According to The Washington Post, “At the National Science Foundation, staff have been combing through thousands of active science research projects, alongside a list of keywords, to determine if they include activities that violate executive orders President Donald Trump issued in his first week in office. Those include orders to recognize only two genders and roll back diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The search is driven by dozens of flagged words, according to an internal document reviewed by The Washington Post and two NSF employees with knowledge of the review process who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak.”

The words triggering NSF reviews provide a picture of the sievelike net being cast over the typically politically independent scientific enterprise, including words like “trauma,” “barriers,” “equity” and “excluded.”

Here is a sampling of keywords drawing scrutiny to science:

activism

activists

advocacy

advocate

advocates

barrier

barriers

biased

biased toward

biases

biases towards

bipoc

black and latinx

community diversity

community equity

cultural differences

cultural heritage

culturally responsive

disabilities

disability

discriminated

discrimination

discriminatory

diverse backgrounds

diverse communities

diverse community

diverse group

diverse groups

diversified diversify

diversifying

diversity and inclusion

diversity equity

enhance the diversity

enhancing diversity

equal opportunity

equality

equitable

equity

ethnicity

excluded

female

females

fostering inclusivity

gender

gender diversity

genders

hate speech

hispanic minority

historically

implicit bias

implicit biases

inclusion

inclusive

inclusiveness

inclusivity

increase diversity

increase the diversity

indigenous community

inequalities

inequality

inequitable

inequities

institutional

Igbt

marginalize

marginalized

minorities

minority

multicultural

polarization

political

prejudice

privileges

promoting diversity

race and ethnicity

racial

racial diversity

This list is not a complete list, although it is quite extensive.

The Washington Post adds that “According to an internal document, NSF grants that are flagged for “further action” because they don’t comply with the executive orders could be subject to a range of additional steps, including modification to be in compliance or being terminated in part or whole.”

NASA pauses work by key space science groups amid Trump executive orders

By Tariq Malik

The space agency’s planetary science analysis groups must pause while NASA checks if they comply with Trump’s orders.

NASA has ordered key planetary science committees for Mars, moon and other exploration to pause all work due to Trump administration executive orders. (Image credit: NASA)

NASA has ordered a pause on all work by key planetary and astrophysics science committees due to recent executive orders by President Donald Trump.

In a series of memos sent from NASA headquarters late Friday (Jan. 31), the space agency directed the leaders of at least 10 planetary science assessment and analysis groups that cover a wide range of topics, from the exploration of the moon and solar system planets to “ocean worlds” like the icy moons of Saturn and Jupiter. According to SpaceNews, NASA’s astrophysics assessment groups received similar memos, all of which cited a need to ensure the groups were in compliance with recent executive orders by Trump.

“As NASA continues to review and ensure compliance with presidential actions, we are requesting that you please pause all meetings and activities of Planetary Science Analysis/Assessment Groups,” read one NASA memo to the Mercury Exploration Assessment Group, which was obtained by Space.com and was nearly identical to memos sent to other planetary science committees.

The memos cited six Trump executive actions, three of them aimed at ending diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs in the federal government. Two others targeting so-called “gender ideology extremism,” while another referred to “Unleashing American Energy” that roll back climate change-related executive orders by the Biden administration.

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The pause order from NASA headquarters has already led to the cancellation of at least one planetary science meeting. The Mercury exploration group, known by the acronym MExAG was scheduled to hold its first in-person meeting this week from Feb. 4 to Feb. 6, but will no longer meet.

“We are forced, therefore, to cancel MExAG 2025,” the Mercury committee’s chair Carolyn Ernst, a planetary scientist with Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, wrote in a memo obtained by Space.com. “This turn of events is shocking and concerning, and is extra painful given the order comes four days before our first in-person meeting.” Some committee members had already begun travel for the meeting, Ernst added.

The nearly three-day hybrid meeting was expected to include at up 200 scientists attending either in person of virtually, one scientist Ed Rivera-Valentin shared on the social media site Bluesky. It was expected to include a number of researchers connected to the BepiColombo Mercury mission run by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and the European Space Agency. The probe just made its sixth flyby of Mercury on Jan. 8.

“The MExAG steering committee is heartbroken that our first in-person meeting was cancelled due to this,” scientist Mallory Kinczyk wrote on Bluesky.

Vicky Hamilton, a planetary geologist with the Southwest Research Institute who chairs NASA’s Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group, said in a memo to her committee that the group has stopped planning work for its own meeting scheduled for April.

“We will let everyone know as soon as we are able to resume work,” she wrote in a memo obtained by Space.com.

NASA’s assessment and analysis groups meet regularly to assess the latest discoveries and missions in their specific fields and report them back to the space agency’s internal planetary science and astrophysics divisions. While they provide key insight into space science, the groups are not formal advisory committees overseen by the Federal Advisory Committee Act, according to SpaceNews. Many of the planetary science committees are overseen by the Lunar and Planetary Institute, which itself is managed by the Universities Space Research Association.

Related Stories:

— Trump wants the US to land astronauts on Mars soon. Could it happen?

— Trump says he’d create a Space National Guard if elected

—  Trump’s space policy won’t catch Europe off guard, ESA chief says

NASA’s pause order to its analysis groups is one of several agency changes that have followed executive orders from the Trump administration.

The agency has begun restricting funding to programs related to diversity, equity and inequality, including to a Here to Observer program that connected students from underrepresented groups with NASA planetary science missions, according to SpaceNews.

SpaceNews also reported that the agency has removed a 2023 article about the NASA astronaut class of 1978, a team that included the agency’s first Black, Asian-American and female astronauts, written by NASA’s own history office. It appears to have been removed by Jan. 29, after being accessible as late as Jan. 25, SpaceNews added. You can still find the article on the Internet Archive.

Space.com has reached out to NASA headquarters for comment and will update this story if one is received.

NASA pauses work by key space science groups amid Trump executive orders

By Tariq Malik

The space agency’s planetary science analysis groups must pause while NASA checks if they comply with Trump’s orders.

NASA has ordered key planetary science committees for Mars, moon and other exploration to pause all work due to Trump administration executive orders. (Image credit: NASA)

NASA has ordered a pause on all work by key planetary and astrophysics science committees due to recent executive orders by President Donald Trump.

In a series of memos sent from NASA headquarters late Friday (Jan. 31), the space agency directed the leaders of at least 10 planetary science assessment and analysis groups that cover a wide range of topics, from the exploration of the moon and solar system planets to “ocean worlds” like the icy moons of Saturn and Jupiter. According to SpaceNews, NASA’s astrophysics assessment groups received similar memos, all of which cited a need to ensure the groups were in compliance with recent executive orders by Trump.

“As NASA continues to review and ensure compliance with presidential actions, we are requesting that you please pause all meetings and activities of Planetary Science Analysis/Assessment Groups,” read one NASA memo to the Mercury Exploration Assessment Group, which was obtained by Space.com and was nearly identical to memos sent to other planetary science committees.

The memos cited six Trump executive actions, three of them aimed at ending diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs in the federal government. Two others targeting so-called “gender ideology extremism,” while another referred to “Unleashing American Energy” that roll back climate change-related executive orders by the Biden administration.

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• Trump orders interim NASA chief to end DEI initiatives

• Trump administration’s funding freeze attempt could have stalled $1.2 billion in NASA spending

The pause order from NASA headquarters has already led to the cancellation of at least one planetary science meeting. The Mercury exploration group, known by the acronym MExAG was scheduled to hold its first in-person meeting this week from Feb. 4 to Feb. 6, but will no longer meet.

“We are forced, therefore, to cancel MExAG 2025,” the Mercury committee’s chair Carolyn Ernst, a planetary scientist with Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, wrote in a memo obtained by Space.com. “This turn of events is shocking and concerning, and is extra painful given the order comes four days before our first in-person meeting.” Some committee members had already begun travel for the meeting, Ernst added.

The nearly three-day hybrid meeting was expected to include at up 200 scientists attending either in person of virtually, one scientist Ed Rivera-Valentin shared on the social media site Bluesky. It was expected to include a number of researchers connected to the BepiColombo Mercury mission run by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and the European Space Agency. The probe just made its sixth flyby of Mercury on Jan. 8.

“The MExAG steering committee is heartbroken that our first in-person meeting was cancelled due to this,” scientist Mallory Kinczyk wrote on Bluesky.

Vicky Hamilton, a planetary geologist with the Southwest Research Institute who chairs NASA’s Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group, said in a memo to her committee that the group has stopped planning work for its own meeting scheduled for April.

“We will let everyone know as soon as we are able to resume work,” she wrote in a memo obtained by Space.com.

NASA’s assessment and analysis groups meet regularly to assess the latest discoveries and missions in their specific fields and report them back to the space agency’s internal planetary science and astrophysics divisions. While they provide key insight into space science, the groups are not formal advisory committees overseen by the Federal Advisory Committee Act, according to SpaceNews. Many of the planetary science committees are overseen by the Lunar and Planetary Institute, which itself is managed by the Universities Space Research Association.

Related Stories:

— Trump wants the US to land astronauts on Mars soon. Could it happen?

— Trump says he’d create a Space National Guard if elected

—  Trump’s space policy won’t catch Europe off guard, ESA chief says

NASA’s pause order to its analysis groups is one of several agency changes that have followed executive orders from the Trump administration.

The agency has begun restricting funding to programs related to diversity, equity and inequality, including to a Here to Observer program that connected students from underrepresented groups with NASA planetary science missions, according to SpaceNews.

SpaceNews also reported that the agency has removed a 2023 article about the NASA astronaut class of 1978, a team that included the agency’s first Black, Asian-American and female astronauts, written by NASA’s own history office. It appears to have been removed by Jan. 29, after being accessible as late as Jan. 25, SpaceNews added. You can still find the article on the Internet Archive.

Space.com has reached out to NASA headquarters for comment and will update this story if one is received.

We all love a good Italian meal, but nothing kills the appetite quite like a grammar gaffe on the menu. Just ask Jodi Amendola, who recently spotted a sign advertising “home maid” sauce—delicious in theory, but questionable in execution. In her Forbes article, she dishes out a timely reminder: proofreading matters.

When you sit down for a fun dinner out at a restaurant with family and friends, the importance of proofreading is rarely top of mind.

Yet that’s where I found myself recently during a visit to a little Italian restaurant while vacationing with my family in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. While the food was great and the chef’s attention to detail was excellent, I can’t say the same for the restaurant’s signage.

A sign on the wall advertised fresh pasta with “home maid” sauce, which sounded right, but of course, wasn’t correct. Of course, the sign should have said the restaurant offers “homemade” sauce.

While the sign gave me a slight chuckle and certainly didn’t detract from my overall dining experience, it nonetheless reminded me of an important lesson we’ve all known since elementary school, yet repeatedly seem to forget: Proofread your work.

It’s not a profound lesson, but it is an important one.

We’ve all heard that “content is king,” but how you present that content matters, too. Misspellings and grammatical mistakes undermine the authority of whatever message you’re trying to get across and are indicative of hurried, shoddy work.

Like it or not: When you put something out into the world, you are being judged.

Or, as the Writing Center at the University of North Carolina states: “When you’ve worked hard to develop and present your ideas, you don’t want careless errors distracting your reader from what you have to say. It’s worth paying attention to the details that help you to make a good impression.”

Why proofread? Isn’t that what spell check is for? Consider this fictional sentence that could have possibly been said by someone, somewhere at some point in time while eating at an Italian restaurant: “Over there, they’re eating their lasagna.”

As someone familiar with the English language with writing experience, I (and, most likely, you) know that “there,” “they’re” and “their” are all spelled correctly in the previous sentence.

But guess what doesn’t know? Your spell checker (at least not always).

Although it’s become a bit of a cliché, that’s why a “human in the loop” is still essential when it comes to most applications of AI. An experienced, competent human proofreader knows to look out for these sorts of little mistakes that can sometimes trip up even veteran writers. Here are a few other tips for proofreading success.

• Start at the end, and read in reverse order: Often when proofreading, we’re looking for the type of misspellings or homonyms that AI will not catch for us, such as “made” versus “maid.” By starting with the last word of the content and then reading each word prior to it, you can divorce your thoughts from the context and meaning of the article and focus exclusively on the word you’re reading at the moment.

• Take a break: Writing and editing sometimes require different approaches and mindsets, so never start proofreading as soon as you finish writing a first draft. Take a little time to get away from the content before you come back for editing, even if it’s only 30 minutes.

• Set aside the distractions: Pick a time of day and a place where you’ll be able to devote your full attention to the text. Hopefully, it is not in front of the TV or on the treadmill. For many of us, the best time is early in the morning while relaxing with a hot cup of coffee before the inevitable stream of emails and texts starts rolling in.

• Ask a friend: It always helps to have an objective viewpoint and a fresh set of eyes. Find a colleague with both.

• Bonus: Cite primary—not secondary—sources: To maintain credibility, it is essential that writers cite the sources of statistics and little-known facts. However, it’s important to cite the original and not secondary sources. In other words, if you’re referencing a survey about executives’ attitudes toward digital health, link to the survey itself or press release announcing it, not a news article about the survey.

One final, critical caveat: When you’re using voice-to-text, these proofreading tips are even more relevant. Proofreading voice-driven texts may reduce the hilarity of your mistaken, garbled messages, but it can save your recipients a lot of confusion.

At Adept Word Management, we are very familiar with the issues unsupervised ai can cause. If you could use a laugh today, read our recent post:

We all love a good Italian meal, but nothing kills the appetite quite like a grammar gaffe on the menu. Just ask Jodi Amendola, who recently spotted a sign advertising “home maid” sauce—delicious in theory, but questionable in execution. In her Forbes article, she dishes out a timely reminder: proofreading matters.

When you sit down for a fun dinner out at a restaurant with family and friends, the importance of proofreading is rarely top of mind.

Yet that’s where I found myself recently during a visit to a little Italian restaurant while vacationing with my family in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. While the food was great and the chef’s attention to detail was excellent, I can’t say the same for the restaurant’s signage.

A sign on the wall advertised fresh pasta with “home maid” sauce, which sounded right, but of course, wasn’t correct. Of course, the sign should have said the restaurant offers “homemade” sauce.

While the sign gave me a slight chuckle and certainly didn’t detract from my overall dining experience, it nonetheless reminded me of an important lesson we’ve all known since elementary school, yet repeatedly seem to forget: Proofread your work.

It’s not a profound lesson, but it is an important one.

We’ve all heard that “content is king,” but how you present that content matters, too. Misspellings and grammatical mistakes undermine the authority of whatever message you’re trying to get across and are indicative of hurried, shoddy work.

Like it or not: When you put something out into the world, you are being judged.

Or, as the Writing Center at the University of North Carolina states: “When you’ve worked hard to develop and present your ideas, you don’t want careless errors distracting your reader from what you have to say. It’s worth paying attention to the details that help you to make a good impression.”

Why proofread? Isn’t that what spell check is for? Consider this fictional sentence that could have possibly been said by someone, somewhere at some point in time while eating at an Italian restaurant: “Over there, they’re eating their lasagna.”

As someone familiar with the English language with writing experience, I (and, most likely, you) know that “there,” “they’re” and “their” are all spelled correctly in the previous sentence.

But guess what doesn’t know? Your spell checker (at least not always).

Although it’s become a bit of a cliché, that’s why a “human in the loop” is still essential when it comes to most applications of AI. An experienced, competent human proofreader knows to look out for these sorts of little mistakes that can sometimes trip up even veteran writers. Here are a few other tips for proofreading success.

• Start at the end, and read in reverse order: Often when proofreading, we’re looking for the type of misspellings or homonyms that AI will not catch for us, such as “made” versus “maid.” By starting with the last word of the content and then reading each word prior to it, you can divorce your thoughts from the context and meaning of the article and focus exclusively on the word you’re reading at the moment.

• Take a break: Writing and editing sometimes require different approaches and mindsets, so never start proofreading as soon as you finish writing a first draft. Take a little time to get away from the content before you come back for editing, even if it’s only 30 minutes.

• Set aside the distractions: Pick a time of day and a place where you’ll be able to devote your full attention to the text. Hopefully, it is not in front of the TV or on the treadmill. For many of us, the best time is early in the morning while relaxing with a hot cup of coffee before the inevitable stream of emails and texts starts rolling in.

• Ask a friend: It always helps to have an objective viewpoint and a fresh set of eyes. Find a colleague with both.

• Bonus: Cite primary—not secondary—sources: To maintain credibility, it is essential that writers cite the sources of statistics and little-known facts. However, it’s important to cite the original and not secondary sources. In other words, if you’re referencing a survey about executives’ attitudes toward digital health, link to the survey itself or press release announcing it, not a news article about the survey.

One final, critical caveat: When you’re using voice-to-text, these proofreading tips are even more relevant. Proofreading voice-driven texts may reduce the hilarity of your mistaken, garbled messages, but it can save your recipients a lot of confusion.

At Adept Word Management, we are very familiar with the issues unsupervised ai can cause. If you could use a laugh today, read our recent post: