The Cooper Square Review of Science, Medicine, and Technology

Illustration by Angelika Manhart

We at the Cooper Square Review join this nation in outrage at the violent death of George Floyd, and at the systemic racism that his death exposes once again. We are scientists and medical professionals. Every day we work on testing new medicines, decoding neural impulses, and analyzing gravitational waves. But we are also citizens. We urge our fellow scientists to turn their passion and creativity to their work as citizens: creating a more just, equitable, and humane world.

New Posts

Corona Chronicles Standard Deviations

Heartbreak, Hope, and George Floyd’s Legacy

By Amicha Robertson

My COVID isolation story, in the beginning, went pretty much as I […]

The sincerest form of flattery

The Laws of Attraction

By Sofia Landi

When I talk about powers of attraction, you have no idea what […]

The Extraordinary Dramas and Dilemmas of Transplant Surgery

Can Learning A Language Make You A Better Person?

The Sperm Whale Social Club And Other Amazing Tales of Animal Culture

An Antidote To Misinformation From 1920’s New York

The Pandemic Dress Rehearsal Where Everything Went Wrong

The Extraordinary Dramas and Dilemmas of Transplant Surgery

Transplant surgeon Joshua Mezrich's book is at once autobiography and history of one of the most extraordinary fields in modern medicine. In it, Paige Winokur also discovers a new perspective on the racial justice movement.

Can Learning A Language Make You A Better Person?

Kevin Gonzales learns about the fascinating ways language-learning can change your brain in Albert Costa's new book

The Sperm Whale Social Club And Other Amazing Tales of Animal Culture

While enjoying Carl Safina's latest, Sofia Landi is forced to ask: "are animals more cultured than we are?"

An Antidote To Misinformation From 1920’s New York

In Deborah Blum's best-selling tale of toxicology in 1920s New York, Karl Palmquist uncovers a dogged struggle to combat misinformation still relevant today

The Pandemic Dress Rehearsal Where Everything Went Wrong

Geena Ianni learns that we've been through a trial-run for pandemic preparedness, and are making the same mistakes all over again

What It Means To Live With Dementia

Stephen Serene finds beauty and insight in Lynn Casteel Harper's portrait of dementia, but worries that it whitewashes the realities of nursing home life

The Ghost of Pandemics Past

Jared Diamond's classic explains how epidemics of the past transformed societies. Agata Bochynska wonders: how will the current pandemic change ours?

A Kassandra For Our Time

Ali Cohen finds Madeline Drexler's twenty-year-old profile of new viruses and public health challenges starkly relevant today

When Fiction Helps Us See

Life imitates art when Megan Elder immerses herself in Saramago's famous pandemic novel

The End of the World As We Know It

Benjamin Pope shares David Wallace-Wells' alarm over climate change -- but balks at his narrow view on solutions to the problem

Explore the Archives (70 Books)

Illustration by Angelika Manhart

This Scientific Life

Our contributors hail from all over the sciences — and all over the world. We’ll share what brought us to science, why we stay, and what makes us (occasionally) want to run away. There will be eureka moments, scientific screw-ups, advice to youngsters, peers, and elders, as well as whimsical stories about space exploration, fruit fly cognition, and how a neuron can live its best life.

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