This is the science podcast for February 21st, 2021.

I'm Sarah Crespi.

First up this week, Deputy News Editor Martin Enshring joins me to talk about how organizers

of US AID-funded studies are grappling with ethical responsibilities to trial participants

and collaborators as funding, supplies, and workers go away. Next, freelance science writer Sandeep Revenrin

talks about creating tiny ML devices. Those are tiny machine learning devices or use in the

global south. Farmers are using low-cost, low-power devices for spotting fungal infections

and tree plantations. Clinics could use them for listening for the buzz of mosquitoes that might

be carrying malaria. Finally, researcher Michael Barnett is here to discuss evolving evolvability. His team

demonstrated a way from microorganisms to become more evolvable in response to

repeated swings in the environment. In January, the Trump administration signed an executive order

that stopped the USAA Agency for International Development, USAID, from doing work, making payments. And now last

week, in the middle of February, the U.S. courts have put this executive order on hold. But between

the end of January, when the executive order was signed, in the middle of February, a lot has

happened with USAID. Martin Nshrink is a deputy news editor here at Science, specializing in global

health. He edited a piece this week on some of the impossible choices that researchers and

public health workers have had to face in the light of the stoppage. Hi, Martin. Welcome to the

Science podcast. Hi, Sarah. Can you give us just a brief rundown of what USAID does? It's a lot of things,

but maybe we could just talk about the global health part. They do a lot of stuff. They're probably

best known for distributing food and medicines, and for instance, running a very big HIV treatment

program called PEPFAR. They do a lot in malaria, but they also do a lot of research. Some clinical trials

in Africa, for instance, and some of our reporting is focused on the impacts on science

...