And we鈥檒l be able to actually take advantage of that.

There鈥檚 also a very traditional part of you. You are an author who has written best-selling books about the future. What is your process?

I have a certain process of planning for the future, which has to do with exponential growth. It has actually been very accurate. My 2010 essay 鈥淗ow My Predictions Are Faring鈥� examines 147 predictions I made in the 1990s. Eighty-six percent of these predictions were correct to the exact year. The other 14 percent were only off by a few years. Combining this method of prediction with my imagining of how these technologies will actually impact our lives is what goes into my books.

You wrote a book for young people called Danielle: Chronicles of a Superheroine. What is that book about?

The book is designed to be read alongside two companion nonfiction books, which I鈥檝e written. One book is called A Chronicle of Ideas, which presents Danielle鈥檚 unique spin on 482 concepts presented. And the second book is called How You Can Be a Danielle, which is basically a guide to help you become a 鈥淒anielle.鈥�

I grew up with a fundamental belief that the power of human ideas can change the world, and when we find an idea that can overcome a problem, we need to implement it. And that鈥檚 Danielle鈥檚 philosophy.

What advice do you have for young people starting college today or their professional careers?

Some people, like myself, are devoted to inventing. My father was devoted to music since he was 5. Other people don鈥檛 have something they are devoted to yet. My advice to young people is to explore different fields and find something that excites them.

There are so many challenges in the world today. What鈥檚 keeping you up at night these days?

I do worry about the downsides of technology. Biotech, nanotech, artificial intelligence. I do strongly believe that technology is greatly enhancing human life. In my upcoming book, The Singularity Is Nearer, I have a chapter that shows just how dramatically every aspect of human life has improved over the decades and over the centuries. But technology could also be used by a totalitarian state to enforce its power. I think that鈥檚 why it鈥檚 important that we keep the promise of technology in mind.

We are going through a terrible time with the pandemic, but I do think that applying scientific ideas will enable us to get out of this.

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You are an alumnus of STS and ISEF. How did these competitions impact your life?

Both ISEF and STS were very important experiences for me as I was going through high school. I grew up in Iowa, and even though I had a few friends in high school who shared my interest in science, it wasn鈥檛 like everybody shared my interests. Participating in ISEF opened up my view of the world, helping me to realize that there are a lot more people interested in science and technology. Meeting students from around the world, making new friends and instantly connecting with them gave me more confidence about pursuing science.

Participating in science fairs also gave me exposure to a larger breadth of science. It gave me an amazing glimpse of scientific areas that I wasn鈥檛 previously aware of, which reinforced my interest in science.

So you found your people, as they say?

Yes. A lot of the students I met through STS and ISEF became really good friends. By the time I started college at Harvard University, I already knew more than 50 other students who were going to be there because of my experience in these programs. And that was very special.

Let鈥檚 jump forward. You鈥檙e one of the pioneers of CRISPR gene-editing technology. Can you describe that journey?

One of the really exciting advances in biology over the past decade or two has been the completion of the human genome. As scientists started to understand more about how each part of the genome contributes to human health, the idea of being able to treat disease by going into our DNA and fixing it has become more and more tantalizing and urgent.

I was first exposed to genetics in high school when I was lucky enough to work in a gene therapy lab. Back then it was more rudimentary gene therapy, simply using viruses to deliver a gene that would kill cancer cells.

Later, I was excited to develop ways to modify DNA in our genome and started by working on systems that were new at the time, like zinc finger nucleases. Then I began to learn about the real challenges facing gene editing: our inability to correct different genes. When I first learned about CRISPR at a seminar, I got excited because I realized that it was something that could be customized to target a new gene.

So that鈥檚 how I got started. Since then it鈥檚 been really exciting to develop gene editing into a technology and see all the ways that scientists have creatively applied it, from understanding disease and biology to using it in agriculture to improve crops to turning it into a therapeutic. We鈥檙e continuing to develop the technology so that we can make people鈥檚 lives better and make the world a more sustainable place.

You and other researchers have called for a moratorium on human germline editing, which would create genetic changes that would be passed down to future generations. What are your concerns?

CRISPR is a very broadly applicable technology. You can use it in animal cells, human cells and plant cells to make changes to DNA and the potential for correcting DNA in somatic cells has really captured scientists鈥� imagination. These are cells in our body that don鈥檛 give rise to germ cells, meaning that people who receive gene-editing treatments in their somatic cells will not pass those changes on to their children.

The ethically challenging aspect has been the application of gene editing to germ cells, which are cells that give rise to eggs or sperm, or to directly modify newly fertilized embryos to change the DNA in the embryo. Those kinds of changes will lead to transmission of genetic changes to subsequent generations, which could have very large consequences for society.

CRISPR gene editing is still a new technology, and there are open questions about the efficacy or the specificity of the various CRISPR-based tools that are currently available. So technically there are a lot of challenges that prevent me from feeling comfortable using the technology in a human germ line.

Scientifically and morally there are challenges too. Scientifically, because the genome is so complicated, when you make one change it can directly impact other processes in the cell. That complexity makes it challenging to feel comfortable about the results being predictable when it occurs in the context of the developing embryo. And then ethically it is also very challenging because DNA changes could be passed on to future generations. This could have consequences on society or the human race as a whole, one of which could be exacerbated inequality.

I think because of all three challenges 鈥� technically, scientifically and ethically 鈥� it really is important to have a strong moratorium against the use of human germline editing until society forms a consensus regarding how and whether to move forward with the technology. Consensus doesn鈥檛 mean that every single person has to agree, but it does mean that society as a whole will have to have had a thorough and productive discussion around this topic.

You have an important role in academia, but you鈥檙e also an entrepreneur with multiple business ventures. Why do you think it is important to be a part of both worlds?

My parents instilled in me this idea that it鈥檚 important to do something useful for the world, and that鈥檚 the motivation that I bring to the things that I work on. Academic science is great for taking on high-risk projects and using outside-the-box approaches. So, within an academic setting, we can really explore new ways to solve a given problem.

But academic labs are not optimized for developing real-world products that can be directly used to benefit patients鈥� lives. That stage is much more suited for industry. It鈥檚 very expensive to hire experts, run clinical trials and set up large manufacturing processes, and there are more financial resources that are available in industry. Being able to take laboratory research and then expand that into an industrial-scale R&D process is really important for turning laboratory discoveries into useful solutions.

What advice do you have for young people just starting college?

When I was finishing high school and getting ready to go to college, one of my high school teachers gave me a piece of advice that I want to pass on. He said, 鈥淲hen you get to college, figure out who the best teachers are. It doesn鈥檛 matter what the teacher teaches. Go and take a class with him or her, and you will open up your mind to thinking about many more interesting problems.鈥� I took that advice to heart, and it was really the best advice that I could have received. When you encounter a good teacher who can share their passion and excitement for a given area, they can infect you with the same passion.

And what about people who are starting their professional careers? Any advice around that?

As one starts on a professional career, I think it is equally important to find good mentors; someone you can learn from and who will take an interest in helping you develop your own abilities. It also means that you have to be willing to be mentored and keep an open mind.

What books are you reading right now? And what books inspired you when you were young?

This week, I鈥檓 reading Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. When I was young, I read a lot of science fiction, but I think the one that probably was most inspiring for me was actually Jurassic Park. That really got me excited about the potential of molecular biology.

There are so many challenges in the world today. What keeps you up at night?

I think one of the biggest challenges that we face today is climate change, and I think there are a lot of things that we should be and need to be doing to mitigate the potential negative consequences of climate change. That is something that I hope more and more people will start to realize and act on. CRISPR is actually one of the tools that I think can help a bit, particularly in agriculture and the global food supply. Scientists are working on creating more drought-resistant crops, as well as crops that need less water or require fewer pesticides. This could both create a more resilient food supply as our climate changes, while reducing some of the pressure that modern agriculture places on our environment.

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You鈥檙e an STS 2003 and ISEF 2003 alum. How did the competitions affect your life?

When I was a college freshman at Princeton, an Intel researcher reached out to me and asked if I wanted to intern in their Strategic CAD Labs. The lab was made up entirely of Ph.D.s and hadn鈥檛 taken on interns before. The researcher knew of me because of my participation in ISEF and STS, and if it hadn鈥檛 been for my science fair participation, I wouldn鈥檛 have had the opportunity to work there.

Long story short, I loved the experience. I liked the freedom that I had, the opportunity that I had to productively deploy creativity at every turn. And I came away from that experience determined to get a Ph.D. What鈥檚 more, my Intel mentor knew Maria Klawe, who was dean of Princeton University鈥檚 School of Engineering and Applied Science at the time, and recommended that she recruit me for a research project. That kicked off my research career.

Do you have any memorable experiences from the competitions to share?

My ISEF project was awarded an Operation Cherry Blossom Award, which included an all-expense-paid trip to Japan. This took me on an incredible adventure: We went to Tokyo and Yokohama and the ancient capitals of Nara and Kyoto. Part of the trip involved meeting a Japanese princess.

You taught at Stanford before moving to Microsoft. Can you describe how being at Microsoft has been different than a purely academic environment and how that鈥檚 helped you in your career?

In many ways my lab, Microsoft Research Labs New England (MSR), is very much like a university. The researchers here work on whatever they want. We publish everything. We鈥檙e evaluated based on our contributions to our academic communities and to the world.

The main difference is in the extra degree of freedom that we have at MSR. If you want to spend 100 percent of your time doing research, you can do that. If you want to teach courses at neighboring universities, you can do that too. You have the freedom to choose how you want to spend your day, and I think that freedom is very valuable.

I鈥檝e also noticed that the researchers here tend to be very hands-on with their projects and very collaborative. I find myself working not just with my students, interns and postdocs, but also with my talented and experienced labmates. That鈥檚 been a big positive for me. Our lab is somewhat unique in that it was created as a research lab for both computer scientists and social scientists. Some of my colleagues are scholars in economics, communication or anthropology. The lab fits on a single floor, and that proximity breeds collaboration. I find myself working on problems that I hadn鈥檛 even considered before coming to MSR.

How do you recommend students start studying and getting involved in machine learning?

I tell all students to try a data science competition. My first encounter with machine learning was through a competition that Netflix ran when I was a senior in college. Netflix wanted to improve its movie recommendation system, so they released a dataset of 100 million ratings that users had given to various movies. Competitors were challenged to predict how the users would rate other movies in the future. My philosophy is that these public competitions provide a great sandbox for people who are just starting out in machine learning because you get to work with real data on a real problem that someone really cares about. By the end, you鈥檒l understand both the methods and the problem, and you鈥檒l have fun doing it.

There鈥檚 been a lot of talk about artificial intelligence and its influence on humankind. Why do you think students or the public should care about AI?

I think we have to be aware of these technologies so that we can hold them accountable to our standards of fairness and safety. AI is becoming much more pervasive, and it鈥檚 increasingly being incorporated into technologies that impact our everyday lives: self-driving cars, r茅sum茅-screening tools and algorithmic risk-assessment tools that inform bail-release and criminal-sentencing decisions.

I also think that AI holds the potential to help us address some of our biggest challenges like poverty, food scarcity and climate change. What I love most about my field is that these tools have the potential to do real good. I think that鈥檚 something that will excite many students and the public more generally.

Using AI to solve issues like poverty is interesting to think about. I would love to hear more about how this technology can be employed to solve these types of problems.

Take the example of , a nonprofit that gives unconditional cash transfers to the poorest people in the poorest communities. They鈥檙e finding that this leads to sustained increases in assets. However, the on-the-ground process the organization goes through to identify transfer candidates is quite laborious and expensive.

So they鈥檝e been working with experts in machine learning, statistics and data science to automate more of that process. Early work transforms satellite images into predicted poverty heat maps to guide the search of field-workers, and I think we鈥檝e just scratched the surface of what is possible.

What do you feel are the most interesting problems that could be addressed within your field of research?

I鈥檇 love to see the field direct more of its attention and resources to social problems like poverty, hunger and homelessness. There are many open questions in this space. What specific problems could actually benefit from machine learning intervention? How can machine learners work with experts and policy makers to actually affect meaningful change? How do we incentivize our talented students and professional machine learners to work on these problems?

A second, different sort of challenge is responsible deployment. We see that AI is being used already to inform important decisions in society, such as screening r茅sum茅s or determining when people should be released on bail. How do we ensure that those decisions are fair and reflect our societal values? This is an increasingly active area of research in the field.

As a person of color in machine learning, what are your thoughts on bringing more young people of color into this field?

There have been some developments in this direction that I鈥檓 particularly excited about. There鈥檚 a 鈥淏lack in AI鈥� movement now. It鈥檚 bringing people of African ancestry together in this field. Although we might be sparse and distributed, we have a big presence. It鈥檚 been excellent for networking and for encouraging younger people to get involved in machine learning and stay involved. You can learn more about it at  or by searching online for Black in AI.

What books are you reading now? And what books inspired you when you were younger?

I just finished reading Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson, and now I鈥檓 in the middle of American Nations by Colin Woodard.

When I was younger, my three favorite books were Brian Greene鈥檚 The Fabric of the Cosmos, Matt Ridley鈥檚 The Red Queen and Neil Gaiman鈥檚 American Gods.

The world faces so many challenges today. What keeps you up at night?

I would say poverty. I can鈥檛 comprehend how there can be so much wealth in my field, my community and this country, and yet half a million people in the United States are homeless on any given night. One in nine people are malnourished in the world. That just doesn鈥檛 make sense to me.

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You have bachelor鈥檚 degrees in mathematics and women鈥檚 studies from Harvard and you have a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Chicago. Can you tell us about that journey?

I had a very strong interest in a question about math that was poorly represented in the math curriculum. I really wanted to think about the social aspects of knowledge production in math. What I mean by that is, what counts as a fact in math? Who decides? How does a proof work anyway? What are the dynamics of expertise and authority? And so going into college, it seemed very natural to be a math and philosophy major because I wanted to understand how knowledge works. But philosophy turned out not to be the place where you could ask that question in the way that I wanted 鈥� how people in their social formations make the world. So I stumbled on gender studies because the feminist tradition of inquiry engages those same kinds of concerns. Who鈥檚 in power, and how did they get there? These were the kinds of questions that interested me.

You are known for pushing the boundaries of mathematics to address gerrymandering and fairness in voting systems. Can you explain how that work started and what it entails?

A few years ago I found myself in a position to teach voting theory. It was through teaching that I became more educated about how mathematicians have seen voting as a math problem. I also have close friends in the civil rights legal community and was seeing the other side of the impact of voting theory through them.

Two things sealed the deal for me to actually start actively working on voting systems. First, I was hearing about a desperate need for more expert witnesses on quantitative and structural aspects of voting rights litigation. Mathematicians are a big untapped pool of brainpower that likes to chew through these kinds of problems. That, for me, was very motivating. Second, I came to realize that there was still a lot of research-level math to do. When you look at redistricting, a lot of the story has been about the shapes of districts. Shape analysis is something that I already did for a living, and when I started out, I assumed that all the tools and ingredients were in place. But I soon realized that there was a lot of room for new ideas that mathematicians could offer to help move the conversation forward. It was the perfect confluence of factors to make me start working on the issue of gerrymandering full-time.

Moon Duchin poses in front of her Science Talent Search 1993 project, 鈥淎pplications of Minkowski鈥檚 Theorem to Classical Number Theory.鈥�

Photo courtesy of 中文无码 & the Public.

In 2018, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf enlisted you to analyze the state鈥檚 congressional districts for fairness. How were you involved in that case?

During January and February 2018, there was a court-ordered scramble to redo the state鈥檚 congressional district maps, and I was asked to create an analytical framework to understand all the maps proposed by various stakeholders. Pennsylvania has 18 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. A decent estimate of how many ways we could cut the state into 18 pieces and meet all the rules is maybe 10⁸⁰ or 10¹⁰⁰ or more. I would venture that you certainly can鈥檛 hold all those possibilities in your mind at once.

So how are you going to decide what maps are fairest out of that vast wilderness of possibility? I interpreted my role in that kind of question very narrowly. It鈥檚 absolutely not to pick a map, much less get a computer to pick a map. It鈥檚 to put some guardrails on the process so that the maps that are really extreme outliers and provide lots of advantage for one party or racial group can be flagged and made impermissible. And it actually happened. A new map that I rate as very reasonable in its partisan properties was ultimately approved by the state鈥檚 supreme court, and it has already shaken up the Pennsylvania congressional delegation. I ended up working on the science of redistricting at a really interesting and impactful time.

Last year, you helped lead a summer program on redistricting for 52 students from around the world. Tell us about that experience.

I run a gerrymandering working group called the Metric Geometry and Gerrymandering Group, with Justin Solomon (ISEF 2005鈥�2006, STS 2006), an MIT computer science professor. Together we developed a summer research program called the Voting Rights Data Institute (VRDI), which we hope will be an annual tradition. We bring people from all domains together, including social scientists, geographers, political scientists, law and philosophy students, plus of course mathematicians and coders. It鈥檚 inspiring to watch the ways that people can do more together than they can do with their own specialty. (You can read about VRDI and some of our other activities at www.mggg.org.)

You are a mathematics professor and teach young minds. What do you say to your students, particularly women, who are anxious about math?

One thing I try to get across is that math is really a lot more like other fields than its reputation would allow it when it comes to the fact that ideas can be halfway there. Ideas can be valuable even if they don鈥檛 totally solve the problems, and it鈥檚 important to get away from the dogma that if you鈥檙e not immediately right you must be wrong. I also think for some people it is very meaningful when the math can connect to the social and political world. Those things together can be helpful if you鈥檙e anxious. Math is incremental so there鈥檚 lots of room for building up to something big over time, and it鈥檚 useful!

What advice would you give young people just starting college?

I鈥檓 a huge proponent of the American liberal arts model. Some advice I give to people at the college level is to be broad. Don鈥檛 squander that chance. You have decades to specialize and in this one moment you鈥檙e pushed to be really broad, so take your interests wherever they go.

What books are you reading right now?

Right now I鈥檓 reading two books. One of them is called The Color of Law, which is about the history of segregation. It鈥檚 a really interesting book because it makes the case that the forces behind residential segregation go all the way up in government, and that it was ruthlessly applied and enforced. For someone like me who likes to think about how to draw district lines, it鈥檚 essential to understand how people got to be located where they are. I think that may be underappreciated, but it is absolutely fundamental. The logic of districts really depends on segregation in some ways, because it鈥檚 only clustered communities that can be well-captured by compact districts. So those two stories are very intertwined.

The other book I鈥檓 reading right now is Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine. Poetry as social critique!

I am the kind of person who would read and reread and reread a favorite book, especially when I was a teenager. And some of the books that I read obsessively include The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton, which is such a great coming-of-age story, and Frank Herbert鈥檚 over-the-top science fantasy novel Dune. The Outsiders holds up really well in many ways, maybe Dunenot so much. But it was science and politics together, so I was sold.

The world faces so many challenges today. What keeps you up at night?

I think about access to power. I think about the direction of the country and its institutions. These days I think about how people like me who speak a technical language can break out of the lecture format and make meaningful interventions.

 

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1. Did your involvement in the Science Talent Search influence you to pursue 中文无码 or promote 中文无码 to others?

Yes! Participating in the Science Talent Search (STS) had a positive impact on my 中文无码 career in two ways. First, I learned about STS early in my high school career and it was always a goal of mine to apply when I became a high school senior. This motivated me to work hard on my various science projects throughout high school. Second, becoming a semifinalist in the competition gave me a lot of confidence and I鈥檓 sure helped in my college acceptances. I think these high-visibility science competitions play an important role in encouraging young people into 中文无码 fields.

Lina and her lab mate, Katerina Mantzavinou, pictured with their Koch Image Award.

Photo courtesy of Lina Colucci.

Lina with her high school science fair project that made her an STS semi-finalist.

Photo courtesy of Lina Colucci.

2. Tell us more about the Koch Image Award you received. Do you think science is especially ripe for visual imagery/photographing?

I was thrilled when my friend and lab mate, Katerina Mantzavinou, asked me to help photograph her research for the image competition. Katerina鈥檚 PhD work involves developing that can continuously deliver chemotherapy to cancer patients. Continuous, low-dose therapy can be just as efficacious as a few traditional, high-dose boluses but with less toxicity and fewer side effects. The implants are white or transparent so they don鈥檛 necessarily photograph well. We used colorful origami paper and multiple light sources to give the implants both color and interesting shadows.

I think science very often lends itself to beautiful images. Turning science into artwork helps interest the public on topics that might otherwise seem unapproachable.

3. Do you find there is a connection/relationship between art and science?

Absolutely. In both art and science, you use creativity to produce or discover something that has never existed before.

Lina gave a TED Talk about her work with Hacking Medicine.

Photo courtesy of Lina Colucci.

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