Category: The Conversation – USA

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Scott Solomon, Teaching Professor of BioSciences, Rice University

The central premise of the blockbuster film “Project Hail Mary” is a long-shot mission with a familiar goal: Save humanity from extinction. While the details of the threat facing humanity are new to this story, moviegoers are used to bingeing on popcorn while watching a heroic quest to save the Earth from certain doom. And like so many popular movies of this genre, from “Armageddon” to “Interstellar,” the hero’s journey involves a seemingly impossible mission into space.

The film’s release is well timed for the new era of space exploration. NASA’s Artemis II mission, which launched on April 1, 2026, is sending four astronauts around the Moon on a path that will take them deeper into space than any humans have ever traveled.

The flyby mission is primarily about testing equipment for a lunar landing in 2028. But the broader plan was outlined in detail in March 2026 by NASA officials: to establish a permanent base on the Moon.

NASA is not alone in its lunar ambitions. Private space companies SpaceX and Blue Origin are developing next-generation spacecraft, rovers and drones to facilitate the American Moon base. And other nations, notably China, are working toward their own lunar outposts.

These nations and corporations see the Moon as a stepping stone toward more ambitious goals: a major human migration into deep space, including Mars.

Given the moment, it’s worth reflecting on what those investing billions in human space exploration, whether tax dollars or private funds, are trying to accomplish. As a biologist, I recognize the limitations of humans as space explorers. As I explain in my book, “Becoming Martian: How Living in Space Will Change Our Bodies and Minds,” while biologists have learned a lot about how the conditions of space affect the human body and mind, sending people on longer missions deeper into space will expose people to unknown health risks.

Boldly going

Plans to send people to the Moon and beyond are accelerating. NASA’s new administrator, Jared Isaacman, has argued that beating China to the Moon is a matter of national security, calling the Moon “the ultimate high ground.” He has also promoted the economic benefits of establishing a space economy that includes mining and manufacturing on the Moon.

Subcommittees in both the House and Senate have passed bills to codify these initiatives into law – making the goal of creating a permanent base on the Moon official U.S. policy. They appear to have bipartisan support, and votes in both houses of Congress are expected soon.

The United States and China are targeting landing humans on Mars in the 2030s, with the intention of building infrastructure that enables long-term habitation.

In March 2026, NASA also announced that the agency intends to test nuclear propulsion during an uncrewed flight to Mars in 2028. Nuclear-powered rockets have the potential to substantially reduce the time it takes to reach Mars, which would make crewed flight to the red planet more feasible.

Humans or robots?

But why do people need to go to Mars? As with the Moon, the purported motivations for both the U.S. and China establishing a human presence on Mars are scientific, economic and geopolitical. Yet these are distinct objectives that are often conflated.

In terms of science, NASA has had dramatic success with its Mars rovers, including the discovery last year of a potential biosignature that could be the best evidence yet that the planet was once home to microbial life.

Robotic missions also have a lower price tag and a higher acceptable risk margin than human missions. While Isaacman remains publicly committed to the Artemis program and its human spaceflight goals, the agency’s plan also includes a suite of robotic missions to the Moon’s surface it hopes to develop in partnership with companies, universities and international partners.

Likewise, some economic objectives, such as establishing mining and manufacturing facilities, could be accomplished using AI-equipped robots, such as those Tesla is developing. Robots are a long way from being able to accomplish the full range of tasks that a human can do, but prioritizing robotic activities could lower the exposure that people have to the hazards of space.

If having people on the Moon and Mars is indeed necessary to achieve these objectives, let’s be clear about the risks that the people undertaking these missions will be assuming.

Space and the human body

While scientists have learned a lot about how space affects the body during the six decades of human spaceflight, there are still significant blind spots. Among them are the effects of deep-space radiation.

The 24 Apollo astronauts who traveled to the Moon are the only people who have ever been past the Van Allen radiation belts, an area of space surrounding our planet formed by Earth’s magnetic field.

By trapping radiation from the Sun and from deep space, our planet’s magnetic field is part of what makes Earth habitable for us and other life forms. The Moon and Mars lack magnetic fields, so radiation levels on their surfaces are substantial. NASA researchers are now conducting experiments on rodents using simulated galactic cosmic rays, which are largely blocked by Earth’s magnetic fields. Preliminary results suggest that this type of radiation may impair cognitive abilities, but the actual effects on people are unknown.

Similarly, while medical researchers know that floating in a zero-g environment causes muscle atrophy and bone density loss during long stays on the International Space Station, they know relatively little about how partial gravity affects muscles and bones. The Moon has one-sixth the gravity of Earth, and Mars has a little over one-third.

Pilots on Earth can simulate partial gravity for up to 30 seconds at a time during parabolic flights, but only the 12 Apollo astronauts who walked on the Moon have ever experienced it for longer than that. The longest they stayed was about three days. Scientists can only speculate about whether prolonged exposure to the partial gravity of the Moon or Mars would have consequential health effects.

Human interest

Sending robots to space avoids having to deal with risks to human health. But there are downsides. Not only do robotic space missions have fewer capabilities than crewed missions, they often fail to capture interest and imagination and demonstrate national prestige in the same way that human missions can.

The four members of the Artemis crew will captivate people worldwide watching their daring mission around the Moon, much like moviegoers root for Ryan Gosling’s character in “Project Hail Mary” as he boldly seeks to save humanity from certain doom on the big screen.

That human interest is the common link that ties together public and private space ambitions worldwide. While robotic missions are more practical and cost effective, they simply don’t inspire the masses the way a human crew can. Beyond achieving any economic, political or scientific goals, space exploration is ultimately about people doing difficult things.

This article was updated with news of the launch of Artemis II.

I am the author of the book Becoming Martian published by MIT Press

– ref. From Artemis II to ‘Project Hail Mary’, spaceflight captures audiences when it centers on people because human space travel is hazardous – https://theconversation.com/from-artemis-ii-to-project-hail-mary-spaceflight-captures-audiences-when-it-centers-on-people-because-human-space-travel-is-hazardous-279147

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Marcia Zug, Professor of Family Law, University of South Carolina

The first parents convicted of involuntary manslaughter for a mass school shooting committed by their child were Jennifer and James Crumbley. The Crumbleys were convicted in 2024, after their 15-year-old son Ethan killed four students at Oxford High School in Michigan in 2021.

In March 2026, Colin Gray became the first parent convicted of murder for a mass shooting carried out by his child. His son, Colt, 14, killed two students and two teachers in 2024 at Apalachee High School in Georgia.

Critics of the Crumbley and Gray decisions worry that holding parents responsible for school shootings may lead to parental accountability for a broad range of children’s actions.

This is possible, but I believe it is unlikely.

That’s because parents already have long been held liable for the actions of their children, as Baylor law professor Dyllan Taxman notes. The previous failure to find parental liability for gun dangers was the exception.

But even if the Crumbley and Gray convictions do not portend the beginning of parental convictions for a new and wide-ranging category of parental actions, they do suggest a growing belief that parents who allow their children easy access to guns are dangerous and unfit.

As a family law scholar, I think this changing view about parental gun ownership may have significant ramifications for parents in other legal contexts, most notably custody determinations.

Guns and best interests

Child custody decisions in the U.S. are based on a court’s determination regarding the “best interest of the child.” Irresponsible gun ownership can be a factor in such conclusions, but historically such considerations have been rare.

This absence is shocking given the well-documented dangers that unsecured firearms pose. Since 2020, firearms have been the leading cause of death for children between the ages of 1 and 19. The statistic includes accidental shootings as well as homicides and suicides. The vast majority of child gun deaths occur at home. And more than 4.6 million children live in a home with at least one unlocked and loaded firearm.

The failure to routinely consider parental gun practices, including gun storage and children’s access, in custody determinations is notable – not just because unsecured guns pose a significant danger to children, but because other less substantial risks regularly factor into custody decisions.

Perceived moral dangers, such as a child’s exposure to profanity or a parent’s nonmarital relationship, are common factors in custody determinations. Similarly, exposure to secondhand smoke or a child’s obesity are also frequent considerations.

Consequently, while the consideration of parental gun behaviors is not entirely absent from custody decisions, its relative rarity suggests a deliberate unwillingness to link them with parental fitness considerations.

The Crumbley and Gray convictions suggest this reluctance may be waning.

Loss of custody as a deterrent

School shootings are relatively rare, but custody disputes are not.

Consequently, if irresponsible gun ownership becomes a common consideration in custody decisions, the implications for gun safety could be substantial. That’s because this approach avoids the pitfalls of previous gun control attempts.

Unlike other gun safety measures, the consideration of gun ownership in custody cases largely avoids Second Amendment concerns regarding the constitutional right to bear arms. As William & Mary law professor James Dwyer notes, in child custody cases the state operates “outside the bounds of the (Constitution) … to the extent of being freed from the restrictions ordinarily generated by the constitutional rights of others.”

The result is that constitutionally protected behaviors are frequently considered in custody decisions.

In the 2011 South Carolina case Purser v. Owens, for instance, the family court considered the mother’s abortion in its best-interest analysis and held that having an abortion demonstrated the mother was irresponsible and thus unfit.

In the 2003 Virginia case Roberts v. Roberts, a father lost custody for his statements that women cannot do what men do.

And in the 1985 Colorado case In re Marriage of Short, a court affirmed parents’ religious beliefs are a relevant factor in custody determinations.

As these cases demonstrate, the fact that some harmful parental behaviors are also constitutional rights doesn’t mean they’re excluded from custody determinations.

A second benefit of raising gun ownership in a custody dispute is that the parent raising this issue does not need to be a gun control advocate. They don’t need to dislike guns, and they can even be a gun owner themselves.

For gun ownership to become relevant, a parent simply needs to argue that the other parent’s gun practices are irresponsible compared to their own. If this increases a parent’s custody prospects, it can be assumed many parents will make this argument.

Parents are paying attention

For parents facing accusations of irresponsible gun practices, the potential loss of custody should provide a strong incentive for modifying their gun behavior.

Case law demonstrates that parents routinely refrain from behaviors that could hurt their custody case. And there is every reason to expect the same result with gun ownership.

Importantly, the Gray case already proved that parents are paying attention to these trends. During his trial, it was revealed that about a week before the September 2024 shooting, Gray’s estranged wife – and Colin Gray’s mother – Marcee Gray, did an internet search for “school shooter parents charged with manslaughter.”

Then, after reading articles about the Crumbley cases’ convictions, she called Colin and asked him to secure his guns. Although Colin ignored his wife’s warning, the next parent might listen, especially when the warning is coming from a divorce attorney.

Should irresponsible gun ownership become a common factor in custody disputes, parents will be advised to secure their guns, and many will heed this advice, I believe. The Crumbley conviction almost prevented Colt Gray’s access to firearms.

Marcia Zug does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Irresponsible parental gun ownership could become a factor in custody disputes – https://theconversation.com/irresponsible-parental-gun-ownership-could-become-a-factor-in-custody-disputes-278251

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Jonathan Entin, Professor Emeritus of Law and Adjunct Professor of Political Science, Case Western Reserve University

The 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence isn’t the only important anniversary in 2026. This year also marks the 75th anniversary of an extraordinary case of student activism that helped lead to the Supreme Court’s decision outlawing segregated schools.

In April 1951, 16-year-old Barbara Rose Johns organized a student strike to protest the shabby conditions and inadequate education at her segregated Black high school in Prince Edward County, Virginia.

Prince Edward County is located about 65 miles southwest of Richmond and around 30 miles east of Appomattox, or 48 kilometers, in a part of Virginia known as Southside. African Americans constituted almost half the population, but they were largely prevented from voting before passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965 and could not eat in local restaurants before passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The public schools were segregated, and for decades there was no Black high school at all.

In 1939, following years of pressure by Black residents, the white authorities opened a high school for African Americans. That segregated institution was named for Robert Roosa Moton, who had been raised in Prince Edward County and served as an administrator at Hampton Institute in Virginia before being appointed as the second head of Tuskegee Institute following the death of Booker T. Washington.

The new building became severely overcrowded almost immediately. Although it was designed for a maximum enrollment of 180, attendance reached 219 the year after it opened and 377 in 1947.

The following year, the school board put up three temporary outbuildings to accommodate the overflow. Many Black residents scorned these buildings as “tar paper shacks” because of their covering and dilapidated condition. They had inefficient wood stoves that provided limited heating, and their thin walls often leaked when rain fell.

The shabbiness of these interim structures became a source of continuing tension, as negotiations between the Black community and white authorities for a more permanent facility dragged on inconclusively into early 1951.

Johns makes her move

As an 11th grader at Moton High School, Johns began talking with some of her fellow students about taking action to protest the shacks and improve their education.

On April 23, 1951, someone lured Moton’s principal, Boyd Jones, out of the building on the pretext that two students were in trouble elsewhere in town. After Jones left, Johns summoned the student body to the auditorium, where she exhorted her peers to walk out to protest the deplorable condition of their school.

Johns also sent a letter to Oliver W. Hill and Spottswood W. Robinson III, two Richmond civil rights lawyers who worked closely with the NAACP, asking for their legal assistance.

The strike went on for two weeks. During that time, Hill and Robinson met twice with hundreds of students and parents. The meetings grew out of the lawyers’ initial skepticism about litigating over school conditions in rural Prince Edward County, where they feared that plaintiffs would be subject to severe physical and economic retaliation.

Those meetings persuaded Hill and Robinson that the Black community broadly supported an effort to obtain desegregation rather than mere improvements in the separate Black schools. The lawyers therefore filed their lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia on behalf of scores of Black students and parents, alleging that segregated schools violated the 14th Amendment.

Victory – and messy history

Johns’ initiative had both short- and long-term consequences.

In the immediate aftermath of the strike, the all-white school board fired Jones, whom they regarded as having put the students up to their activism despite his – and the students’ – insistence that the whole affair was a student initiative.

The lawsuit – and other similar suits filed in South Carolina, Delaware and Kansas – failed in the lower court. The plaintiffs appealed to the Supreme Court, which reversed those judgments and ruled in the consolidated case called Brown v. Board of Education that segregated public schools were unconstitutional.

Meanwhile, in the wake of the student strike at Moton, Johns’ family feared that she would be in physical danger if she remained in Prince Edward County for her senior year. They sent her to live with her uncle Vernon Johns, a minister and outspoken civil rights advocate, in Montgomery, Alabama.

Johns graduated from Drexel University and worked for many years as a public school librarian in Philadelphia before her death in 1991.

The post-Brown history of Prince Edward County is very complicated. White authorities closed the public schools for five years to avoid desegregation. For a long time afterward, virtually all the white children went to a private academy that opened when the public schools closed.

But that messy history cannot detract from the courage and impact of Barbara Johns.

In December 2025, her statue replaced that of Robert E. Lee as one of the two Virginians displayed in the U.S. Capitol. Johns is there – along with George Washington.

Jonathan Entin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. 75 years after she led a student strike that helped end school segregation, Barbara Rose Johns now stands in the US Capitol where Robert E. Lee once did – https://theconversation.com/75-years-after-she-led-a-student-strike-that-helped-end-school-segregation-barbara-rose-johns-now-stands-in-the-us-capitol-where-robert-e-lee-once-did-273531

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Christine Keiner, Chair of the Department of Science, Technology, and Society, Rochester Institute of Technology

With the world struggling to get oil supplies moving from the Middle East, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich raised eyebrows with a social media post highlighting a radical idea: Use nuclear bombs to cut a new channel along a route that would avoid Iranian threats in the Strait of Hormuz.

Gingrich’s March 15, 2026, post linked to an article that labeled itself as satire. Gingrich has not clarified whether his endorsement was serious. But he is old enough to remember when ideas like this were not only taken seriously but actually pursued by the U.S. and Soviet governments.

As I discuss in my book, “Deep Cut: Science, Power, and the Unbuilt Interoceanic Canal,” the U.S. version of this project ended in 1977. At the time, Gingrich was launching his political career after working as a history and environmental studies professor.

Improving global trade and geopolitical influence

The idea for a new canal to move oil from the Middle East had emerged two decades earlier, in the context of another Middle East conflict, the Suez crisis. In 1956, Egypt seized the Suez Canal from British and French control. The canal’s prolonged closure caused the price of oil, tea and other commodities to spike for European consumers, who depended on the shipping shortcut for goods from Asia.

But what if nuclear energy could be harnessed to cut an alternative canal through “friendly territory”? That was the question asked by Edward Teller, the principal architect of the hydrogen bomb, and his fellow physicists at the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory in Livermore, California.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administration had already begun promoting atomic energy to generate electricity and to power submarines. After the Suez crisis, the U.S. government expanded plans to harness “atoms for peace.”

Project Plowshare advocates, led by Teller, sought to use what they called “peaceful nuclear explosions” to reduce the costs of large-scale earthmoving projects and to promote national security. They envisioned a world in which nuclear explosives could help extract natural gas from underground reservoirs and build new canals, harbors and mountainside roads, with minimal radioactive effects.

To kick-start the program, Teller wanted to create an instant harbor by burying, and then detonating, five thermonuclear bombs in an Indigenous village in coastal northwestern Alaska. The plan, known as Project Chariot, generated intense debate, as well as a pioneering environmental study of Arctic food webs.

Teller and the Livermore physicists also worked with the Army Corps of Engineers to study the possibility of using nuclear explosions to build another waterway in Panama. Fearing that the aging Panama Canal and its narrow locks would soon be rendered obsolete, U.S. officials had called for building a wider, deeper channel that wouldn’t require any locks to raise and lower the ships along its route.

A sea-level canal would not only fit bigger vessels; it would also be simpler to operate than the lock-based system, which required thousands of employees. Since the early 1900s, U.S. canal workers and their families had lived in the Canal Zone, a large strip of land surrounding the waterway. Panamanians increasingly resented having their country split in two by the racially segregated, colony-like zone.

Crossing Central America

Nuclear explosions appeared to make a new sea-level canal financially feasible. The greatest impetus for the so-called Panatomic Canal occurred in January 1964, when violent anti-U.S. protests erupted in Panama. President Lyndon B. Johnson responded to the crisis by agreeing to negotiate new political agreements with Panama.

Johnson appointed the Atlantic-Pacific Interoceanic Canal Study Commission to determine the best site to use nuclear explosions to blast a seaway between the two oceans. Funded by a $17.5 million congressional appropriation – the equivalent of around $185 million today – the five civilian commissioners focused on two routes: one in eastern Panama and the other in western Colombia.

The Panamanian route spanned forested river valleys of the Darién isthmus and reached 1,100 feet above sea level. To excavate this landscape, engineers proposed setting off 294 nuclear explosives along the route, in 14 separate detonations, using the explosive equivalent of 166.4 million tons of TNT.

This was a mind-blowing amount of energy: The most powerful nuclear weapon ever tested, the Soviet “Tsar Bomba” blast in 1961, released the energy equivalent to 50 million tons of TNT.

To avoid the radioactivity and ground shocks, planners estimated that approximately 30,000 people, half of them Indigenous, would have to be evacuated and resettled. The canal commission considered this a formidable but not impossible obstacle, writing in its final report, “The problems of public acceptance of nuclear canal excavation probably could be solved through diplomacy, public education, and compensating payments.”

A not-so-hot idea, in retrospect

As explored in my book, marine and evolutionary biologists of the late 1960s sought to study the project’s less obvious environmental effects. Among other potential catastrophes, scientists warned that a sea-level canal could unleash “mutual invasions of Atlantic and Pacific organisms” by joining the oceans on either side of the isthmus for the first time in 3 million years.

Plans for the nuclear waterway ended by the early 1970s, not over concerns about marine invasive species but rather due to other complex issues. These included the difficulties of testing nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes without violating the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963 and the huge budget deficits caused by the Vietnam War.

Despite the geopolitical and financial constraints, the sea-level canal studies employed hundreds of researchers who increased knowledge of the isthmus and its human and nonhuman inhabitants. Ironically, the studies revealed that wet clay shale rocks along the Darién route meant nuclear explosives might not work well there.

But for Project Plowshare’s biggest proponents, atomic excavation remained a worthwhile goal. In 1970, in their final report, the canal commissioners predicted that “someday nuclear explosions will be used in a wide variety of massive earth-moving projects.” Teller shared their commitment, as he explained near the end of his life in the 2000 documentary “Nuclear Dynamite.”

Today, given widespread awareness of the severe environmental and health effects of radioactive fallout, it is hard to envision a time when using nuclear bombs to build canals seemed reasonable. Even before Gingrich’s post sparked ridicule, press accounts described Project Plowshare using words like “wacky,” “insane” and “crazy.”

However, as societies struggle with disruptive new technologies such as generative AI and cryptocurrency, it is worth remembering that many ideas that ended up discredited once seemed not only sensible but inevitable.

As historians of science and technology point out, technological and scientific developments cannot be separated from their cultural contexts. Moreover, the technologies that become part of people’s daily lives often do so not because they are inherently superior, but because powerful interests champion them.

It makes me wonder: Which of the high-tech trends being promoted by influencers today will amuse, shock and horrify our descendants?

Christine Keiner received funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation, and Eisenhower Foundation for the initial stages of this research.

– ref. Bypass the Strait of Hormuz with nuclear explosives? The US studied that in Panama and Colombia in the 1960s – https://theconversation.com/bypass-the-strait-of-hormuz-with-nuclear-explosives-the-us-studied-that-in-panama-and-colombia-in-the-1960s-278851

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Eve Bohnett, Assistant Research Scholar, Center for Landscape Conservation Planning, University of Florida

Florida is home to a host of diverse wildlife you can’t find anywhere else. Most people know of manatees and Florida panthers. But you might never have heard of the Big Cypress fox squirrel, a subspecies found only in southwest Florida.

At up to 2 feet, 3 inches (68.5 centimeters) long, including its tail, and weighing roughly 3 pounds (1.36 kilograms), the Big Cypress fox squirrel is a heavyweight compared with its cousin, the eastern gray squirrel. But while gray squirrels can thrive across much of the eastern U.S. and Canada, the Big Cypress fox squirrel’s habitat is limited to five Florida counties south of the Caloosahatchee River.

This means every new road, canal and subdivision takes a bigger bite out of its world.

Because this squirrel is so shy and hard to spot, no one knows how many remain, which is one reason the state of Florida lists it as threatened. Historically, it moved through cypress swamps, pine savannas and hardwood forests. But these days, it often navigates a patchwork of golf courses, parks and low-density neighborhoods, crossing open lawns and scattered tree canopies to reach safe cover.

As the links between habitable areas disappear, Big Cypress fox squirrels are funneled into a few risky travel routes. This can cause their populations to become isolated from each other and more vulnerable to decline.

As a landscape conservation researcher, I study how wildlife moves through changing environments and how urban design can support that movement. My most recent research, in collaboration with colleagues from the University of Florida and Florida State University, focused on the Big Cypress fox squirrel. Our team asked one practical question: How can city planning and landscape design support wildlife movement as the region grows?

A new approach

What’s new about our work is that we paired connectivity modeling – a method that maps how easily animals can move across a landscape – with an approach to urban design that organizes landscapes along a gradient from dense urban areas to natural habitats. This approach helps planners match conservation strategies to each setting, or transect zone – urban, suburban, seminatural, such as parks and golf courses, and core habitat, or undisturbed areas.

Our method is unique because it integrates wildlife connectivity data directly into actionable design solutions for each zone, rather than proposing a single corridor. This allows planners to design landscapes that support wildlife movement in ways that can be replicated anywhere. In suburban neighborhoods, for example, wildlife crossings and native plants provide safer movement options.

Importantly, this approach is not specific to preserving just this species of squirrel. Planners and conservationists can use it to maintain wildlife movement alongside development across Florida and beyond. This includes other priority areas along the Florida Wildlife Corridor where development constrains animal movement.

To develop our approach, we used habitat suitability models developed by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission using detailed land-cover data and verified squirrel observation records kept by Florida Natural Areas Inventory and universities in Florida and Arizona. Then we converted this data into what landscape conservationists call a resistance map, which shows how difficult it is for a Big Cypress fox squirrel to move across the landscape.

We applied the model across the squirrel’s known range in southwest Florida, with a focus on rapidly developing areas around Fort Myers and Naples. We then identified where movement is concentrated and where it gets squeezed into narrow pathways.

Squeezing through ‘pinch points’

Our model showed that the squirrel’s best habitat persists in a network of pinch points, bottlenecks where development and infrastructure funnel movement into a limited set of pathways.

In the broader southwestern Florida region, those bottlenecks show up near urbanizing areas such as Naples, Fort Myers and Bonita Springs. In Fort Myers, for example, squirrel movement was funneled into just a few narrow routes, such as urban parks in highly developed areas and less developed spaces such as golf courses and residential neighborhoods with tree cover. Movement was more diffuse near wetlands and along the Caloosahatchee River.

This means that even in built-up areas, a few connected strips of trees, water edges and open space make a big difference, because they may be the only workable routes left.

We also found that many important habitat patches and connections fall outside protected areas. Rather, they lie on private and intensively managed lands, such as residential yards, golf courses, agriculture and landscaped spaces that are regularly maintained. In fast-growing southwestern Florida, that means long-term conservation depends not only on preserves but also on how neighborhoods, road projects, parks, golf courses and vacant lots are planned and maintained.

From wildlife science to real-world design

Instead of creating just one wildlife corridor, we design solutions for different types of landscapes along a city-to-nature gradient. From dense urban areas to natural habitats, this lets us keep the landscape connected using a network of green infrastructure while matching conservation actions to how the land is used and how squirrels are likely to move through it.

In urban and suburban areas, squirrels are using the remaining open spaces, such as parks and low-density residential areas, but these landscapes can function as ecological traps as well as population “sinks,” where risks such as vehicle collisions are higher.

Roads, highways and railroad tracks are major sources of habitat fragmentation and wildlife mortality, so one priority is to make it safer for wildlife to cross.

Our study proposes canopy bridges and other wildlife crossings. Other helpful measures include traffic-calming strategies, signage and “green street” design, which integrates vegetation, stormwater management and safer road layouts to reduce risks for both wildlife and people.

We also propose retrofitting existing infrastructure in urban areas with elements such as green roofs, living walls, bioswales – channels that help keep stormwater clean – rain gardens and permeable pavement. These features add vegetation, absorb stormwater and reduce heat, while also making urban areas easier for wildlife to navigate.

In suburban areas, priorities include planting native vegetation in yards, parks and roadside buffers and improving road crossings where animals are most at risk.

In seminatural areas such as golf courses, opportunities include restoring native vegetation and maintaining “stepping stone” habitats. These are small patches, such as tree clusters and bushes, that animals can use as safe stopovers while moving across developed landscapes.

This kind of green infrastructure can reduce flooding, improve water quality, lower urban temperatures and create recreational spaces – benefits that support both wildlife and the people who live alongside them.

Eve Bohnett does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Better urban design could help save Florida’s threatened Big Cypress fox squirrel – https://theconversation.com/better-urban-design-could-help-save-floridas-threatened-big-cypress-fox-squirrel-276827

Source: The Conversation – USA – By William Akoto, Assistant Professor of Global Security, American University

Michigan may be more than 6,000 miles away from the war in Iran, but, virtually speaking, it’s well within striking distance.

An Iran-linked group calling itself Handala claimed responsibility for a cyberattack on Portage, Michigan-based medical device maker Stryker Corp., carried out on March 11, 2026. Handala said the attack was in retaliation for events related to the conflict in Iran.

The cyberattack affected Stryker’s internal Microsoft software system, disrupting the company’s order processing, manufacturing and shipping.

As a scholar who researches cyber conflict, I’ve found that in periods of geopolitical tension such as the current U.S./Israel-Iran war, cyber operations often sit right next to missiles and airstrikes as a tool that states and state-linked groups use to inflict damage, probe weaknesses and signal resolve to their enemies.

The Stryker case is notable because it shows how quickly a regional conflict can translate into disruption for organizations far from the battlefield. It also illustrates the vulnerabilities of U.S. organizations, including those involved in critical infrastructure.

Modern critical infrastructure does not only involve the obvious big targets like power plants or water utilities. It also relies on suppliers and service providers that sit one or two links upstream – such as managed information technology providers, cloud and data center operators and specialized parts suppliers – that keep everything from hospitals to transit systems running.

This is one reason U.S. officials emphasize critical infrastructure as a whole-of-society problem, not a niche government issue. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s “Shields Up” guidance is written for exactly this reality: a world where geopolitical shocks can threaten organizations that did not think they were part of the battlefield.

Cyber operations are often about options

When people imagine cyber warfare, many often picture dramatic outcomes. The lights go out. The water turns toxic. The trains stop. Those scenarios are real risks. But they are not the only objective, and often not the main one. The real strategic value is access.

Cyber access is like a set of keys. If you can get into a network quietly, stay there and learn how it works, you create options for later. You can steal information, map dependencies and position yourself to cause disruption. You can keep the option to strike in your pocket, so that in a crisis, you can cause or credibly threaten to cause harm.

That is why U.S. agencies took the China-linked Volt Typhoon group’s hacking activity so seriously. In joint advisories, U.S. officials described a campaign that compromised the information technology systems of organizations across multiple critical infrastructure sectors and used so-called living-off-the-land techniques that can blend into normal administrative activity.

This is an important point. A lot of state-linked cyber activity is not designed to create immediate, visible chaos. It is designed to build leverage.

How state-sponsored cyberattacks typically work

Most state-backed cyber operations, including those carried out by the United States, follow a common sequence.

First, the attackers gain initial access through techniques such as phishing, exploiting known vulnerabilities or abusing weak remote access. Once inside, attackers try to learn where the valuable data and sensitive systems are. They seek higher privileges and move laterally, often using legitimate administrative tools to blend in.

That stealthy maneuvering is one reason campaigns like Volt Typhoon raised alarms. Defenders can have a hard time distinguishing an intruder from a normal administrator in a busy environment, especially when the intruder is deliberately trying to make their actions look like ordinary activity.

The attackers then establish persistence, meaning they can sustain their access. If the goal is leverage, the attackers want to survive defenders’ cleanup efforts after they discover they’ve been hacked. That can mean gaining multiple footholds, altering authentication settings or gaining access via third parties.

Finally, they choose the effects they want to have. Consider the “Shamoon” attack in 2012 in Saudi Arabia. After gaining access, the attackers used malware to wipe data on thousands of computers at oil giant Saudi Aramco, disrupting business operations.

But not every intrusion ends in destruction. Sometimes it ends with data theft, where the prize is information rather than causing downtime. An example is the 2015 breach of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, in which attackers stole sensitive personnel data. Other times, the point is disruption designed to send a message such as the cyberattack on Sony Pictures in 2014, when hackers sought to keep the company from releasing the comedy film “The Interview.”

What defenses does the US have?

The U.S. has a growing defense ecosystem, but it is not a single shield you can switch on. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency encourages organizations to heighten their cybersecurity vigilance during periods of elevated geopolitical risk. The agency, along with the FBI, the National Security Agency and international partners, also publishes advisories with indicators and recommended mitigations when they see active campaigns.

Because critical infrastructure is mostly privately owned, federal defense also depends on partnership. For instance, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative is designed to support coordinated public-private planning and information sharing around major cyber risks.

Congress has also pushed the private sector toward reporting incidents more quickly. The Cyber Incident Reporting for Critical Infrastructure Act of 2022 sets reporting timelines that include reporting cyber incidents within 72 hours and ransomware payments within 24 hours after payment. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has been implementing these requirements through ongoing rulemaking.

These are meaningful steps, but they do not erase the basic constraints: uneven resources, uneven incentives and the reality that many targets sit outside direct federal control.

Lessons from the Stryker hack

The Stryker episode is a reminder that cyber operations are now a routine tool that state-linked actors can use to project power during international crises. They can aim at theft, disruption or signaling. Sometimes they hit government networks, and other times they hit private companies that sit inside essential supply chains.

Either way, the consequences can be felt far from the conflict itself.

In cyber conflict, the quiet part – gaining access, establishing persistence and preparing for deployment – typically comes first. The visible disruption often gets headlines, but it is the hidden positioning that sets the stage for offensive cyber operations in a crisis.

Wars today are not only fought with missiles and airstrikes you can see in the sky. They are also fought with what you cannot see moving through computer networks.

William Akoto does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How Iranian hackers pose a threat to US critical infrastructure – https://theconversation.com/how-iranian-hackers-pose-a-threat-to-us-critical-infrastructure-278377

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Benjamin F. Henwood, Professor of Social Policy and Health, University of Southern California

Can giving homeless people US$750 a month to use any way they choose help them move into long-term housing?

I am the director of the University of Southern California Homelessness Policy Research Institute. My research team, in partnership with Miracle Messages, a San Francisco social services nonprofit, set out to answer that question in a study that will be published in an upcoming peer-reviewed issue of Social Work Research.

In one of the first randomized studies of basic income for homeless people in the U.S., 103 homeless people living in California received $750 payments every month for a year. Then we compared their housing situations with people who were homeless but did not receive this money. All study participants met the federal definition of literal homelessness. That basically means they either stayed in a homeless shelter or lived on the streets.

In 2022, when we began this study, we expected the answer to our question would be “yes.”

Beginning with optimistic expectations

A similar experiment in Canada with 50 homeless participants showed that providing 7,500 Canadian dollars in cash as a lump sum resulted in 99 fewer days homeless over a one-year period.

In addition, Miracle Messages had already completed a similar but smaller pilot in which six of its nine participants moved into long-term housing after receiving $500 monthly for six months.

But the results of pilots with so few participants can be misleading because the people who got money may have found housing anyway. What’s more, an experiment conducted in Canada may not directly translate to the United States – which has a weaker safety net than its northern neighbor.

Homelessness is often short-term for everyone

After receiving monthly payments for a year, nearly half of the participants in our study were no longer homeless.

But almost the same share of people who didn’t receive the payments had also found housing.

This points to an important reality: For many Americans, homelessness – while highly destabilizing – is often temporary. And, most people who are living on the street are actively trying to become housed.

Because the payments did not substantially change the rate at which participants obtained housing, we found ourselves asking another question: If the money didn’t alter housing outcomes, what did it change?

How people spent the money

Basic income programs typically let people decide how to use the funds they get. Critics of giving people money with no strings attached often worry that they will spend it, or even squander it, on so-called “temptation goods,” such as alcohol and illegal drugs.

That isn’t what we observed.

The people taking part in this study overwhelmingly spent this money on basic needs, such as food, housing-related expenses, transportation and health care. Spending on alcohol, cigarettes and illegal drugs accounted for 5% of the money.

But those expenditures only tell part of the story. Cash also allowed people to meet their own immediate and personal needs.

One participant used this money to keep his car running – both for transportation to work and as the place where he slept at night. Another bought birthday and holiday presents for his relatives. One sent money to aging parents. Another donated to a charity because it restored a sense of contribution.

Another paid down credit card debt that had been a source of stress.

While we found no evidence that the basic income payments reduced homelessness, other aspects of the participants’ lives appeared to become more stable. We found no evidence that the money caused them any harm.

Why this result makes sense

The distribution of cash assistance has been evaluated in many places, usually targeting a specific kind of community, such as unemployed individuals or families living in poverty. Studies consistently find that people spend the money on necessities and end up better off.

Homelessness presents a different challenge. Housing requires access to an available and affordable unit. In most U.S. housing markets, a $750 monthly payment doesn’t cover that month’s rent. Nationally, rent for a typical one-bedroom apartment was about twice that amount in February 2026.

Programs tied directly to housing, such as rent vouchers or subsidies, may therefore have a more immediate effect on housing status.

Moving forward, I believe our results suggest that for a basic income approach to help counter homelessness, monthly payments would have to be larger, continue over a longer period – or both. The payments should, that is, be closer to covering the full cost of a month’s rent in the local area.

Benjamin F. Henwood does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Getting $750 a month didn’t end homelessness – but our study shows it still improved the lives of homeless people – https://theconversation.com/getting-750-a-month-didnt-end-homelessness-but-our-study-shows-it-still-improved-the-lives-of-homeless-people-278141

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Brad Badertscher, Professor of Accountancy, University of Notre Dame

Elon Musk’s SpaceX is expected to soon become a public company in what may be the biggest initial public offering in history. But my new research suggests that investors who buy shares of the company are unlikely to see the explosive growth that past IPOs had.

The rocket and satellite maker, which confidentially filed to go public on April 1, 2026, is reportedly planning to raise as much as US$75 billion in the offering, which would give it a valuation of $1.75 trillion.

SpaceX isn’t the only high-profile company expected to sell shares to the public for the first time this year. Artificial intelligence companies OpenAI and Anthropic are also expected to list in the coming months in massive IPOs.

For Wall Street, that means blockbuster deals with hefty fees for the banks involved. For early investors and executives, it could mean enormous paydays. For everyday investors, meanwhile, the question is whether a hot company “going public” today represents a good investment opportunity.

What does it really mean when a company “goes public”?

For decades, an IPO marked the moment when ordinary investors could buy into a fast-growing company and share in its future expansion. Today, that moment often comes much later in a company’s life – after much of the dramatic growth has already taken place behind closed doors.

I study financial reporting, executive compensation and initial public offerings. In a recent study of nearly 1,000 U.S. IPOs conducted from 2007 to 2022, my co-authors and I examined what happens in the critical period just before and after companies go public. Our research suggests that the modern IPO increasingly represents a chance for insiders and executives to cash out — not the start of value creation for public investors.

IPOs used to fund growth

An IPO is when a private company sells shares to the public for the first time. Traditionally, IPOs helped young, cash-strapped companies raise money to grow. Investors supplied capital and shared in future success.

Many iconic businesses — including Amazon and Apple — went public early in their life cycles. Much of their dramatic growth happened after they were already public.

That pattern has changed. Research shows the number of publicly traded U.S. companies has fallen sharply since the late 1990s. At the same time, private capital from venture capital and private equity firms has expanded. In our research, we document that the average age of a company when it goes public has more than doubled from four years in the early 2000s to nearly 10 years by 2025.

Companies can now raise billions privately. They do not need public markets as early as they once did.

What we found in nearly 1,000 IPOs

Our research focuses on what regulators and practitioners call “cheap stock.”

This refers to stock options granted to executives before an IPO at a share price far below the eventual IPO price. Stock options give executives the right to buy shares later at a fixed price. If the IPO price is much higher than that exercise price, the options are immediately very valuable.

For example, say you’re a CEO of a company going public. You received stock options that give you the right buy 10,000 shares of your company’s stock at a price of $2. The IPO price is set at $20. After the IPO, you could exercise your right to buy the company’s shares at $2 and then immediately sell those shares for around $20, for a gain of $180,000.

We examined nearly 1,000 IPOs between 2007 and 2022. On average, the IPO price was 5.7 times higher than the exercise price of options granted in the year before the IPO.

In simple terms, executives often held options that surged in value the moment the company went public. Some of this difference may reflect real growth or the fact that private shares are less liquid – that is, less easy to sell – than public ones. But even after adjusting for those factors, the gap remained large.

This matters for future shareholders, namely those buying shares after the IPO, as substantial value has already been transferred to insiders before public investors bought shares.

Incentives to go public

We also found patterns in which companies granted more deeply discounted options.

Companies backed by venture capital and private institutional investors were more likely to show significant gaps between option prices and IPO prices. This supports a straightforward incentive story.

Some early investors want liquidity, or investments that are easy to turn into cash. Granting executives options that become highly valuable at the IPO can help motivate managers to complete the offering. In that sense, the IPO often serves as a liquidity event — a way for insiders to cash out.

That does not necessarily imply wrongdoing, but it does suggest the IPO now frequently reflects insiders’ exit timing rather than simply public investors’ growth opportunity.

What happens after the IPO

The story does not end on IPO day.

Our research shows that companies with more cheap stock options invested less in capital expenditures and research and development after going public. Cheap stock options provide less incentives for the company to take risks. And that in turn can affect a company’s future financial prospects.

Executives who already hold valuable stock options may prefer stable growth over aggressive expansion of the company. Since risk and reward are linked, companies that take fewer risks tend to grow at a slower pace, meaning future shareholders may see smaller gains.

Our research supports this conjecture, as we found that companies with more cheap stock experienced lower stock returns over longer horizons after going public. That matters for new investors who are not only expecting exponential growth after the IPO but also longer-run stock performance.

For public investors, the takeaway is simple: Much of the explosive growth in corporate value now occurs while companies are still private.

Brad Badertscher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. SpaceX and OpenAI IPOs are unlikely to bring skyrocketing returns that Amazon and Apple did, as companies go public later in life and early investors cash out – https://theconversation.com/spacex-and-openai-ipos-are-unlikely-to-bring-skyrocketing-returns-that-amazon-and-apple-did-as-companies-go-public-later-in-life-and-early-investors-cash-out-276147

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Michael Delayo, Ph.D. Candidate in Communication Arts and Sciences, Penn State

MLB’s past few seasons have been plagued by a spate of gambling scandals.

In April 2024, authorities arrested Ippei Muzihara, the interpreter for Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani, on suspicion of illegally transferring more than US$16 million from Ohtani’s bank accounts to pay a bookie. Muzihara pleaded guilty in February 2025.

Two months later, MLB suspended four minor leaguers for violating the league’s sports betting rules. The league also issued a lifetime ban to San Diego Padres utility infielder Tucupita Marcano – the first active player in a century to receive one due to gambling.

The following season, MLB placed Cleveland Guardians All-Star closer Emmanuel Clase and starting pitcher Luis Ortiz on indefinite leave after suspicions emerged that they’d rigged pitches to help gamblers win bets. In November 2025, both were federally indicted, and each has pleaded not guilty.

But if you thought that MLB might ease up on its embrace of sports betting ahead of the 2026 season, you would be mistaken.

On March 19, 2026, MLB announced a new partnership with Polymarket. The world’s largest prediction market, Polymarket allows users to buy shares on the outcomes of future events – like betting – but with probabilities instead of odds.

For most of baseball’s history, formal affiliation with any form of gambling was inconceivable. That has changed under current MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred who, since the start of his tenure in 2015, has embraced gambling and prediction markets as they’ve become legalized in the U.S.

I’ve researched and written about the league’s abrupt reversal from anti-gambling crusader to sports gambling partner, and how Manfred has justified this pivot to players, fans and the media.

The about-face is even more jarring when you consider the fact that the commissioner position itself was created in the wake of the 1919 “Black Sox” scandal.

A higher standard

During that infamous episode, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Eddie Cicotte, Chick Gandil and five of their teammates on the Chicago White Sox conspired to intentionally lose the World Series, forcing the sport to break from the gambling culture that helped fuel its rise.

With baseball’s integrity in doubt, the league chose an outsider – Illinois federal judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis – as its first commissioner.

“We have got to have a higher standard of integrity and honesty in baseball than in any other walk of life,” Landis said upon accepting the job. “And we are going to have it.”

Thus began baseball’s century of resisting – and punishing – any whiff of gambling.

In 1947, Landis’ successor, Happy Chandler, suspended Brooklyn Dodgers manager Leo Durocher, in part, for his ties to gamblers.

Bowie Kuhn, who served as commissioner from 1969 to 1984, suspended All-Star pitcher Denny McLain in 1970 for his involvement with bookmakers. He later banned baseball greats Willie Mays in 1979 and Mickey Mantle in 1983 for working as casino promoters, though commissioner Peter Ueberroth reinstated them in 1985.

The most notorious post-Black Sox scandal involved all-time hits leader Pete Rose. In 1989, Ueberroth launched an investigation after hearing that Rose had bet on games while managing the Cincinnati Reds.

A. Bartlett Giamatti, who became commissioner later that year, banned Rose from the sport for life in 1989 at the conclusion of the investigation.

The next two commissioners, Fay Vincent and Bud Selig, consistently denied Rose’s appeals to be reinstated. In 2012, Selig described gambling as “evil,” adding that it “creates doubt and destroys your sport.”

From fantasy to reality

Manfred took the baton from Selig in 2015, just as daily fantasy sports were becoming more popular.

Daily fantasy sports players draft rosters of athletes competing that day, stake money and win cash prizes based on the athletes’ real-life performances. Sports leagues permitted daily fantasy sports, deeming them games of skill, not chance.

Even though daily fantasy sports operated in a legal gray area, Manfred inked a deal with DraftKings in April 2015 to make the fledgling brand MLB’s “Official Daily Fantasy Game.”

“The fantasy space,” Manfred explained at the time, “was really, really important to [MLB] in terms of engaging young people.”

Manfred took pains to distinguish these games from gambling, telling reporters in April 2015 that “there’s a line in the law. And we understand that line very carefully.”

But by the time the Supreme Court decided in 2018 to put the legalization of sports gambling in the hands of the states, Manfred described the league as a gambling authority that was “in a position to meaningfully engage and shape … what the new regulatory scheme looks like.”

Protecting integrity to enable prosperity

Much of MLB’s shift is in response to legal, technological and cultural forces beyond its control.

But there’s a difference between accepting the legality of gambling and actively promoting it, whether that’s through opening sportsbooks at stadiums like Wrigley Field or saturating game broadcasts with gambling advertisements.

Under Manfred, the league’s messaging can be summed up as follows: Gambling is happening whether we like it or not. By going all in on gambling, we can at least control what shape it takes and better shield the sport from those with ill intent.

It’s a bit convoluted, to say the least. But the scandals that have emerged have given Manfred opportunities to double down on the logic.

By giving exclusive data access to MGM Sportsbook, for example, the league claims it can detect and monitor suspicious behavior.

Manfred has said that baseball is “in a better position to know what’s going on today then we were in the old days when it was all illegal,” a position he credits to the league’s work with its gambling partners.

In this way, the league frames its gambling partnerships as protective – even as new scandals emerge.

Numbers games

Other trends have made fans and owners more receptive to gambling.

Baseball’s embrace of gambling and prediction markets – with their spreads, parlays and share prices – is unfolding at a time when people are more comfortable with the integration of data and technology. Rhetoric scholar Michael Butterworth calls this “the statistical frame” – the idea that the world is increasingly understood through data, whether it’s through polling results, blood oxygen levels and, yes, betting odds.

The game has also changed from the owners’ box. Fewer teams are being steered by local, civic-minded businesspeople. In their place are international investment groups and private equity firms that treat franchises as part of a broader asset portfolio. According to sports journalist Bruce Schoenfeld, the sports industry has come to resemble “a mutual fund that includes television and digital content, real estate, retail clothing, hospitality, catering and concessions.”

For a sport increasingly focused on return on investment and growth, a reunion with gambling was a natural next step for baseball. And it’s been a boon for the bottom line.

Baseball’s ‘best interests’

In conjunction with the Polymarket announcement, Manfred also signed a memorandum of understanding with the chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, reiterating that “protecting the integrity of the game on the field is our top priority.”

But what about the protection of the athletes themselves?

Baseball players have opened up about the threats they’ve been subjected to since gambling’s legalization.

“You hear it all, man,” Arizona Diamondbacks reliever Paul Sewald told USA Today. “You blow a save, you don’t come through, you get it all. … ‘You cost me all of this money. (Expletive) you. (Expletive) your family. I’m going to kill you and then kill your family.’”

Manfred has said that these developments are “a matter of concern to us that we take really seriously.”

It’s possible that MLB will return to an anti-gambling stance in the face of these mounting threats. But as annual revenues for sports betting soar toward US$20 billion, that’s a tough bet to make.

Michael Delayo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. MLB doubles down on gambling with new Polymarket deal – https://theconversation.com/mlb-doubles-down-on-gambling-with-new-polymarket-deal-279176

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Laura E. Knouse, Professor of Psychology, University of Richmond

Do you ever find yourself at the end of a nonstop day feeling like you haven’t made progress on the things that are actually important to you? If so, you’re not alone.

If you are a person with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, you might find it even harder to direct your effort toward what’s most important – especially if your goal is a ways in the future and you have lots of distractions to manage.

Fortunately, there are research-backed strategies that can help you start and finish a task even when you feel stuck.

I’m a professor and clinical psychologist who has spent my career researching the challenges that adults with ADHD experience and ways to help improve their quality of life. I co-authored a book with Dr. Russell Barkley, a preeminent ADHD expert, published in October 2025 called “Living Well with Adult ADHD: Practical Strategies for Improving Your Daily Life.”

There are a few strategies that may help you more effectively direct your efforts toward the things that matter most.

Tips grounded in cognitive behavioral therapy

One of the most effective nonmedication treatments for ADHD in adults is specialized cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT.

By teaching skills that help manage thoughts, feelings and behaviors, CBT helps people with ADHD learn and use self-regulation skills. Research shows that CBT for adult ADHD can help reduce ADHD symptoms and improve quality of life.

But you don’t have to be in full-time therapy or even have ADHD to potentially benefit from CBT strategies.

If you find that you have difficulty doing what’s most important in our increasingly distraction-filled world, these tips might help.

Before diving in:

• Identify the goals that are most important to you, not just most urgent. Sometimes the most meaningful tasks, like taking steps toward a new career or growing your social network, fall by the wayside because they don’t have external deadlines.

• When testing out new strategies, it can take some time to see results. But if you could take meaningful action just 10% more often, that could add up to much better outcomes. So choose one of the following tips and practice until it becomes a habit.

Tip No. 1: Break it down

Important tasks are often also bigger, scarier and more ambiguous, which can make it hard to get started. Imagine you want to get a new job and the next step is to draft your cover letter.

If you saw “Write cover letter” on your to-do list, would you jump right into that task? Maybe. But if you’re like me, this task might be daunting and vague enough to make you turn to an easier task instead.

To get past that emotional barrier, break the task into much smaller steps. No step is too small if it gets you started.

So instead of “Write cover letter,” try “Outline cover letter” or “Find template for cover letter.” Still in avoidance mode? How about “Create cover letter document with opening line.” Even if you stop there, you’ll be one step closer to the goal.

When breaking down tasks, a timer can be your best friend. “Work on cover letter for 15 minutes” might feel less overwhelming and build behavioral momentum.

Consider, for instance, the Pomodoro technique, invented by a university student in the 1980s who was trying to come up with a strategy to work more efficiently.

A pomodoro, the Italian word for tomato, represents an amount of time – typically 25 minutes – to focus on a task, followed by a short break. The creator of this technique used a tomato-shaped kitchen timer, thus the name.

To practice the technique, write down the task you’ll work on, start the timer and get to work. When the alarm sounds, take a five-minute break to refresh. Then move to the next interval of 25 minutes, until after four repetitions you get a longer break, such as 15 to 30 minutes.

Research shows that this technique may reduce distractibility while working, leading to greater productivity and a sense of completion. It helps me get started on my most avoided task: grading papers. I’m much more likely to commit to 25 minutes of grading than I am to tackle them all at once.

Tip No. 2: Notice your avoidant thoughts

“I have much more time to do that later.”

“I’ll do just one more thing before I leave.”

Do these thoughts sound familiar? If so, you’re not alone. Using mini-surveys sprinkled throughout the day, my lab found that college students reported having thoughts like this about 50% of the time. For non-college adults, the rate was only slightly lower, at about 45% of the time.

We also found that when people had recently had these thoughts, they were more likely to be distracted and avoid something they should have been doing. We decided to call these thoughts “avoidant automatic thoughts” because they pop into your head effortlessly and are associated with putting off doing a task.

Importantly, we found that college students with ADHD report more avoidant automatic thoughts, along with the distraction and procrastination that come with them.

Just becoming aware of these automatic thoughts in daily life is a good place to start. Make a list of the thoughts that you experience most frequently when you go into avoidance mode.

If you catch yourself having one of these thoughts, coach yourself by adding a strategy to your self-talk. For example, when “Write cover letter” results in the thought, “I’ll have time for that on Friday,” say to yourself: “But you can do a little bit now. Maybe just two Pomodoros.” Then add: “After that, you can check your email.”

Tip No. 3: Leverage relatively rewarding activities

When people are avoiding tasks, they’re not usually sitting around doing nothing.

In one study mentioned above, we found that work-related tasks were among the most frequently avoided. What were people likely to be doing instead? Other work-related tasks. A similar example: The only times in college I ever did a dorm room deep-clean was when I should have been studying for finals.

This so-called “procrastivity” might contain some useful clues about how to motivate your way through tasks you tend to avoid.

It’s helpful to think about rewards not as things – like cookies, video games and gold stars – but as activities, like eating cookies, playing video games, seeing gold stars and thinking about what they represent.

There’s a name for this: Psychology’s Premack principle holds that the opportunity to do a more preferred activity can be a reward for doing a less preferred activity. An example would be what’s commonly known as “grandma’s rule” – if you eat your vegetables, then you can eat dessert.

This means that you can arrange the activities on your schedule in a way that uses more rewarding activities to “pull along” your behavior during less rewarding activities. Set up your day to “do the worst first,” and strategically place more enjoyable activities after difficult but important ones. For example, a friend of mine delays her first cup of morning coffee until she completes her workout. It’s not pleasant in the moment, but it helps her get the workout done, and her coffee feels extra rewarding afterward.

What are some relatively rewarding activities that already happen throughout your day? Can you arrange the order of things to leverage them? If you can flip the motivational script even once a day, it might make a big difference in making progress toward your goals.

Remember that better self-regulation is about making small, sustainable changes that fit with your daily life. There will definitely be setbacks: After all, you’ve been doing it the old way for a long time! But be sure to notice and celebrate even the small steps toward your goals.

Laura E. Knouse receives book royalties from Routledge Publishers and Guilford Publications and is a consultant and clinical advisor for Inflow Holdings, Inc., maker of a CBT-based app for adult ADHD. Dr. Knouse is a member of the professional advisory board for CHADD (Children and Adults with ADHD).

– ref. For adults with ADHD – or even those with just some symptoms – using smart strategies to start and complete tasks can make all the difference – https://theconversation.com/for-adults-with-adhd-or-even-those-with-just-some-symptoms-using-smart-strategies-to-start-and-complete-tasks-can-make-all-the-difference-271332