The US government has imposed a freeze on $22 billion in multi-year grants to Harvard University after it rejected demands that it change the hiring, admissions and other policies on anti-Semitism on its campus. Harvard said it has taken steps to address the issue. In March, the government had announced an investigation into 60 universities for allegedly failing to protect Jewish students.
Learn more →A student at US’ Columbia University, Mahmoud Khalil, who participated in last year’s pro-Palestinian protests on campus was arrested by immigration officials on Saturday. Trump said that Khalil’s arrest is “the first of many to come” of students “who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity”. This comes after Trump signed executive order in January, which cites a federal law authorizing the deportation of any foreign national.
Learn more →A recent Nature report found that over the last decade, the proportion of published articles in a year that have been retracted has trebled. The report was provided with the data from three technology firms, as well as countries and journals associated with retracted articles. Over the years, the number of retracted articles by the firms is more than the Retraction Watch data set they build on.
Learn more →Researchers at US’ Washington University have used cancer-derived mitochondria to “reverse cancer-related cell death.” The mitochondria in cancerous tumors were less able to divide and more likely to commit cell’suicide’, the team showed in cellular models. In mice with cancer, cancerous TILs that had imbibed alien mitochondria showed signs of T cell exhaustion, the loss of cancer-killing potential.
Learn more →Dennis Torswats, the man who swatted a child’s phone in US’ Seattle last year, said that children should be taught what they don’t know. In his latest interview with Wired, Torswats said, “It’s taking money that would ordinarily be used for welfare checks to Jews and bankers…and it’s being spent on searching schools.” He added that he made the hoax calls partly for fame.
Learn more →US-based NPR is asking students to record a podcast for a story on NPR’s ‘Morning Edition’ or ‘All Things Considered’, between three and eight minutes in length. The students will be interviewed by the NPR team. The entries should be original work by students. “Pre-recorded music cannot be used,” NPR said, adding that students can use live performances of public domain songs.
Learn more →Australia has fallen to 12th position in the 2019-2024 Nature Index ranking of the world’s top 100 research institutions. This comes after the government announced that it would no longer fund all Australian universities and colleges under a ‘University Accord’ scheme. The government also cut funding for public and private research by a total of AU$900 million between 2016-2019.
Learn more →US President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday nominated Linda McMahon to lead the Department of Education. She served as the head of US Small Business Administration during Trump’s first term in office and will be taking over as Secretary of Education. McMahon said she will fight tirelessly to expand ‘Choice’ to every state in America and empower parents to make the best education decisions for their families.
Learn more →The University of Hull has proposed to stop teaching chemistry from the academic year 25th to 26th of the following century. In July, the UK’s Office for Students (OS) tendered a contract for financial-management consultancy firms to take over universities that become insolvent. OS said that universities should close departments that aren’t popular with students.
Learn more →The FBI has said that it received several anonymous tips about online threats to commit a school shooting at an unidentified location and time. The threats contained photos of guns. In a post on X, the FBI said that it received “several anonymous tips about online threats to commit a school shooting at an unidentified location and time”.
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