Steve Acquah, associate research professor of chemistry; the Digital Media Lab coordinator; and 2009 Lindau Meetings alumni; will be part of a team of Lindau alumni, young scientists and young economists participating in the first Sciathon hosted by the Council for the Lindau Nobel Laureates Meetings.
The Sciathon will follow the idea of a hackathon over 48 hours beginning 11 a.m. EST on Friday, June 19. During the event, the participants will work on interdisciplinary projects based on the three main topics, including The Lindau Guidelines 2020 (which responds to the current emergence of distrust of significant parts of the public in science in many parts of the world); climate change; and capitalism after corona. Forty-eight groups with ten members per group will work on specific projects.
Acquah will be working on a project idea by Nicholas Clifton, a Research Fellow at Cardiff University in the United Kingdom, to develop an online tool that will allow scientists to work together to communicate reliable sources of scientific information to the public. The project will include the development of a Google Chrome Extension that provides verified scientists the ability to score sources of scientific information.
At the end of the Sciathon, each team will produce a report, and a two-minute video with the best projects being featured at the Online Science Days and highlighted through social media.
Due to COVID-19, the 70th Lindau Nobel Laureates Meeting was postponed until 2021 with the Online Science Days creating a virtual platform for invited participants and Nobel Laureates from June 28 through July 1, 2020.
Acquah said, “Being involved with the Lindau Nobel Laureates Sciathon and Online Science Days is a great opportunity to connect and work with scientists and economists from around the world to address some of the unique challenges we find today.”