Smithsonian Magazine: September 2007
Features
Young Innovators in the Arts and Sciences
Take a look at 37 people under the age of 36 who are shaping the world through their talents in the arts and sciences
By Smithsonian magazine
Meet the Innovators
By The Editors
Water Works
Taking up the family business, Philippe Cousteau campaigns to save our oceans and rivers
By G. Bruce Knecht
Roving Eye
Documentary filmmaker Rachel Grady opens our eyes to the complexities of overlooked places and people
By Kenneth Turan
Midas Touch
To clean highly polluted groundwater, Michael Wong has developed a detergent based on gold
By William Booth
Hot Idea
Christina Galitsky's energy-efficient cookstove makes life a little easier for Darfur's refugees
By Neil Henry
High Scorer
Composer Nico Muhly wowed them at Carnegie Hall and the New York Public Library
By Tim Page
Painting the Edge
With an eye for despoiled landscapes, Lisa Sanditz captures the sublime
By Arthur Lubow
Stepping Up
Even as he travels the world, dancer and hip-hopper Marc Bamuthi Joseph has stayed close to his musical roots
By Derk Richardson
Shell Fame
Paleobiologist Aaron O'Dea has made his name by sweating the small stuff
By Laura Helmuth
Flower Power
Studying ancient botanical drawings, Daniela Bleichmar is rewriting the history of the Spanish conquest of the Americas
By Rick Wartzman
Mounds vs. Vegans
In drawings and paintings, Trenton Doyle Hancock pits archetypes against each other
By Amy Crawford
How to Make a Dodo
Biologist Beth Shapiro has figured out a recipe for success in the field of ancient DNA research
By Andrew Curry
Site Seer
Faced with the Internet's overwhelming clutter, Joshua Schachter invented a deceptively simple tool that helps us all cut to the chase
By Adam Rogers
Russian Idol
Moscow-born Regina Spektor draws on classical music roots to create and perform pop songs of rare originality
By Caryn Ganz
Flu Fighter
With a possible pandemic in our future, immunologist John Wherry is racing to develop a once-a-lifetime vaccine
By Arthur Allen
Show Stopper
The classically trained dance star Alicia Graf showed true grit overcoming a career-threatening ailment
By Cathleen McGuigan
Dogged
Primatologist Brian Hare investigates the social behavior of chimpanzees and bonobos in Africa. But dogs and foxes showed him the way
By Virginia Morell
Chameleon
Playwright and performer Sarah Jones displays a genius for climbing into other people's skin
By Elizabeth Méndez Berry
The Big Picture
Political historian Jeremi Suri has come up with a new way of looking at the links between the low and the mighty
By Heather Laroi
Mighty Mouth
Spoken-word artist Mayda del Valle brings to life "democracy writ large in poetry"
By Serena Kim
The Player
Luis von Ahn's secret for making computers smarter? Get thousands of people to take part in his cunning online games
By Polly Shulman
Signs of Life
Astrophysicist Lisa Kaltenegger analyzes light from distant stars for evidence we're not alone
By Charles Seife
Down to Earth
Anthropologist Amber VanDerwarker is unraveling the mysteries of the ancient Olmec by figuring out what they ate
By Andrew Lawler
One Man Band
The next Bob Dylan? Maybe. Sufjan Stevens' honest sound and stark lyrics speak volumes to a new generation. And he plays all the instruments
By Nic Harcourt
Wild Woman
Playwright Sarah Ruhl speaks softly and carries a big kick
By Matthew Gurewitsch
Primed for Success
Terence Tao is regarded as first among equals among young mathematicians, but who's counting
By Dana Mackenzie
Faith Healer
Religious historian Reza Aslan calls for a return to Islam's tradition of tolerance
By Amy Crawford
Organizing Principal
In the South Bronx, Ramón Gonzalez gives a troubled middle school a kidcentric makeover
By Paula Span
The Bias Detective
How does prejudice affect people? Psychologist Jennifer Richeson is on the case
By David Berreby
Crossing the Divide
Novelist Daniel Alarcón's writings evoke the gritty, compelling landscape of urban Latin America
By Marie Arana
Civil Wrongs
In a painstaking study of 1960s Atlanta, Kevin Kruse takes suburban whites to task
By Dick Polman
Rock of Ages
Where did the world's highest mountains come from? Geologist Elizabeth Catlos takes a new view
By J. Madeleine Nash
I, Lender
Software engineer Matt Flannery pioneers Internet microloans to the world's poor
By Amy Crawford
Comedienne of Manners
Novelist ZZ Packer uses humor to point up some disconcerting signposts along America's racial divide
By Tessa Decarlo
Keeper of the Keys
Pianist Jason Moran laces his strikingly original music with the soulful sounds of jazz greats
By Jamie Katz
Marked Man
Guerilla artist James De La Vega leverages his street smarts to a fashion career
By Colin Fleming
Net Worker
Where are your friends in cyberspace? Closer than you might think, says Internet researcher Jon Kleinberg
By Matt Dellinger
Making the Grade
Yurok Indian Geneva Wiki is helping other young Native Americans "develop their best selves"
By Katherine Ellison
From the Castle
Sci-High
By Cristián Samper
A Pox Upon the Kauri
New Zealanders rally to save their much-loved, 2,000-year-old national symbol
By Debora Vrana
West Side Glory
Out of Hell's Kitchen came an image that would epitomize one of Broadway's greatest love stories
By Owen Edwards
