Unconventional Oil and Gas Energy Systems: An Unidentified Hotspot of Antimicrobial Resistance?

Biocides used in unconventional oil and gas (UOG) practices, such as hydraulic fracturing, control microbial growth. Unwanted microbial growth can cause gas souring, pipeline clogging, and microbial-induced corrosion of equipment and transportation pipes. However, optimizing biocide use has not been a priority.

Synthetic Biology R&D Risks: Social-Institutional Contexts Matter!

Factors that shape actual research practices - 'social and institutional context' - typically are missing from considerations of synthetic biology R&D-related risk and containment. We argue that analyzing context is essential in identifying circumstances that create, amplify, or diminish risk, and in revealing new opportunities for avoiding or managing those risks.

Specificity and Engagement: Increasing ELSI's Relevance to Nano-Scientists.

Scholars studying the ethical, legal, and social issues (ELSI) associated with emerging technologies maintain the importance of considering these issues throughout the research and development cycle, even during the earliest stages of basic research. Embedding these considerations within the scientific process requires communication between ELSI scholars and the community of physical scientists who are conducting that basic research. We posit that this communication can be effective on a broad scale only if it links societal issues directly to characteristics of the emerging technology that are relevant to the physical and natural scientists involved in research and development.

Adding to the mix: integrating ELSI into a National Nanoscale Science and Technology Center.

This paper describes issues associated with integrating the study of Ethical, Legal and Social Issues (ELSI) into ongoing scientific and technical research and describes an approach adopted by the authors for their own work with the center for nanophase materials sciences (CNMS) at the Oak Ridge national laboratory (ORNL). Four key questions are considered: (a) What is ELSI and how should it identify and address topics of interest for the CNMS? (b) What advantages accrue to incorporating ELSI into the CNMS? (c) How should the integration of ELSI into the CNMS take place? (d) How should one judge the effectiveness of the activity? We conclude that ELSI research is not a monolithic body of knowledge, but should be adapted to the question at hand. Our approach focuses on junctures in the R&D continuum at which key decisions occur, avoids topics of a purely ethical nature or advocacy, and seeks to gather data in ways that permit testing the validity of generalization.

Making decisions about hazardous waste remediation when even considering a remediation technology is controversial.

This paper investigates the circumstances under which proposed hazardous waste remediation technologies are socially acceptable, that is, considered seriously as options in a public arena. First, it summarizes a conceptual framework that guides investigation and interpretation of site-specific remediation decision-making. Second, it describes an initial application of that framework to the public participation venue of U.