While the digital revolution has changed the nature of news distribution, it has not diminished the need for ambitious, accurate, and reliable journalism in American society. This project looked at the evolving role of the media in today’s world, in general, and analyzed how reporters cover science and economic issues, in particular.

This study addressed an urgent issue: How can NATO improve its conventional weapons capacity to enhance its deterrent to aggression and lessen its dependence on possible early use of nuclear weapons?

This project brought together educators and practitioners to explore ways to foster strong, ethical leadership skills in three arenas critical to American society: business, law, and the university.

This project attempted to deal constructively with the principal issues raised by the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). The resulting report, initially published as a double-issue of Dædalus, does not reach conclusions about the desirability or feasibility of the SDI; rather, it presents favorable, opposing, and skeptical views about the relevant scientific, technological, strategic, and political issues involved.

Challenges for International Scientific Partnerships aimed to articulate the benefits of international collaboration and recommend solutions to the most pressing challenges associated with the design and operation of partnerships. This initiative sought to identify policy recommendations and best practices to mitigate challenges for international science collaborations, including physical facilities, distributed networks, and peer-to-peer partnerships.

New Dilemmas in Ethics, Technology and War is a three-year study exploring the intricate, rapidly evolving relationship between advancements in military technology and the moral and ethical dilemmas that new technologies pose for states, international organizations, and global society. 

This project brought together experts in the biological sciences, physical sciences, and social sciences to examine the evolution and origin of human biology, behavior, and society.

This project analyzed public trust in vaccines from multiple disciplines to identify barriers to vaccine coverage, evaluate the role of the media in the public’s attitudes towards vaccines, and provide recommendations to improve the public’s trust in vaccines.

Less than one-third of American undergraduates major in the natural sciences, mathematics, or engineering. This project examined the goals of science requirements for nonscientists, and how students fulfill those requirements, in an effort to inform curriculum policies at higher education institutions.

To address a deepening crisis in the lives of America’s children, the Academy organized a steering committee to explore how the Academy could increase the nation’s commitment to and investment in children.

This project convenes interdisciplinary experts to identify the grand challenges in digital mental health, including policy recommendations for ensuring that AI and other emerging technologies shape mental health diagnosis and treatment ethically and equitably.  

By convening scholars, practitioners, and policy-makers with representatives of the courts, legal aid providers, and foundations, the project seeks to understand and assess the challenge of providing legal services for low-income Americans.

The American Academy Studies in Global Security Series was edited by Carl Kaysen, MIT, John Steinbruner, University of Maryland; and Martin B. Malin, American Academy of Arts and Sciences and was a project of the Committee on International Security Studies.

This series of studies analyzes the evolution of humanities disciplines and institutions, examines the conditions and intellectual climate in which they operate, and assesses the role and value of the humanities in society.

This project brought together physical scientists, legal experts, space program directors, economists, political scientists, and policymakers from all space-faring nations to discuss how to mitigate the problem of ever-increasing quantities of man-made orbital debris in space.

This project provides an institutional history of higher education in California.

For this project, the Academy co-sponsored a series of symposia and conferences to examine censorship from a variety of perspectives. In the resulting volume of essays, an interdisciplinary group of scholars analyzed efforts to regulate speech and examined the subsequent cultural implications.

This project studied the influence of Paul Tillich⁠—a distinguished philosophical and cultural theologian and an eminent interpreter of the 20th century⁠—on contemporary life.

As a member of the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO, the Academy formed a special committee to examine, and consider Academy action in response to, the “politicization” of UNESCO.

This project brought together experts from education, law, statistics, economics, policy studies, and business to assess how critical thinking is taught and to propose ways to strengthen these skills.