WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) is excited to announce the expansion of its senior leadership team as the organization enters an ambitious new chapter of science and technology policymaking. 

Erica Goldman and Sara Schapiro have recently joined the FAS leadership team to advance science policy as well as education, workforce, and talent issues respectively:

Erica Goldman joins FAS as Director of Science Policy, after previously helping oversee the Global Council for Science and the Environment (GCSE) in her capacity as Deputy Director. At GCSE, Erica directed a number of initiatives in collaboration with a network of policy and research institutions and diverse groups of scientists to improve the use and uptake of science in environmental decision-making. Erica will help steer FAS and the Day One Project’s strategic efforts to advance science policy across a number of domains. 

Sara Schapiro joins FAS as a Senior Fellow and its first Director of Education, Workforce & Talent. Sara joins FAS after serving as the Vice President of Education at PBS, where she worked to expand educational impact through free, classroom-ready digital resources. Sara brings a depth of expertise and experience to bolster FAS’s capacity to drive progress on innovative education and workforce policy solutions, while helping direct FAS Federal Talent initiatives. Prior to PBS, Sara helped launch “Digital Promise,” an independent, bipartisan nonprofit whose mission is to spur innovation and improve the opportunity to learn for all Americans. 

In addition, two current FAS team members are joining the FAS senior leadership team: 

Jordan Mixter is FAS Director of Operations and Strategy. In this role, Jordan also oversees communications and development, and has shepherded FAS’ operations and staff through its recent leadership transition.

Joshua Schoop is assuming the role of Principal Director for Technology and Innovation and Director for Day One Project. As Deputy Director of the Day One Project, Josh has played a vital role in the initiative’s leadership, strategy, and growth since its inception in 2019. In his new capacity, Josh will help oversee and drive FAS’ efforts across technology and innovation policy. Josh holds a PhD from Tulane University and has spent his career working on applying innovation and research to solve societal challenges. “I cannot imagine anyone better to lead the Day One Project than the person who has been most responsible for so much of its impact” said FAS Chief Executive Officer Daniel Correa.

“These four individuals bring both the vision and entrepreneurial spirit that will help FAS meet the most important challenges of our day with technical expertise and policy impact,” said Dan Correa, CEO.

The Federation of American Scientists is a nonpartisan, nonprofit policy research and advocacy organization founded in 1945 to meet national security challenges with evidence-based, scientifically-driven policy and expertise. 

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WASHINGTON, D.C.– Today the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) announced that the Organ Procurement Organization (OPO) Innovation Cohort is opening up ten years of data to engage in research to increase the rates of lifesaving organ donations every year.

Data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) indicate that improvements in organ recovery practices will lead to at least 7,000 additional lifesaving transplants every year.

Bipartisan Congressional leaders have highlighted the need for accelerated data-driven reforms given COVID-19’s ravaging effects on organs. According to a July 19, 2021 letter led by the Senate Finance Committee and the House Committee on Oversight and Reform:

“The COVID-19 pandemic is exacerbating the need for organs now and creating an urgent health equity issue, as communities of color are disproportionately impacted by the failures of the current organ donation system and the effects of COVID-19.” 

Historically, OPO accountability and data-driven improvement has been hindered by opacity coupled with self-interpreted and self-reported performance data. The OPO Innovation Cohort will make public a trove of data regarding OPO performance, operations, finances, and governance with the goal of informing ongoing federal policymaking toward improving OPO performance and addressing health inequities. The first tranche of data released will be shared with MIT’s Healthy ML Lab and Wilson Lab, and will include case-level performance data, including all unstructured case notes, allowing for never-before-possible analysis of the organ donation process. Detailed data to be shared as part of the OPO Innovation Cohort can be found here. A visualization of OPO performance can be found here.

MIT’s Healthy ML Lab, led by Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi, will review the de-identified case notes of seven OPOs, representing one-sixth of the country, to better understand where and how potential donors are lost, including by race and ethnicity. Dr. Ghassemi’s groundbreaking work will include using natural language processing and sentiment analysis of case notes to better understand the ways variation in care, communication and context might impact organ procurement and utilization. The Wilson Lab, led by Dr. Ashia Wilson, will target estimation of risks and opportunities for organ placement by OPOs to improve utilization and fairness of the organ transplant system. Dr. Wilson’s work specializes in using optimization to improve the efficiency and fairness of machine learning systems, and will bring this expertise to look for opportunities to increase the availability of organs for all demographic groups.

“Working with this data is a first step towards making better decisions about how to save more lives through organ procurement and transplantation. We have an opportunity to use machine learning to understand potential issues and lead improvements in transparency and equity,” said Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi.

“Patients deserve transparency, and this research is even more important given what we are learning about COVID-19’s effects on organs,” said Jennifer Erickson, Senior Fellow, Federation of American Scientists.

The seven organ procurement organizations who are leading in opening up their data include: Donor Network West, Life Connection of Ohio, LiveOn New York, Louisiana Organ Procurement Agency, Mid-America Transplant, OurLegacy, Southwest Transplant Alliance. They have publicly committed to:

• Transparency: public sharing of data/analysis in order to set a standard to which all OPOs can be held;
• Accountability: support for the OPO final rule, and any efforts to move up implementation date so all parts of the country can be served by high-performing OPOs as soon as possible in 2024; and
• Equity: commitment to analyzing/publishing data to ensure all parts of community served.

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WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) announced the selection of Daniel Correa to serve as Chief Executive Officer of FAS. Since January, Dan has served as Acting President of FAS since former President Ali Nouri departed the organization to join the Biden-Harris Administration. 

“As we mark the 75th year of the Federation of American Scientists, we are thrilled to announce that Dan will step up to serve as the organization’s Chief Executive Officer. We are enormously proud of the impact Dan has made in launching and leading the Day One Project at FAS over the past two years and are thrilled he will bring this leadership and commitment to advancing science and technology policy to build on the organization’s accomplishments over the past 75 years,” Gilman Louie and Rosina Bierbaum, Chair and Vice Chair of the Federation of American Scientists Board of Trustees, said in a joint statement.

“It is an immense privilege to step forward to lead the Federation of American Scientists in this new chapter. Seventy-five years ago, the scientists behind the Manhattan Project established FAS to ensure that the fruits of their labor benefited humankind. As we look ahead, FAS has the opportunity to both continue advancing this important work while evolving to meet a range of today’s pressing challenges — from biological and public health threats to the need to bolster a STEM workforce capable of competing in the 21st century economy, to the perils of a changing climate and more. FAS is the perfect home for this critical work where scientific and technical expertise is indispensable to any effective policy response. I am grateful for the opportunity to work with the stellar team at FAS to advance this mission,” Dan Correa said.

Dan Correa joined FAS in 2019 to launch the Day One Project, a nonpartisan initiative focused on developing new ideas across science and technology policy. As Director of the Day One Project, Dan has built a team focused on developing and implementing new ideas in science and technology policy and supporting scientists and technologists that want to step up and serve in government. Prior to this work, Dan served as a Fellow and Director at the Freeman Spogli Institute at Stanford University and as Assistant Director for Innovation Policy at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Dan holds degrees in law and economics from Yale University and a Bachelor of Arts from Dartmouth College.

As CEO of FAS, Dan will be responsible for guiding the organization in a new era of science policymaking, shaping the organization’s vision and overseeing all management including operations, budget, administration, and communications.

“FAS has always been an ‘idea factory’ that helps generate solutions to pressing national problems,” said Steven Aftergood, Director of the FAS Project on Government Secrecy. “Under Dan Correa’s leadership, we know that the organization will extend and expand that problem-solving tradition.

The Federation of American Scientists is a nonpartisan, nonprofit policy research and advocacy organization founded in 1945 to meet national security challenges with evidence-based, scientifically-driven policy and expertise. 

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WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Federation of American Scientists (FAS), in collaboration with Congressman Bill Foster (D, IL-11) and his office, has launched a new Science Council to:

• Scale up the capacity of Members of Congress and their teams for policy work on pressing science and technology (S&T) issues;
• Facilitate the contribution of nonpartisan, evidence-based information into the U.S. policymaking process; and
• Forge trusted, lasting relationships between policymakers and the S&T community.

The Science Council includes seven leading scientists and technologists, specializing in fields such as infectious diseases, artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, and social epidemiology. During the first FAS-convened meeting between the Science Council and Congressman Foster, the experts shared scientific knowledge on many pressing issues, including the COVID-19 pandemic, socioeconomic and racial inequality, and the competitiveness of the U.S. research and development enterprise.

“I am a firm believer that policymakers must work with nonpartisan experts to inform comprehensive and effective policies,” said Congressman Foster. “I am grateful to FAS for launching the Science Council, a model where a team of experts in scientific and technological fields can provide members of Congress with the insights and data to underpin evidence-based policy. I am looking forward to all we will be able to accomplish.”

The Congressman’s Science Council is working to augment the Foster office’s S&T policy capacity by providing on-demand, nonpartisan, evidence-based information, research, and analysis on pressing issues the Foster team is addressing. The Council provides scientific information in plain language, in formats that are tailored to meet the moment (such as briefings, one-pagers, or suggested hearing questions) and suitable for sharing widely with congressional staff and Members of Congress. The experts on the Council can also connect congressional offices with other specialists throughout the S&T community, facilitating access to scientific knowledge on an expansive set of issues.

“The U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic would likely have been more effective if every Member of Congress had had a team of STEM experts on standby, with the ability to rapidly connect with them and their networks to get a true sense of potential scenarios the country could be facing, and learning what it would have taken to minimize deaths, infections, and economic impacts,” said Science Council member Nahid Bhadelia, M.D., M.A.L.D, infectious diseases physician, founding director of Boston University’s Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases Policy and Research, and associate director of the National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories.

FAS modeled Congressman Foster’s Science Council, in part, on PCAST (the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology), and is happy to work with additional congressional offices to build councils tailored to the needs and priorities of individual Members of Congress and their staff. Depending on the preference of the office, council membership can include experts in diverse disciplines spanning the S&T landscape, or be composed of a team of experts focused on one or two core issues, such as infectious diseases, energy, or agricultural practices. FAS is intentional about working to include experts on the councils who are constituents of the Member of Congress, forging powerful connections since the council may be directly affected by pressing issues within the Member’s district or state. As noted in a Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center analysis of the Legislative Branch’s capability to address advancements in S&T, Members of Congress and their staff generally demonstrate a reliance on “regular ‘trusted’ sources in lieu of interrogating the credibility of individual pieces of information produced by that source,” and so establishing a greater number of trusted, lasting relationships between Members of Congress, their teams, and the S&T community can increase the use of science in the policymaking process, bolstering the effectiveness of U.S. public policies.

“Members of Congress have an opportunity to more fully incorporate science-derived information into policy decision-making, helping not only their own constituents, but people all across the U.S., and around the world,” said Michael A. Fisher, Ph.D., FAS senior fellow and director of the Congressional Science Policy Initiative. “Imagine a Congress in which every Senator and Representative is hardwired into the U.S. science community via strong ties with their science council, with on-demand access to evidence-based research and analysis, and how that would improve public policy outcomes.”

The experts serving on Congressman Foster’s Science Council are Danielle Tullman-Ercek, Ph.D., Andrew V. Papachristos, Ph.D., Kiarri N. Kershaw, Ph.D., M.P.H., and Mohanbir Sawhney, Ph.D., M.A. of Northwestern University; Michael V. Volin, Ph.D. of Midwestern University; Fei-Fei Li, Ph.D., M.S. of Stanford University; and Nahid Bhadelia, M.D., M.A.L.D. of Boston University.

For more information regarding FAS’ work to organize and staff science councils for Members of Congress, Dr. Fisher can be reached at sciencepolicy@fas.org.

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WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Federation of American Scientists Acting President Dan Correa released the following statement on President Joe Biden’s proposed $6 trillion budget request to Congress:

“With a global pandemic disrupting the world and highlighting both the strengths and liabilities of the United States’ economy and infrastructure, the Federation of American Scientists commends President Biden on putting forward a budget that would address critical needs, from childcare and paid leave to investing in electric vehicle charging stations. Foundational investments in roads, water pipes, broadband internet, and advanced manufacturing are key to helping our nation rebuild, enhancing national security, and supporting all Americans. Included in the President’s budget request is $7.5 billion to launch Advanced Research Project Agencies for health and climate, representing a generational investment in advancing innovative research and development. Further, the budget includes a $500 million investment in the Technology Modernization Fund, $300 million for research and development in technologies of the future, and an additional $750 million devoted towards upgrading the security of IT, which represent opportunities for the federal government to deliver services more effectively to the American people. The budget request includes a critical $8.7 billion investment to support the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to help prepare for emerging global threats, a necessary national security priority.”

The Federation of American Scientists is committed to ensuring that insights from scientists and technologists are included at policymaking tables. For further information on modernizing technology in government, you can read Scaling Proven IT Modernization Strategies Across the Federal Government, a Day One Proposal by Ann Dunkin and Greg Godbout. For further information on delivering high-speed internet to rural communities, clean infrastructure development, investing in health research, and building a competitive workforce, you can read the Day One Project proposals to Prioritize Funding for High-Speed Internet Connectivity that Rural Communities Can Afford to Adopt by Caroline Stratton, a proposal on Revitalizing the DOE Loan Program Office to Support Clean Infrastructure Development by David Foster, Michael Kearney, and Chris Knittel, a proposal on Creating the Health Advanced Research Projects Agency (HARPA) by Michael Stebbins and Geoff Ling, and a proposal on Responding to the COVID-19 Unemployment Crisis and Meeting the Future of Work Challenge by Marcus Courtney and Adam Bobrow.

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), with financial support from Schmidt Futures, announced that six organ procurement organizations (OPOs) have joined the FAS Organ Procurement Organization Innovation Cohort, committing to use data science and transparency to accelerate improved patient outcomes and to inform ongoing, data-driven policy development. 

This follows the finalization of the bipartisan, scientifically-informed OPO rule that can save more than 7,000 lives each year, and which has been highlighted by both Senate and House leaders as an urgent equity issue. Given COVID-19’s potential to affect and attack organs, coupled with its disproportionate impact on communities of color, the need for reform is only intensifying.

Through the Federation of American Scientists, the OPO Innovation Cohort will share data to establish open and transparent lines of communication between OPOs as nonprofit government contractors and the public they serve, including branches of the federal government, in an effort to build trust and support further reforms that will save patient lives. (See data visualization from the OPO final rule here.)

Working with alumni from the United States Digital Service, over the next 12 months the Innovation Cohort will leverage the most granular OPO data ever shared with external researchers to inform ongoing policy development at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and in Congress. During a transformative period in the organ procurement industry, the Innovation Cohort will help shape the future of organ recovery in America, improving OPO practice and informing OPO policy. Most importantly, the Innovation Cohort will help return OPOs to their core mission by singly focusing on striving toward new heights of operational excellence in order to increase organ transplants in an effort to best serve the public, organ donors, donor families and patients waiting for transplants.

In the coming months, the FAS OPO Innovation Cohort will share additional de-identified, retrospective data with the Federation of American Scientists to be published openly – including all referrals for donation made to the OPOs with every outcome documented, audits of hospital-level deaths, OPO financials (including organ acquisition charges), procurement and organ recovery data from organ recovery centers, and staffing models – and will work actively to source data science partners and researchers to mine these datasets for performance improvement insights.

“COVID-19’s ravaging effect on organs has further increased the urgency of accelerating accountability for the government’s contractors in organ donation. Transparency is a critical first step, and the Federation of American Scientists applauds today’s commitments from six OPO leaders to break from their peers and prioritize patients and the public interest.”

Federation of American Scientists Acting President Dan Correa

“So many of the problems and inefficiencies of the organ waiting list are solvable, but we need a new, data-driven approach. We look forward to seeing how the OPO Innovation Cohort, paired with interdisciplinary talent, can bring transformational change to a sector in dire need of it.”

Schmidt Futures Managing Director and Head of Partnerships Kumar Garg

 

The six OPO CEOs below have underscored their commitment to the following principles:

• Transparency: public sharing of data/analysis in order to set a standard to which all OPOs can be held;
• Accountability: support for the OPO final rule, and any efforts to move up implementation date so all parts of the country can be served by high-performing OPOs as soon as possible in 2024; and
• Equity: commitment to analyzing/publishing data to ensure all parts of community served.

Diane Brockmeier, Mid-America Transplant

Helen Irving, LiveOnNY

Ginny McBride, Our Legacy

Patti Niles, Southwest Transplant Alliance

Kelly Ranum, Louisiana Organ Procurement Agency

Matthew Wadsworth, LifeConnection of Ohio

 

Further, as the House Committee on Oversight and Reform is investigating “poor performance, waste, and mismanagement in organ transplant industry”, the OPOs in the FAS OPO Innovation Cohort offer themselves as a resource for Congressional staff, noting their commitment to transparency, accountability, and equity, setting a standard to which all OPOs should be held. The participating OPOs have informed AOPO that they are leaving AOPO, noting the Committee’s investigation into AOPO’s “lobbying against life-saving reforms.”

A full visualization of the final rule from Bloom can be viewed here.

The Federation of American Scientists is pleased to introduce Fall 2020 Scoville Fellow, Ishan Sharma. The Herbert Scoville Jr. Peace Fellowship, established in 1987, is a highly-competitive national program that provides recent college and graduate school alumni with the opportunity to work on key issues of peace and security in Washington, D.C.

Ishan will be working on issues at the intersection of emerging technologies and international security, as well as global biosecurity. From artificial intelligence, surveillance, Internet governance, and China-US cyber strategies, his wide array of interests and skills will be fostered at FAS through various research projects and publications. 

“The exponential increase in the power of science and technology brings with it a tremendous amount of good, but also opens the door for certain individuals, non-state actors, and even governments to misuse those advances for nefarious purposes,” said FAS President Ali Nouri. “We are thrilled to have Ishan Sharma from the prestigious Scoville fellowship, working to reduce those risks.” “I don’t know of many recent college graduates that have the privilege of leading their own research and writing projects.” Ishan said about his placement at FAS. “I am looking forward to working closely with FAS staff and leadership team on this exciting project.”

Ishan Sharma

Recently, Ishan won the New America U.S. Security Policy essay contest, for his proposal that counters digital authoritarianism by imagining a liberal-democratic model of AI surveillance. The article, which will be published soon, is best summarized by Ishan himself: 

“AI surveillance is a technology that isn’t going away anytime soon. Bans are a temporary fix, and in the meantime, China is exporting the technology across the world to empower digital authoritarians to crush dissent. It is incumbent upon the U.S.—the world’s technological powerhouse–not only to produce cutting-edge tech but to work with our allies to design global models for ethical use. And it starts on our home turf.”

Former Scoville Fellows have gone on to pursue graduate degrees in international relations and related fields and have taken prominent positions in peace and security with public-interest organizations, the federal government, academia, and more. To date, 193 fellowships have been awarded.

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Washington, DC, June 30, 2020

Mr. Doug Parker
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
American Airlines

Mr. Scott Kirby
Chief Executive Officer
United Airlines

Dear Mr. Parker and Mr. Kirby,

As representative of an organization dedicated to a safe and more secure world, I write to express my strong concerns about your recent decisions to return to booking your airlines’ flights to capacity.

COVID-19 spreads easily and is deadly — as of Tuesday afternoon on June 30th, there have been over 2.6 million confirmed infections and, tragically, more than 126,000 deaths in the US alone. The coronavirus — SARS-CoV-2 — is primarily spread “through respiratory droplets produced when an infected person coughs, sneezes, or talks,” and some of those droplets are aerosolized, remaining airborne for tens of minutes. Moreover, COVID-19 can be transmitted efficiently “by people who are not showing symptoms.” These factors make it all the more critical to follow public health guidance.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that people put at least six feet of distance between themselves and those outside of their households, in addition to taking other preventative measures such as covering the mouth and nose with a cloth face cover when around others. Even air travel at 50 percent capacity, or flights with middle seats left open, while not allowing six feet of distance between people, would be better than nothing.

In light of all this, your decisions to book flights to capacity place your crew and your passengers in excessive danger. That’s why it is also drawing criticism from government experts. The country’s top two federal public health officials — Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Dr. Robert Redfield, CDC director — described your actions as problematic and deeply disappointing at today’s Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing.

For all of these reasons, I urge you to immediately reverse your decision and to protect your passengers and crew from COVID-19 to the extent possible.

Ali Nouri, PhD

President, Federation of American Scientists

The Federation of American Scientists is proud to announce that Hans Kristensen, Nuclear Information Project director, is honored as a Carnegie Corporation of New York 2020 Great Immigrant, Great American.

The Great Immigrant, Great American initiative is a tribute to its namesake, the Scottish-American industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, and recognizes American immigrants who have contributed greatly to American life in a variety of fields. Honorees like Hans Kristensen demonstrate an exceptional commitment to excellence in fields of research, art, medicine, entrepreneurship, and more. 

Kristensen oversees the Nuclear Information Project, called by the Washington Post “one of the most widely sourced agencies for nuclear warhead counts,” which publishes the world-famous Nuclear Notebook and SIPRI overview of world nuclear forces. He is a frequent consultant to and is widely referenced in national and international news media on the role and status of nuclear weapons.

“I’m deeply honored and humbled to receive this award. As a nuclear weapons analyst, you don’t get many,” said Kristensen upon receiving the award. “So as a newly naturalized citizen, this award is double meaningful to me.”

“When it comes to striving for a safer world, Hans Kristensen is a national treasure. He is a testament to all the ways immigrants make our country great. FAS and the United States are lucky to have him,” FAS President Ali Nouri said about Kristensen. 

Gilman Louie, FAS Chairman and member of the US National Security Commission for Artificial Intelligence, said: “In the great tradition of the Federation of American Scientists, Hans has made the world safer by increasing public transparency on global nuclear forces and proliferation. Hans brought his exceptional analytic skills to better this country and is the embodiment of a great American and scholar, well deserving of this award.”

Rosina Bierbaum, FAS Vice Chair, former White House science advisor, and UMD Professor, said: “American science is strong because of the influx of talent and scholarship from other countries working together to improve the human condition and Hans Kristensen is the embodiment of great American science. For four decades, Hans has worked to ‘foresee and forestall’ the threat of nuclear weapons around the world. He is most deserving of this recognition.”

Joan Rohlfing, President and Chief Operating Officer of Nuclear Threat Initiative, said: “Congratulations to Hans Kristensen for this well-deserved recognition. His outstanding research, analysis and advocacy has been essential to greater public understanding and debate on reducing global nuclear threats, a critical step toward a safer world.”

Frank von Hippel, former FAS Chair and Princeton University Professor, said: “This award is richly deserved. Hans Kristensen is probably the most cited analyst in the nuclear arms control community. He and his collaborators provide authoritative and regularly updated assessments of  the nuclear weapons and ‘delivery vehicles’ of all the nuclear-weapon states and make key contributions to the literature on such subjects.”

Sharon K. Weiner, American University Associate Professor and former White House Office of Management and Budget analyst, said: “Hans Kristensen is one of the most highly regarded nuclear weapons analysts in the world, and his work serves as a constant key reference point for international efforts aimed at understanding, explaining, reducing and eliminating the threat from nuclear weapons to humankind and the planet. He is a national treasure.”

For more information about the Great Immigrant, Great American award, to see the full 2020 cohort, and past recipients, visit the Carnegie Corporation of New York’s website here.

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The demonstrations that we are witnessing across the nation are in direct response to police violence and to systemic racism that has plagued this country from its birth.

All officers responsible for the senseless killing of George Floyd — which follows a pattern of police brutality against countless other black Americans — must be fully prosecuted under the law.

Justice for George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and other victims will be one step in a long process that is required to bring healing to the country.

The Federation of American Scientists stands with black Americans who have endured centuries of institutional racism that has contributed to everything from disproportionate negative health outcomes in the midst of a pandemic to the killing of unarmed individuals by those who are sworn to protect them.

FAS was created to promote peace and stability throughout the world. As such, we must redouble our own efforts to fight all forms of racism, and to strive for diversity and inclusiveness in our own organization and throughout our community.

Washington, DC, March 18, 2020

Today, the Federation of American Scientists, the Governance Lab at New York University Tandon School of Engineering, and the State of New Jersey  Office of Innovation launched a free interactive tool to help answer the public’s questions on COVID-19 virus in English and Spanish. 

“Ask a Scientist,” located at covid19.fas.org offers answers to questions about the nature of the virus, public health data on the outbreak, guidance on how to protect against contracting the virus, and even information for travellers. All the content is sourced from WHO, CDC, and other reliable and verified sources, researched and edited for readability and clarity by a team of scientific experts. 

“We are in the midst of what could become the greatest infectious disease outbreak of our time,” FAS President Ali Nouri says about the new collaboration. “The public deserves science-based information during this crisis and we’re proud of this partnership to provide that.” 

To use the service, a person types in a question. If they don’t find the answer they need, they can click “Ask a Scientist” and receive a researched answer by a team of FAS researchers and a crowdsourced network of vetted science experts led by the National Science Policy Network. Every answer is sourced, cited and dated to ensure accuracy and timeliness. Answers are then added to the knowledge base for the benefit of others.

“We are getting all hands on deck, and engaging a global volunteer network of scientists, journalists and other experts to lend their know how to provide rapid and accurate information that will help slow the spread of this disease and mitigate its impact,” says Professor Beth Simone Noveck, Director of the Governance Lab at the NYU Tandon School of Engineering and Chief Innovation Officer for the State of New Jersey.

In addition to providing the public with key information on COVID-19 virus, Ask a Scientist is also designed to dispel myths and disinformation on coronavirus that is circulating online and on social media. 

Ask a Scientist will also be live on the Amazon Alexa by the end of the week. Just say “Alexa, Ask a Scientist” followed by your COVID-19 questions to access the service by voice. 

To visit Ask a Scientist, click here.

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