Harris Poll Survey Shows Bipartisan US Support for Science Amid Concerns Over China Leadership

• NSF Center for Oldest Ice Exploration at Oregon State University analyzed Allan Hills ice cores, extending histories of greenhouse gases and ocean temperatures to 3 million years ago. • Led by Julia Marks-Peterson and Sarah Shackleton, studies published in Nature reveal past climate dynamics using East Antarctic ice. • New 6-million-year-old ice discoveries and ongoing drilling will refine CO2 reconstructions and preservation methods.

• FASEB hosted its annual Capitol Hill Day on March 18, 2026, bringing 46 biomedical researchers from 19 member societies across 25 states to Washington, D.C., to push for increased NIH and NSF funding. • Advocates met with nearly 90 House and Senate offices, thanking lawmakers for bipartisan FY 2026 appropriations that boosted NIH funding and protected facilities costs from 15% caps. • The effort highlights the role of federal investment in accelerating medical discoveries and delivering state-specific impacts on health outcomes.

• NERSC, at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, launched an open call for projects using the Perlmutter supercomputer to advance AI in scientific domains like climate, physics, and biology through January 19, 2027. • Proposals require deep learning expertise, scientific domain knowledge, and proof-of-concept; evaluated on innovation, DOE relevance, feasibility, and scale readiness, with submissions rolling until April 30, 2026, for priority. • NERSC supports 11,000 scientists annually, producing 2,000 peer-reviewed papers and aiding seven Nobel winners.

• DOE's SLAC National Accelerator Lab and collaborators created a generative AI model that rebuilds molecular structures from fragmentation patterns during explosions. • The breakthrough enhances analysis of molecular dynamics using accelerator data, advancing chemistry and materials science research. • Published within the last 8 hours, it promises novel insights into molecular behaviors under extreme conditions.

• A new study finds that exposure to PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances)—chemicals used in non-stick coatings and water-resistant products—is linked to low bone density in teenagers. • The research, announced by the Endocrine Society, involved collaboration between the CDC, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Simon Fraser University, and George Washington University. • The finding adds to growing evidence that PFAS contamination poses significant health risks, particularly during critical periods of skeletal development in adolescence.

• The U.S. Department of Energy announced $293 million in funding to advance the Genesis Mission's efforts to tackle the nation's most complex science and technology challenges. • The funding represents a significant federal commitment to supporting breakthrough scientific research and innovation across multiple fields.

• The United States saw a record amount of new clean power capacity come online in 2025, according to a report released today by the Environmental Defense Fund. • Despite the record deployment, the renewable energy sector faced significant headwinds including project delays and cancellations that threatened to slow progress. • The achievement underscores continued momentum in U.S. transition toward clean electricity despite policy uncertainties and regulatory challenges.

• A new coalition led by University of Maryland professor John Moult, creator of the Critical Assessment of Structure Prediction (CASP), is launching an initiative to assess the reliability of Alzheimer's literature and identify which experiments can be trusted. • The effort aims to evaluate competing hypotheses about the APOE4 gene's role in Alzheimer's by examining experimental conditions, statistical analyses, and data quality across human, mouse, and cell studies. • The approach leverages large language models to apply objective measuring standards to scientific literature, similar to how CASP's blind challenge methodology validated DeepMind's AlphaFold tool, which contributed to the company's 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

• A new study published in the journal Science documents that climate change is making fish smaller, posing significant threats to global food security and fishery productivity. • The research warns that the shift toward smaller fish species could worsen fishery losses by as much as 50%, impacting both commercial fishing industries and food availability worldwide. • The findings highlight the cascading ecological effects of climate change on marine ecosystems and underscore the urgency of addressing global warming to protect food systems.

• Engineers at Washington University in St. Louis discovered that cells can sense far beyond the surfaces they touch through a process called "depth mechano-sensing," with clusters of normal epithelial cells detecting layers as far as 100 microns away by tugging on surrounding collagen fibers. • Individual cancer cells can probe about 10 microns ahead, while normal cell clusters working together can sense 10 times farther, helping cells decide where to migrate and providing new insights into cancer cell behavior. • The findings, published in PNAS, could reveal new targets to prevent cancer from spreading and advance understanding of how cancer cells move through the body.

• A UC Riverside-led study analyzing thousands of samples from unrelated studies found that no places in the ocean remain completely untouched by human chemical impacts. • Researchers combined consistent, high-resolution mass spectrometry methods across multiple laboratories with computational tools to create a unified dataset revealing the extent of human chemical alterations to marine environments. • The study reveals significant data gaps, with heavy concentration in North America and Europe while the Southern Hemisphere and regions like Southeast Asia, India, and Australia remain largely understudied, limiting full understanding of global ocean impacts.