Solar energy is one of the most contentious topics out there. Some see it as the way to a carbon-neutral energy system, while others say it’s a boondoggle. Varun Sivaram has worked in the ivory tower of academia, the nitty gritty of municipal governance, and the high-risk, high-reward world of tech start-ups. Along the way, he’s come face-to-face with differing views of solar energy. He attempts to put them in perspective in his new book, " Taming the Sun."

We know we have an opioid epidemic. Opioid overdoses have become the leading cause of accidental deaths for Americans under the age of 50. But the problem is far worse in some places than in others. A new county-by-county analysis of deaths due to drug and alcohol abuse highlights just how enormous the disparities can be.

Case in point, between 1980 and 2014, drug-related deaths increased nationwide — and in every single county. But, in some counties the increase was a modest eight percent, while in others it was more than 8,000 percent. Some of the hardest-hit counties are in southern West Virginia, Ohio, and eastern Kentucky – areas that already had some of the highest drug abuse death rates.

“By giving a number for a state or for the nation, for example, you are really giving an average,” said Ali Mokdad, a public health researcher at University of Washington and co-author of the new study. “By pointing out the problem at the local level this is when you energize the community and the local authorities to act.”

Millions of people use social media, many overuse it, and some are actually clinically addicted. Isaac Vaghefi, assistant professor at the Binghamton University School of Management, says that about 15 to 20 percent of the college students he works with fall into the problematic category. But who is most likely to develop a social media problem?

Vaghefi’s research suggests that certain personality traits, particularly neuroticism, conscientiousness and agreeableness, may be important predictors of social media addiction. But Vaghefi says the relationships are complicated. For example, neuroticism can dampen the benefits of conscientiousness. And individuals who fall at the extreme ends of the spectrum for many personality traits (highly agreeable or highly disagreeable, highly extroverted or highly introverted) may be more prone to social media addiction.

For those with personalities that raise red flags, Vaghefi isn’t suggesting personality change. Rather, he says that monitoring social media usage – being mindful about it – can help reduce the risk of addiction. And, wouldn’t you know it? There’s an app for that.

Cindy Voisine grew up in Fort Kent, Maine – a small town with a strong French Canadian influence. Her family is bilingual, and she was the first in her family to go to college. She grew up thinking she would become a medical doctor, the only career she knew of that would satisfy her interest in biology. But her ideas changed when she got to Bates College.

Voisine fell in love with research, and pursued a Ph.D. She did postdoctoral research at Harvard University, then Northwestern University. But, it was at Northeastern Illinois University, a lesser-known state school just blocks away in Chicago, that things clicked. Voisine says she felt an immediate connection with many of the lower-income and minority students at Northeastern Illinois University.

Now, those students are driving her research in new and interesting directions, including a study on aging, another on racial disparities in prostate cancer outcomes, and a third in which worms sniff out tuberculosis quickly and cheaply.

“It engages [the students] .... on a community level, where they see they can impact the communities that they come from,” Voisine said.