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Tatiana Toro, professor of mathematics at the UW, will maintain her tenure at the UW during her five-year director term of MSRI, a collaborative mathematics research center based in Berkeley. [This is part of "Tech Moves"]

Before heading off to college, UW student and English major Zoe Hana Mikuta signed a two-book deal with major publisher Macmillan, with the movie rights quickly optioned. The first of those books, a young adult science fiction novel called “Gearbreakers,” comes out June 29; in it, two teen girls fighting opposite sides in a futuristic society fall in love. Shawn Wong, professor of English at the UW, is quoted.

There's a market for just about anything — and fossils are hot right now. Collectors are paying tens of thousands of dollars for the latest dig, and that's making it difficult for paleontologists to track important finds. The UW's Christian Sidor, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Burke Museum and professor of biology, is interviewed. [This is the third segment on "The Record"]

As a tourist destination, the moon doesn’t have a lot to offer: no beaches, no museums, no oxygen. On the other hand, it does have the virtue of being the moon. When will common folk, not just the super-rich, get to make the trip? Scott Magelssen, professor of theatre history at the UW, is quoted.

With the publication of “Rare Earth: Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe” 20 years ago, the UW’s Peter Ward, professor of biology, and Donald Brownlee, professor of astronomy, explained why microbial life may be ubiquitous in the universe, but intelligent life may be rare indeed. They are now working on a sequel, tentatively titled “The Rare Earth Hypothesis: Assessing the Frequency of Complex Life in the Cosmos, in the Age of Exoplanet Discovery.”

This week, watch a UW alum on NBC’s Making It, attend a discussion hosted by the Henry Art Gallery, and more.

While some social scientists, journalists and activists have been raising concerns about how social media is affecting our democracy, mental health and relationships, we haven’t seen biologists and ecologists weighing in as much. That’s changed with a new paper published in the prestigious science journal PNAS earlier this month, titled “Stewardship of global collective behavior.” The UW’s Joe Bak-Coleman, a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for an Informed Public, and Carl Bergstrom, professor of biology, are interviewed.

Researchers warn that phony satellite imagery could become a common and dangerous mode of disinformation. Bo Zhao, assistant professor of geography at the UW, is quoted.

Architect Kirsten Murray mentions her plans to visit the Burke Museum this summer.