Suryatapa Jha

Suryatapa Jha is Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology at Scripps College. She has a PhD in Plant Biology from the University of Vermont and completed her postdoctoral research at the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford University. Her research interests center on evolutionary cell biology and plant-environment interactions. In 2022, she was a Virtual Faculty Resident at the Dumbarton Oaks Plant Humanities Initiative.

A botanical illustration of Indigofera tinctoria from La botanique de J.J. Rousseau, 1805

Plant of the Month

Plant of the Month: Indigo

The cultivation of this plant for its cherished blue dye tells the story of exploitative agricultural practices—and, hopefully, its reversal.

Editors' Picks

James Baldwin and Nikki Giovanni in Conversation

In 1971, two legends of Black letters discussed Black manhood, white racism, the role of the writer, and the responsibility to teach.

Science & Technology

Can We Build a Better Facebook?

Is it time to turn our back on Facebook? And if so, what social network could possibly replace it?

Science & Technology

The Anatomists of Ancient Alexandria

Cultural forces under the Ptolemaic dynasty briefly allowed scholars like Herophilus to practice dissection—and possibly vivisection—on human subjects.

Politics & History

The Genocide Before the Shoah

For a century, Jews in Turkey have maintained a strategic silence when it comes to recognizing the Armenian genocide. Could that be changing?

Politics & History

Wilhelm Reich: Twice Burned

A psychoanalyst and physician, Reich fled the Nazis only to be detained by the US as an “enemy alien” during World War II. And then came the sexual revolution.