It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Thursday, January 02, 2025
Genomic analysis of modern maize inbred lines reveals diversity and selective breeding effects
Science China Press
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Genomic features, population structure, and genomic prediction across a maize panel containing 2,933 lines
Maize is a globally cultivated staple crop and one of the most successful examples of heterosis utilization in food production. The development of elite inbred lines is critical for breeding hybrid varieties and achieving sustained yield improvements. However, efficient breeding of inbred lines faces significant challenges, including the broad origins of germplasm resources, complex and diverse genetic structures, and low accuracy in phenotypic prediction. Advances in modern genomics and artificial intelligence technologies provide powerful tools for gaining deeper insights into the genetic backgrounds of germplasm resources and improving the accuracy of trait prediction.
Recently, scientists from the Institute of Crop Science, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, published a research paper titled "Genomic analysis of modern maize inbred lines reveals diversity and selective breeding effects" in SCIENCE CHINA Life Sciences. The research team collected 2,430 inbred lines derived from elite commercial hybrids promoted across different geographical regions, along with 503 inbred lines from natural populations, and constructed a broadly sourced and genetically diverse inbred population. The study began with resequencing this large-scale population of maize inbred lines. After variant calling and quality control, 437,081 high-quality SNP markers covering the entire genome were identified.
Based on these data, the researchers conducted an in-depth analysis of genomic variation distribution, genetic diversity, heterotic group types, and population differentiation characteristics within the population. The findings highlighted the impact of artificial selection on shaping the maize genome and identified two potential new heterotic groups. Through selection sweep analysis between the 2,430 modern inbred lines and 503 natural population inbred lines, the study uncovered numerous loci potentially under selection during the breeding process. Within these loci, genes associated with critical biological processes such as flowering time, root development, stress resistance, yield, and plant architecture were identified, emphasizing the importance of these genomic regions.
Using the identified selected loci, the research team employed deep learning-based genomic prediction algorithms to develop predictive models for eight traits related to plant architecture and yield. These models demonstrated high accuracy in predicting target traits, confirming the reliability of the selected loci.
Additionally, the study introduced the concept of the selection proportion to explore the relationship between the size of validation populations and breeding efficiency in genomic selection breeding. Simulation analyses reveal that the selection proportion is a critical factor influencing genetic gains for yield-related traits.
In summary, this research established a diverse maize germplasm resource pool, identified new potential heterotic groups, and uncovered numerous elite breeding loci. These findings provide valuable genetic resources for maize breeding, and the genomic prediction models developed using deep learning algorithms can guide the utilization of this population in breeding programs.
Rice chemists create eco-friendly method to make chlorine-based materials for drugs and chemicals
Rice University
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Led byJulian West, researchers developed a photocatalytic process that uses iron and sulfur catalysts activated by mild blue light to add chlorine atoms to organic molecules.
Chlorine plays an essential part in daily life, from keeping pools clean to preserving food. Now, a team of chemists at Rice University has developed a more environmentally friendly way to integrate chlorine into chemical building blocks for medications, plastics, pesticides and other essential products while reducing costs. This research was published in Nature Synthesison Jan. 2.
Led by Julian West, assistant professor of chemistry and a Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) Scholar, the research team developed a photocatalytic process that uses iron and sulfur catalysts activated by mild blue light to add chlorine atoms to organic molecules. This innovation eliminates the need for harsh chemicals or high temperatures typically required in chlorination, which can generate difficult-to-purify byproducts.
“Our method uses sustainable, low-cost catalysts and operates at room temperature with gentle blue light,” West said. “It provides a targeted, efficient way to chlorinate molecules without conventional approaches’ environmental and purification challenges.”
One advantage of the team’s method is its precise targeting of chlorine placement on molecules, a process called anti-Markovnikov hydrochlorination. This precision creates highly pure products by selectively attaching chlorine atoms to less-reactive parts of the starting molecules. With this approach, chemists can avoid extra purification steps that are often time-consuming and costly.
The researchers also unveiled a novel addition to this process: using heavy water to incorporate deuterium, a stable hydrogen isotope. This step could make certain drugs last longer in the body by increasing their stability, potentially enhancing their effectiveness.
“It’s exciting that this method could open new doors for modifying pharmaceuticals and natural products in ways that weren’t possible with older techniques,” West said.
Research collaborators include Rice students Kang-Jie Bian, Shih-Chieh Kao, Ying Chen, Yen-Chu Lu, David Nemoto Jr. and Xiaowei Chen.
Angel Martí, professor and chair of chemistry and professor of bioengineering and materials science and nanoengineering, also contributed to this study, which was supported by CPRIT, the Welch Foundation, the Research Corporation for Science Advancement and the American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund.
Anti-Markovnikov hydro- and deuterochlorination of unsaturated hydrocarbons using iron photocatalysis
Article Publication Date
2-Jan-2025
Quantity over quality? Different bees are attracted to different floral traits
The research findings may help guide efforts to restore pollinator habitats
Penn State
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — When it comes to deciding where they’re going to get their next meal, different species of bees may be attracted to different flower traits, according to a study led by researchers at Penn State and published in PNAS Nexus.
The study focused on two species of solitary bees: the horned-face bee, which helps pollinate crops like apples and blueberries, and the alfalfa leafcutting bee, which pollinates alfalfa.
The researchers found that the horned-face bees tended to prefer plants with a large number of flowers — for them, quantity was most important. Meanwhile, the alfalfa leafcutting bees tended to visit flowers with a high pollen protein-to-lipid, or more protein than fat, content ratio. In this case, they prioritized nutritional quality.
Jaya Sravanthi Mokkapati, first author on the study and a postdoctoral scholar in the Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences and Center for Pollinator Research, said that understanding how different bee species forage can help guide conservation efforts.
“Information on the foraging strategies of different bee species give insights for understanding how plant–pollinator interactions evolved,” Mokkapati said. “Our study also highlights the need for more research on seasonal foraging habits among various bee species, which can deepen our understanding of their vital role in pollination and plant reproduction.”
Pollinators and flowering plants have evolved side by side over thousands of years to develop a mutually beneficial relationship, the researchers said. As bees visit flowers to collect nectar and pollen for food, they help plants reproduce by spreading their pollen. Since many crops require pollination to produce their fruits, vegetables or nuts, the process underpins food security for humans.
Unfortunately, many pollinator populations are in decline, the researchers added, and a major contributor to these declines is the loss of flowering plants.
Understanding which floral traits are especially attractive to bees can help in restoring pollinator habitats, according to co-author Christina Grozinger, Publius Vergilius Maro Professor of Entomology and director of the Penn State Center for Pollinator Research.
“Bees can be attracted to plants based on a number of traits, such as the color, scent, size, number and nutritional content of its flowers,” she said. “However, because these traits are co-evolved in flowers, it can also be very challenging to pinpoint which traits are the ones attracting which bees.”
For the study, the researchers worked with their collaborators in the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, who crossed the self-fertilizing Capsella rubella plant and the pollinator-dependent outcrosser C. grandiflora to produce 20 different genetic lines of plants that varied across floral traits. These traits include floral resource quantity — assessed through the number and size of flowers — and floral nutritional quality, which was evaluated based on pollen protein concentration, lipid concentration and the protein-to-lipid ratios.
This resulted in different floral traits being uncoupled from each other, which allowed the researchers to test which trait, specifically, was most attractive to different bee species.
The differences in foraging behavior between the two species of bees may be due to resource availability, the researchers said. For example, the horned-face bee is a spring species that faces limited food sources that are only available for a short time. Because of this, they may forage for whatever is available and prioritize the quantity of flowers.
“In contrast, the alfalfa leafcutting bee is a summer species that typically has access to more abundant resources,” Mokkapati said. “We hypothesized that these bees can afford to be more selective, choosing flowers based on nutritional quality instead of quantity.”
The findings could be helpful for restoring pollinator habitats, the researchers said. For example, landscape managers could plant a variety of flowers that cater to the bees’ specific needs, which is essential for supporting their populations. They could also create habitats that ensure food sources are available that are attractive and nutrition for bees throughout the growing season, promoting healthy ecosystems.
Additionally, Mokkapati said educating the public and stakeholders about the specific needs of these bee species can encourage support for initiatives like native plant gardens and other efforts that create pollinator-friendly environments.
“By raising awareness of how these gardens can provide essential resources for bees, we can inspire community involvement and commitment to preserving local biodiversity,” she said. “This collective effort not only benefits the bees but also enhances the beauty and ecological health of our surroundings.”
The researchers said in the future, additional studies could explore why these species differ in their foraging strategies, especially in terms of their sensory and cognitive processes and why these different strategies evolved.
Michael Hill, former graduate student at Penn State; Natalie Boyle, assistant research professor of entomology at Penn State; Pierre Ouvrard, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences; and Adrien Sicard, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, also co-authored this study.
This research was support by a grant from the Human Frontier Science Program to Grozinger, Sicard and Benjamin Risse, a collaborator at the University of Münster in Germany. Additional support was provided by the Penn State Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences and the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new study investigating ancient methane trapped in Antarctic ice suggests that global increases in wildfire activity likely occurred during periods of abrupt climate change throughout the last Ice Age.
The study, just published in the journal Nature, reveals increased wildfire activity as a potential feature of these periods of abrupt climate change, which also saw significant shifts in tropical rainfall patterns and temperature fluctuations around the world.
“This study showed that the planet experienced these short, sudden episodes of burning, and they happened at the same time as these other big climate shifts,” said Edward Brook, a paleoclimatologist at Oregon State University and a co-author of the study. “This is something new in our data on past climate.”
The findings have implications for understanding modern abrupt climate change, said the study’s lead author, Ben Riddell-Young, who conducted the research as part of his doctoral studies in OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences.
“This research shows that we may not be properly considering how wildfire activity might change as the climate warms and rainfall patterns shift,” said Riddell-Young, who is now a postdoctoral scholar at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Ice that built up in Antarctica over tens to hundreds of thousands of years contains ancient air bubbles. Scientists use samples of that ice, collected by drilling cores, to analyze the gasses preserved in these bubbles and build records of the Earth’s past climate.
Previous research has shown that levels of atmospheric methane, a greenhouse gas, spiked during abrupt climate change periods during the last Ice Age, which ended about 11,000 years ago. These abrupt climate change events, known as Dansgaard-Oeschger and Heinrich events, were associated with rapid regional temperature changes and shifting rainfall patterns, as well as spikes in atmospheric methane. The goal of the study was to try to determine what caused those spikes.
“These spikes were notable because of how quickly the methane levels changed during these periods,” Riddell-Young said.
Riddell-Young used samples from the two-mile long Western Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide Ice Core and a replicate core collected with a specialized drill that reenters the core and borehole and collects more ice. The records in those cores date back 67,000 years.
“Because this ice is in a place where the annual snowfall rate is high, the record doesn’t go back as far in time as other ice cores, but you get more ice for each year, and you can better see the detail in those years,” said Brook, a professor in OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences.
Riddell-Young used a system he designed to extract the air from ice samples and then used a mass spectrometer to measure the isotopic composition of the methane, which can indicate the sources of atmospheric methane.
The measured isotopic changes suggest that the spikes in methane were caused by methane emissions from an increase in wildfires globally, Riddell-Young said.
“These fire events were likely one of the cascading impacts resulting from what triggered the abrupt climate change event,” he said. “It probably went something like: Ocean currents slowed down or sped up rapidly, the northern hemisphere cooled or warmed rapidly, and then this caused abrupt shifts in tropical rainfall that lead to increased drought and fire.”
Past research has suggested that shifts in temperature and tropical rainfall were associated with these abrupt climate change periods, but the new study provides the first good evidence that fire was also a feature of these periods, Brook said.
Additional research is needed to better understand the role these periods of burning may have in climate patterns, Brook said. For example, burning produces atmospheric CO2, another greenhouse gas, which also contributes to climate warming.
“Understanding what this burning really means for the carbon cycle is one of the places the research is headed next,” he said.
The research was supported by the National Science Foundation. Additional co-authors are James Lee of the Los Alamos National Laboratory; Jochen Schmitt and Hubertus Fischer of the University of Bern; Thomas Bauska of the British Antarctic Survey; James A. Menking of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization in Australia; René Iseli of the University of Fribourg; and Justin Reid Clark of the University of Colorado, Boulder.
A sample of ice from an ice core shows the bubbles of air and chemicals that help researchers learn about past environmental conditions.
Abrupt changes in biomass burning during the last glacial period
Article Publication Date
1-Jan-2025
What Is Salting, the Organizing Tactic Spicing Up the Labor Movement?
No Class is an op-ed column by writer and radical organizer Kim Kelly that connects worker struggles and the current state of the American labor movement with its storied — and sometimes bloodied — past.
The resurgence of the American labor movement is being led in no small part by a cohort of young, diverse, fired-up workers around the country. Union density remains embarrassingly low overall, but last month the National Labor Relations Board, or NLRB, released some genuinely inspiring numbers that suggest the perceived upswing in union activity is more than just a vibe.
During the 2024 fiscal year, which ended in September, the number of union petitions filed jumped 27% compared with 2023 — and was more than double what the agency received in 2021. Why does this matter? Basically, filing these petitions is a concrete sign that more people are trying to unionize their workplaces.
We already know that unions are popular, especially among young people. A 2022 report from the Center for American Progress found that Gen Z is the most pro-union generation in the US, and young organizers have been at the forefront of many labor actions in recent years, including the Starbucks union campaign. This new generation of organizers is embracing all sorts of strategies, including one of the oldest tactics in the pro-union handbook: salting.
Salting is an organizing tactic in which a person gets a job at a specific workplace with the goal of unionizing their coworkers. This kind of shop-floor organizing has a long history within the labor movement, and was once so common it was thoroughly unremarkable; if you were a young worker with socialist or progressive ideas in, say, the early 1900s, it was the most normal thing in the world to start talking to your coworkers about unionizing as soon as you’d learned their names.
“Compared to being a full-time union [organizer] supporting from the outside, it’s easier to organize people when you’re in the trenches with them as a co-worker, building personal relationships and trust day-by-day on the shop floor,” explains Eric Blanc, an assistant professor of labor studies and employment relations at Rutgers University and trainer for the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee, which connects workers with union organizers.
Salting popped up again in a big way during the 1960s and ’70s, when workers who were already involved in anti-Vietnam War protests and the Black power movement found themselves also organizing on the job. Former salt and factory worker Jon Melrod wrote in his memoir, Fighting Times: Organizing on the Front Lines of the Class War, “Along with thousands of other student revolutionaries, I believed that our generation could organize workers and poor people to fight for an end to exploitation, racial oppression, and sexual discrimination, and to bring to birth a new world in which hunger, poverty, inequality, and environmental destruction were forever banished.”
Melrod’s time organizing auto workers in the tumultuous 1970s and into the ’80s may seem like a world away from making cappuccinos in a coffee shop in western New York, but when Teen Vogue reached out to Jaz Brisack, one of the most well-known salts in the modern labor movement, their experiences started to sound awfully familiar. When Brisack started working at the Starbucks on Buffalo’s Elmwood Avenue in 2020, they brought plenty of prior organizing experience with them. Fresh off a successful organizing campaign at another local coffee chain, Spot Coffee, and motivated by the sting of an earlier, failed union drive at a Nissan factory in Mississippi, Brisack decided to start working at Starbucks after witnessing what they believed was a friend’s unjust firing. Within a year, Starbucks Workers United was born.
“I had learned about salting at Inside Organizer School trainings, and knew that it was an amazing tactic because it allows you to build relationships with co-workers, map your workplace, and get ready to launch a campaign with the speed necessary to take a company by surprise,” Brisack tells Teen Vogue via email. “With a team of 10 salts across Starbucks cafes in Buffalo, we were able to launch a campaign with enough support quickly enough that Starbucks wasn’t able to prepare their union-busting efforts ahead of time — which was essential to our ability to win.”
Four years after starting their job at Starbucks, Brisack is currently a practitioner in residence at the UC Berkeley Labor Center, where they’re working on building out the Insider Organizer School. Their goal for that project is “to give young people a path into the labor movement and to help unions build salting programs and take advantage of this incredible tactic so that they can help more workers organize.” Meanwhile, Starbucks Workers United has continued to organize store after store, and recently hit a major milestone: The union represents 507 stores and more than 11,500 workers nationwide, as of late October, and is in the midst of bargaining its first contract with Starbucks.
Brisack and the other salts involved in that campaign obviously did a hell of a job, but they’re far from the only pro-union workers trying to spice up the workplace. The Rank & File Project (RFP) is a national organizing effort founded last year to recruit young progressive and socialist activists to join the labor movement. Explains Cyn, a 24-year-old pre-nursing student who’s planning to pursue a union job in nursing in the Bay Area, “Specifically, we’re hoping that people join the labor movement at the level of rank and file, where we can have trusting relationships with our co-workers and organize together as equals.” Cyn, who has asked to withhold their last name given the sensitive nature of their work, is a member of the RFP’s steering committee.
“We believe that in order to transform the world, to fight for an ambitious, radical agenda…, we need to build not just any kind of labor movement, but a strong, democratic, and increasingly left-wing labor movement,” Cyn continues. “There have been political events, especially within the past decade, that have really radicalized a lot of young people and created a generation that’s hungry to practice radical politics, and we want to show them that one really potent way to do that is to join the labor movement as rank and file workers, especially in industries where organizing can have an outsized impact.”
RFP has received support from movement stalwarts like Labor Notes and Teamsters for a Democratic Union, both of which boast members with personal experience in salting from its 1960s and ’70s glory days. Another RFP member (who requested anonymity to avoid outing himself at work) is currently employed at the United Parcel Service, or UPS, and has joined their Teamsters local. He has previous experience as a student at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations and working as a union staffer, but felt he could make more of a difference on the shop floor. “My job is to get in here, do a good job, and help my co-workers understand the contract and build solidarity with people,” he tells Teen Vogue. “It’s a lot of fun. Personally, I feel like I can relate to my co-workers at this job a lot better than I could at my white-collar jobs.”
Since his workplace already has a strong union, he sees his role as more political, and tries to use shared circumstances as an opportunity to make the connection between desired changes in the workplace and taking collective action. “You don’t have to slam the socialism button,” he says. “Usually someone will bring up an issue to me, and I will use socialism — like, my analysis, all the things that I learned through my struggle and through school — and try to connect the dots for them; explain what I understand about collective action and how that can be an answer to some of their problems; and what it looks like to build collective action and use our labor power… you just kind of talk like a normal person.”
Changing the world for the better has been the goal of many generations of workers; some pulled it off and some didn’t, but the most important thing for all of us is to keep trying. Salting is just one way out of many to go about it, but Brisack is a big fan: “Unions are at 6% density in the private sector, and yet there are millions of workers who would like to organize their workplace,” they say. “Salts can help show their co-workers that a better life is possible and get things rolling in that direction.”
Yet as romantic or glamorous as the undercover aspects of salting might seem (especially if you’ve watched Boots Riley’s absurdist anti-capitalist epic Sorry to Bother You), Blanc says it’s just as important for young workers to stick around and organize at their current jobs. There are union drives happening in tech, higher ed, media, and so many other industries. There’s no need to run off and try to get a new gig at an auto factory if you’re already late for your shift at Amazon — though salts have reportedly been pretty busy there too. As Rutgers’ Blanc sees it, the bottom line is simple: “Every job would benefit from a union and any job can become a union job if you’re willing to put in the work to organize your co-workers.”
You heard them. Let’s get to work!
MIT Student Banned From Campus, Facing Suspension After Pro-Palestine Activism
Prahlad Iyengar has faced the ire of university officials over actions such as questioning Lockheed Martin recruiters on campus
Prahlad Iyengar recently came across a video of children in Gaza reacting to the sound of their school bell ringing through a pair of headphones. Iyengar watched as the children burst into tears over how much they missed school, unsure which of their teachers and friends were still alive.
Iyengar, a Ph.D. candidate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), has felt similarly in recent weeks—though not to the same extent. In Gaza, Israel has destroyed communities, wiped out schools and universities, and killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, leaving many others starving, displaced, or missing. But as Iyengar watched the video from Cambridge, he shared a keen sense of loss: He, too, misses school.
The 24-year-old electrical engineering student hasn’t stepped foot on MIT’s campus since Nov. 1, when he was notified via email that he was banned from its grounds. Since then, his charges have escalated, and he now faces a yearlong suspension. He said this would effectively terminate his participation in his National Science Foundation fellowship. By January 2026, he’d be too far behind on his work, and his readmission would hinge on approval from the same committee that is currently issuing the discipline.
Prahlad Iyengar at a pro-Palestine protest at MIT in May 2024. Credit: Courtesy of Prahlad Iyengar
“I miss being in school, I miss going to my classes, I miss seeing my friends on campus,” Iyengar said. “But I have the luxury of being able to miss those things. The schoolchildren of Gaza, the college students of Gaza, their campuses have been bombed. None of their campuses are still standing.”
At issue is an article Iyengar, who has been heavily involved in campus activism for Palestine, wrote for the MIT student publication Written Revolution. In the latest edition of the magazine, Iyengar penned an article titled “On Pacifism,” in which he calls for a reevaluation of pacifism—or unconditional nonviolence—as an overall strategy, and to instead view it as one of many tactics within pro-Palestinian activism.
MIT’s Office of Student Conduct swiftly responded to “numerous” complaints it said it received about the article, which also featured images of posters from the Marxist-Leninist resistance movement Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), which was designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department in 1997. One image featured in the article read, “We will burn the ground beneath your feet,” accompanied by the PFLP emblem.
In a Nov. 1 email to Iyengar, obtained by Prism, MIT called the article’s imagery “deeply concerning” and its statements “troubling.”
“The reports MIT received indicated that these statements could be interpreted as a call for more violent or destructive forms of protest at MIT,” the email said. “Including stating that it is time to ‘begin wreaking havoc’ and ‘exact[ing] a cost’ at MIT.”
MIT also banned Iyengar and the other students who led the publication from distributing the issue on campus.
Iyengar said he wasn’t expecting this fallout when he wrote the article and that restricting his campus access and magazine distribution violates free speech. He said that the inclusion of the PFLP image doesn’t mean he endorses the group but instead serves as a historical reference. He rejected claims that his article’s statements supported tactics of terrorism, including his call to “begin wreaking havoc.”
“Wreaking havoc is also a tactic of 2-year-olds when they throw tantrums,” Iyengar said.
Iyengar also denied claims that the article calls for an escalation of violence. Instead, he said it urges readers to treat pacifism as one protest tactic, instead of an overall strategy, and to reframe their thoughts about violence in response to oppression.
We cannot be honest with ourselves about a movement that’s trying to dismantle a colonial regime without acknowledging that, yes, at some level, it requires non-pacifist action.Prahlad Iyengar
“We cannot be honest with ourselves about a movement that’s trying to dismantle a colonial regime without acknowledging that, yes, at some level, it requires non-pacifist action,” Iyengar said. “But non-pacifist action is not limited to violence.”
MIT’s email to Iyengar also noted several other pending disciplinary cases, including an email blast regarding MIT’s Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), which Iyengar said has research ties to Israel. Iyengar led an October protest outside CSAIL labs, then emailed its graduate workers and postdoctoral researchers to explain the protest’s aims and invite them to join the cause.
MIT said in its email to Iyengar that he amplified an “unauthorized protest” that disrupted CSAIL work, created safety concerns, and led to an assault of a CSAIL staff member.
However, when MIT notified Iyengar of his suspension on Dec. 4, it cited disciplinary sanctions not for the article or the email, but for accusations of harassment and intimidation at a September career fair.
At the career fair, Iyengar—who was already on probation for his involvement in a Palestine solidarity encampment and other protests in the spring—approached recruiters from the aerospace and defense company Lockheed Martin, which manufactures fighter jets and missiles used in the Israeli military.
Iyengar said he struck up a conversation with Lockheed Martin recruiters, mentioning that he would not be comfortable working on projects complicit in Israel’s military offense. Iyengar said he was trying to think deeply about the impact of science and engineering, and to learn about Lockheed Martin’s mission.
“And what I learned was that they want MIT students to work for the military,” Iyengar said. “That, to me, doesn’t sit right.”
MIT’s discipline committee determined that Iyengar approached Lockheed Martin recruiters with the intent to probe in a way that witnesses said went beyond civil discourse, Iyengar said. Iyengar, however, said claims that he harassed, intimidated, or taunted the company’s recruiters are untrue and that no such actions are shown in police camera footage and other evidence the committee reviewed.
Michel DeGraff, a linguistics professor who has been vocal in his support of Palestine and the student protesters, was at the career fair and disputed MIT’s characterization of events. He said Iyengar and other students were asking “tough questions” to recruiters about the company’s role in Israel’s genocide in Palestine. DeGraff said Iyengar appeared “polite and very composed” throughout the interaction and exhibited no signs of intimidating or harassing behaviors.
He said the students have expressed “outrage” at MIT’s collaboration with such companies and that they raised a banner above Lockheed Martin’s recruiting booth that read “Lockheed kills kids in Gaza.”
“And that’s a fact,” DeGraff said. “Lockheed Martin’s weapons are killing children in Gaza.”
DeGraff described MIT’s disciplinary actions against Iyengar as a repression of speech.
“It’s as if MIT doesn’t care about the truth,” DeGraff said. “All they want to do is to repress the students, put them in this Kafkaesque cycle of accusations, and basically get them away from expressing the deeply ethical beliefs about what’s happening in Gaza.”
An MIT spokesperson said the university cannot discuss the details of any student disciplinary matter.
“Even in instances where misinformation may be in circulation, we are unable to comment because doing so may suggest or reveal information we are obliged to keep private,” the spokesperson said in an email.
Eric Lee, a federal immigration lawyer who is advising Iyengar in his disciplinary case, said MIT’s disciplinary process raises concerns about the status of free speech on college campuses.
The university’s disciplinary procedures against Iyengar after publishing his article “should send a chill down the spine of defenders of the First Amendment,” Lee said.
Jessie Rossman, legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, said that although private colleges like MIT are not subject to the First Amendment, “their policies must be applied equally and fairly.”
“University leaders should consider not only what is lawful, but also what is wise,” Rossman said. “Colleges and universities play a critical role in our democracy by providing a marketplace for ideas and expression, where multiple viewpoints can be explored and debate is encouraged—even for speech that is unpopular, controversial, or deeply offensive.”
Iyengar filed an appeal with the student conduct committee on Dec. 11, hoping to get the suspension lifted. For now, he awaits word from MIT, with no set deadline in sight. “I actually feel sort of righteous [indignation],” Iyengar said. “I do think that this has had an extremely chilling effect on speech, and I think it will only get worse.”
