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UnDisciplined: The Polar Biologist And The Free Press Policy Expert

Utah Public Radio | By Matthew LaPlante
Published August 17, 2018 at 11:40 AM MDT
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As ice melts, polar bears have to swim ever-farther to find food. Biologist Blaine Griffen's research explores the increasing energy demands this makes on the bears.
National Geographic
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Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Potter Stewart swears in George H.W. Bush as President of the United States. Free spech polict researcher Ellada Gamreklidze tracked the way one of Stewart's off-bench addresses made its way through U.S. case law.
Associated Press
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Blaine Griffen is an associate professor in the College of Life Sciences at Brigham Young University. Among many other things, he studies the response of natural systems to human impacts.
Brigham Young University
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Ellada Gamreklidze works in the Journalism and Communication program at Utah State University. Her recent research traced the impact of a former Supreme Court justice's off-bench address had throughout U.S. case law.
Utah State University

Ellada Gamreklidze examines the ways in which the views of members of the Supreme Court move through time.

Blaine Giriffen studies how polar bears move through water.

Together, we’ll discuss the ways in which old data can offer new clues about our world.

Tags
Programs BiologyJournalismPolicycommunicationFree SpeechEnergyUnDisciplinedswimmingGloabl climate change
Matthew LaPlante
Matthew LaPlante has reported on ritual infanticide in Northern Africa, insurgent warfare in the Middle East, the legacy of genocide in Southeast Asia, and gang violence in Central America. But a few years back, something donned on him: Maybe the news doesn't have to be brutally depressing all the time. Today, he balances his continuing work on more heartbreaking subjects by writing books about the intersection of science, human health and society, including the New York Times best-selling Lifespan with geneticist David Sinclair and the Nautilus Award-winning Longevity Plan with cardiologist John Day. His first solo book, Superlative, looks at what scientists are learning by studying organisms that have evolved in record-setting ways, and his is currently at work on another book about embracing the inevitability of human-caused climate change with an optimistic outlook on the future.
See stories by Matthew LaPlante
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